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pepin bite??


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hey I know no one wants to say, but just wondering if still getting any on the ice down Maiden Rock area or Frontenac?? thanks, save me a drive!!

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From what i've heard, a lot of nice sauger and eyes' are comin out of there. Thats just word of mouth though

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I was out sunday and had pretty good luck 7am-10am in 18 ft of water then moved out to a little deeper 22-25 from 10 till 2 and caught some more.3 of us fishing with a jiging rap's firetiger,chrom blue combo and gold and caught some mighty nice fish wich were all let go biggest being a fat 25' eye so yes there are fish out there just dont be afraid to move around to find them. cool.gif

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I got out from Maiden Rock Saturday very easily - from there all I could manage were 7" saugers (moved 4 times.) Drove all over looking very closely at the h2o at where everyone else was set up: looked like miles and miles of no man's land (about 18-22 fow/mid-river.) What do you guys look for on Pepin? Just set up and wait for 'em to cruise though?

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The maps for the H20 reguarding pool 4 arent very accurate as far as contours for starters. I'm going to get out in my boat this open water season and spend some time scouting for future ice seasons.

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Actually the chip I have (Navionics Premium Hot Maps North '07, I think) has Pepin as one of the lakes with the 1-foot contours. Staight out from Maiden Rock - might have been the structure coming out of Rush Creek? - had an awsome underwater finger dropping from 12' - 20'. This was quite a ways out and nobody had drilled there, so I gave it a shot. The Lowrance was dead on, but I just kept marking those little saugers (camera down.) So I just assumed most of the people doing so well were fishing the deeper bowl...

I did learn that the fish in the lake do not care a bit about set-lines.

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Yeah my lakemaster isnt real accurate out there. Its the only body of water i've found this on.

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how do you get out on pepin . and do people drive out there. never ice fished a river. only fished it in the summer

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Down there last weekend sat and sun fishing slowed from the week earlier but still good size fish no bities on set lines had to play with fish on vex and jig to get them to bite. (Madien Rock) Would have loved to been down there the week before buddies tore into them. Maybe they will pick up again later. Good ice for sure in the area I was but have to be carefull as always on the river.

crappie getter,

You can drive out on the boat access at madien rock or old frontenac SP? You will see the other cars and the trails leeding you out there just stick to the tracks.

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There will be a new chip coming out this year from an entirly new company for Pool 4. Hopefully it will be out by spring.

mw

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Could this be why the chief turkey Joel Nelson swapped his electronics for a combo unit? Chips by Joel there's a concept.

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 Quote:
Chips by Joel there's a concept.

A very scary concept!

I just heard rumors of something new that's coming out.

mw

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brother in law went fishing yesterday, not knowing where to go and anything, seems they went north of Frontanic Mn side and caught nothing, down most of the day, said seen more pple fishing old frontanic area more!! biting better there?? also said no one fishing Maiden rock flats either??

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Well went ice fishing for the first time in three years. First time out was an adventure. Decided to start out Deer Island. First off the 4 wheeler battery was dead so headed into pepin and bought jumper cables. Solved that probelm. Next go onto the ice drilled about three holes looking for the depth I wanted. Then next three holes we hit sand, there went the auger blade. No more drilling. Headed to Redwing and no one in town had blades so we bought a couple files to sharpen the blade. This did not work either. So we headed out from Frontenac state park. A guy there was nice enough to drill us three holes. So after getting on the ice at 8:00 we were now fishing at 1:00 p.m.

My buddy and I started out 5 minutes of fishing and we hit a double. He mostly caught saugers and I was mostly catching walleyes. We must have caught and released 20 or so walleyes and saugers. We really had to jig for them. Sitting lines caught nothing and had no bites. I caught fish on jigging raps, sweedish pimples, air planes jigs, jigging spoons and maybe a couple more i have forgot about. When the fish came through it didn't seem to matter what you had on, they would hit it.

Fished again on Sunday from 10:00 - 4:00 fishing was a lot slower for us. I managed a 20" and 24" sauger along with a couple of 15 inch suagers. Overall I would have said it was a good weekend of fishing. We fished 23 FOW. Most fish were caught within 2 feet of the bottom with a few coming up as high as 4' off the bottom.

Will probably head back down next weekend again but might just go on an adventure to get away from the people.

Good Fishing

Droptine.

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We were there in that same area during the middle of the week and threw everything but the tackle box itself at them and couldn't get a bite!! whats your little trick that worked best if you don't mind me asking? Color? Size of jig? Plain jig or tipped with something? just looking for a nice meal of fresh eyes!! Thinking about heading there again tomorrow and giving it another try. Anything happening out from Deer Island?

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I tired Saturday too, out by Maiden rock flats and caught nothing too!!! you were down in Frontanic then??

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Fished there this morning with 3 other buddies. One fish total between the 4 of us. I talked to others and no-body was catching anything.

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Myself and 2 friends fished there Saturday from 6:00 am to 12:30. We caught 15 Walleye/Sauger 14" to 21" Went out again Sunday afternoon from 3:30 to dark and only caught 2.

I saw several vehicles that drove over the ice heave and then across the point - it might seem like there is a lot of ice (we had 20"+). BEWARE it will deteriorate VERY fast from the current of the river in certain spots. Especially if Excel gets their second nuclear reactor back up and running like I've heard they are going to.

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it sounds like its a real hit and miss out there!! more consistancy would be nice. oh well what else can you do. thats why its called fishing! HAHA

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Anyone ever fish the edge of the open water with a boat? ( Fish within 100yds of the ice edge?)

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Never tried that. I guess i've never had the boat ready this early in the year. No garage to get it ready. \:\(

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I can't say if anything was happening around Deer Island as we never got a line in the water before the blade on the auger went bad.

I can't say we had any secret other than we kept jigging the whole time we were there. If we would set a rod down it would never get hit. We used what I would call medium sized jigs tipped with a minnow head or head and half body. No color seemed to work better than another. It seemed like when a school of fished moved through they would bite on anything we had on.

When we were jigging we would try different methods of jigging. I can't say one worked better than other. The one thing I would say that was very consistent was right after jig movement I would stop the rod and thats when the fish would take it. But the rod was not stopped for long.

Now that my auger is going again I think I will do a little exploring this weekend as I am not a crowd person.

Will be down this weekend. Good luck to all who go out fishing.

Droptine

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thanks for the info Droptine! Thats how we were fishing to, always jigging and stopping presentation. The fishing gods just were not on our side that day I guess. haha. well good luck to ya this weekend and maybe see you out there.

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3 of us tried Frontanec this morning from 8-11, caught nothing but a white bass, tried all over for depths, but nothing, would mark some from time to time, but not knowing what they are since no talkers!! time to get boat ready i think!!!

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