Metro Minnesota Tiger Muskie Report

As a result of most of my normal pure strain muskie haunts being very, very slow lately; I decided to opt for chasing some Tigers instead. Switching over to these beautifully marked fish has proven quite rewarding during the past week. Saturday my friend Takashi and I fished the annual Metro Muskie Tournament and chose to chase Tigers as they were offering a $500 prize this year for the largest Tiger. Our plan payed off very nicely when this meaty 40″ fish clobbered an SS Shad as soon as it hit the water. Lucky random cast on a fish lookin’ for a meal. Overall the fishing was very slow for us and everyone else as well. This year only 12 fish over 40″ were registered out of over 500 anglers. Oh well, that’s this madness called muskie fishin’ for ya.

Sundays plan was to hit another local Tiger Lake early with IDO member Stingler in his boat. Our early plans ended up being thwarted by downed powerlines that landed on his boat. Luckily for him all is well! After charging my batteries for a few hours we opted to go carp fishing as it was getting towards mid-day with high blue skies. We chummed one of our carp spots and decided to go throw a few muskie lures for an hour or so as we waited for the carp to move in. Within 10 minutes on the water we had three follows and never ended up getting back to carpin’. Who woulda thunk it….the muskies were goin’ nuts in the middle of a hot, clear blue skies day. We fished for about three hours and ended up with 12 agressive follows, 3 hooked and missed fish, and this new PB Tiger for me.

Now, on to the tactics involved…We have been pretty much fishing very shallow running crankbaits such as SS Shads and Cranes over and around off shore structure. Also an occasional follow on Phantoms has made it’s way to the boat to only disappear from whence they came. The depths producing the best seem to be about 8-15 feet, these fish are charging up from the deep to sometimes slam our baits (only when the muskie gods choose to smile upon us every now and then). The odd thing is the typical shoreline/weedline bite has been non-existent thus far this year for us. Hopefully that will change soon with the steady weather forcasted for the next week or so. We’ll See!

Over the last week the bite has been pretty consistent, as we’ve been able to boat at least one fish each time out. For all you Skllungers in an early season slump it might be worth giving one of your local, underpressured Tiger lakes a shot. These fish are fat, beautiful, and very fun to catch! Here’s a photo of my new best friend Lemmy the Ski. Take a look at his funky chin growth. Pretty cool carbuncle there buddy.. Maybe you should join an English metal band!