Rainy Lake Fishing Reports by Rainydaze Guide Service

[Chris Granrud]

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Boy.....It's been a long time for me here!! Hope to only be able to add to the great information shared here on Hot Spot Outdoors. Wealth of information for the angler. A brief introduction for those who don't know me. My add to the "Ice Team" has brought me back to my roots. Big thanks to Matt Johnson who is a personal friend for his involvement in bringing to the blue team.

My name is Chris Granrud. I am the owner operator of Rainydaze Guide Service. We've been guiding customers full time for the past 7 years here on Rainy Lake and the Rainy River. We guide summer and winter running an average of 175 trips a year between summer and winter.

I work hand in hand with 5-6 other guides here on Rainy Lake as well who are personal friends.

I am an occassional outdoor writer contributing articles to the Outdoor news, Minnesota Deer hunters Assoc. and various sponsor pieces.

Kelly and I live on the shores of Rainy lake and love sharing our passion for fishing with others.

While in the past I've filmed most of our television shows with In Depth Outdoors we look to do our filming in the coming year with Jason Mitchell Outdoors Television, Midwest outdoors and edit our short clips on our Youtube channel.

I look forward to sharing information with you all!!

Yesterday's "Hero Shots". Congratulations to Dean and Ernie for both landing and effectively releasing personal best fish. Dean's 42.5 inch Pike and Ernie's 26 inch Walleye gave two grown men quite a thrill.

We remain shallow anywhere from 2-15 feet of water. Fish are angry!! Customers are Happy!!

More detailed reports to follow. Most importantly..........Happy Fathers day everone!!

[clKiekhafer]

Hi Chris,

Looking good and waiting to hit the lake again this year you on July 14th with my two son-in-laws, Jim and Erik.

[Gritz]

Chris: Welcome back - looking forward to your reports.

[harvey lee]

Seems when the fish are in the shallows, it's easy pickin's from my past expierence.

Nice fish.

[Chris Granrud]

Hi Chris,

Looking good and waiting to hit the lake again this year you on July 14th with my two son-in-laws, Jim and Erik.

As always I look forward to our day Chester!! I think we may have a difficult time topping last years action. 1 1/2 hour 4 man limit of 15-16 3/4 inch Walleyes sets the bar high. I like the challenge!!

[Chris Granrud]

Chris: Welcome back - looking forward to your reports.

Thank you Gritz!! One thing I can promise will be a steady stream of big fish pics and hopefully enough info to keep your mind on fishing!!

[Chris Granrud]

Seems when the fish are in the shallows, it's easy pickin's from my past expierence.

Nice fish.

Thank you Harvey. Yeah it seems sometimes those fish want to box themselves up and sometimes they are a bit grumpy. Either way we do our best.

[JacobG]

Any crappie action chris? Everything else seems to be going bonkers figure the crappies might be as well

[Chris Granrud]

Any crappie action chris? Everything else seems to be going bonkers figure the crappies might be as well

Hey Jacob!!

In all honesty we've been running Pike and Walleyes and I haven't spent a day fishing Crappies yet this open water season. Sad I know!! Water temps are right and I presume those slabs are on spawning grounds. I just haven't been fishing them for a first hand report bud!!

SAD....considering my love for the "Donks".

[JacobG]

Thanks chris. I like the honesty! Im fishing crappies tomorrow for one last time this year before I start fishing muskies. Already have had a very solid crappie season and the muskie season is off to a good start as well. Time to switch gears.

[Chris Granrud]

Good Luck!!

[lzika]

Hi Chris. I remember reading in some of your past posts that you had great success with Max Raps for shallow water walleyes. I'm wondering if you have had any success with Max Raps so far this Summer? What's your best color? Thanks.

[Chris Granrud]

Hi Chris. I remember reading in some of your past posts that you had great success with Max Raps for shallow water walleyes. I'm wondering if you have had any success with Max Raps so far this Summer? What's your best color? Thanks.

Good memory!!

Yes we have murdered the Walleyes on the Max Raps!! Of course they are apparently not in production and longer. We've been buying them up!! LOL!!

Purple Ghost and any Perch imitation colors like the Olive.

Great suspending stick bait!! I would have thought our guide service alone would keep them in production. LOL!!

Other options are suspending rogues, Xraps, Floating 13 Raps, Husky Jerks..... All have been fished withs success.

Each bait gives you a slightly different action.

Remember this; Tight wobble in cold water, Loose wobble in warm water as a rule of thumb.

[Chris Granrud]

The big fish continue to increase metabolism rates as the water warms. Yesterday found the fish to be absolutely snapping!! Biggest Walleyes of the day were respectable 26 and 26.5 inch fish. Biggest Pike was a Personal Best for customer Jeff taping an even 37 inches.

Some fish are transitioning scattering fisherman Shallow, Deep and In-Between! It's that "In Between" area where most fisherman truly struggle.

It's that precise structure that can hold tremendous volume and quality!!

We were reading 64-68 degree Surface temps yesterday.

Tight lines team. We received another hard rain, and I wouldn't be shocked if Kettle Falls opened up the gates again increasing our rate of flow.

Tight Lines Team!!

[Chris Granrud]

Closing Bell 26.5!!

[clKiekhafer]

Well Chris have to ask what did you have your camera set on to get those pics?

[Barry45]

Nice looking fish!! It kind of looks like that camera may have gotten wet one time too many though. I will be up there next week and hope to be finding the good spots too.

Regards

[Chris Granrud]

Kelly takes care of most of my picture editing and so forth. My only job is catching fish!! LOL!

[Chris Granrud]

Do you know how to work Cranks?? Yes most of us can troll crankbaits, but how about learning how to trigger fish in a cast and retrieve cadence that simply angers big predator fish?

Been a dominate pattern all year long!!

Sometimes it's as simple as fishing for the fish you want to catch. If your looking to box up 11-14 inch fish......Go get em!! If your looking to box up 16-30 inch fish........I'd suggest you fish FOR them. Early in the season anglers often struggle finding the elite caliber fish.

July comes around and the lake is HOT right?? Nope......The fish are biting all year.

[Chris Granrud]

Devoured a Xrap!! One of 18 over 20 inches yesterday!!

[Chris Granrud]

Fishing has been fantastic, but anglers need to recognize the warming water has fish on the move. These fish will soon be showing up in proximity to early summer patterns. Right now they seem to be stuck in that fuzzy "In Between" area.

Limits of nice 15-16.75 inch fish have been the story of the last days with several bigger Walleyes and a few big pike and smallies on accident.

Water levels seem to be dropping with resort docks looking better by the day.

Tight lines Team!!

[Chris Granrud]

[Chris Granrud]

Congrats to Seth Lockertz on his 37.5 PB!!

[Chris Granrud]

Arizona boys Catch limit of Rainy Lake Walleyes and enjoyed a great shorelunch during the trip!!

[Chris Granrud]

Fishing remains fantastic here on Rainy lake. Mayflies.......Still showing up, but I feel safe to say that they are in the final stages. Fish have migrated to breaklines and reefs in large numbers. Many different presentations will turn fish for anglers. I do like both crawlers and leeches this time of year. If your a jig fisherman, July through October is a fantastic time to "Get your jig on".

Tight lines team!!

[Chris Granrud]

Fishing remains good beyond a couple days of extreme winds. Anglers need to remember when big bodies of water like Rainy Lake get ugly.....STAY ON SHORE. Fish seem to be consistently holding on mid-lake structure yet need some convincing at times to bite.

We are getting a very consistent bite on light jigs and crawlers or leeches.

I prefer a Purple and white color combo!!

Tight lines team!!

[Chris Granrud]

[SledNeck]

Nice Pics.

We (me and the kid) did really good on Monday around 50 fish (and countless misses) that we remembered to write down and we were done fishing by 4:30pm. Crawlers by far worked for us. We had unpopular out of the way reefs all to ourselves all day (im very anti-social on the lake, lol). Didn't mark any fish ontop of the reefs or above 28 feet. Everything we caught was outside edge down to 44 feet. Only kept 5, but when you catch all hawgs, Im not gonna complain.

back to back doubles

[SledNeck]

sorry if I hijacked your thread

[clKiekhafer]

I'm sorry to see that you had to chase the fish so deep in the water column for biters. How many of those do you think will be living several days after you brought them to the surface.

One would be better off to leave those fish along and look for action not so deep like less than 25 FOW.

Nice Pics.

We (me and the kid) did really good on Monday around 50 fish (and countless misses) that we remembered to write down and we were done fishing by 4:30pm. Crawlers by far worked for us. We had unpopular out of the way reefs all to ourselves all day (im very anti-social on the lake, lol). Didn't mark any fish ontop of the reefs or above 28 feet. Everything we caught was outside edge down to 44 feet. Only kept 5, but when you catch all hawgs, Im not gonna complain.

back to back doubles