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Bait to use


Flash

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Hey all,

Heading to Mille Lacs tomorrow.  What has been the hot bait?  Shiners, fatheads???

Flash

"Set the Hook"

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  • Official Fishing Report Team - MN

Bring a scoop of each and try a variety the fish will tell you what they are preferring. 

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Smaller suckers and shiners.  One hint is that you may want to get your bait prior to getting close to the lake.  A lot of the area bait shops having a hard time getting the suckers and shiners in the past weeks.

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suckers, suckers, suckers. This was the only bait that worked for us last weekend and when the fish hit the rattle reels line spooled fast.

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Call ahead for shiners.  I’ve heard there aren’t any left in the state.  At Mille Lacs 2 weeks ago I asked for some and the guy looked at me like I was stupid.

Of course I blame that on the question... ;)

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There was a couple mixed in the bucket. They were big shiners 5 to 6 inch range. The shiners would be down for 6 hours or so each time and we never waited that long for a sucker to be taken. Just our experience. If a guy could have both I say try and see.

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I found a great bait selection at the Baxter Fleet Farm today.  3 sizes of suckers, multiple sizes of golden shiners, and of course fat heads and crappies.

The first bait shop I tried only had fat heads and crappies.

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Shiners and suckers not needed for us this weekend.  The better pike were sucking down my wife’s crappie minnows on a demon in 20 feet.

 

B342B53C-1382-46B0-9675-D49099360BE8.jpeg

 

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You two are sure putting the smack down on some super sized Pike! Those walleye text you just sent were nice too. Your killing me man; I'm off todo more snowblowing. Though to take it when the wife's schoolin' ya', been there lots of times with Patty. Join my club, LOL!

  • Yayyyy 1
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  • Your Responses - Share & Have Fun :)

    • leech~~
      Nope not me.  May want to go nextdoor and ask around?  
    • smurfy
      Looks to me like Leech brought his chair home!!😅😆
    • Brianf.
      I'm not there, so I can't tell exactly what's going on but it looks like a large area of open water developed in the last day with all of the heavy snow on the east side of wake em up Narrows. These two photos are from my Ring Camera facing north towards Niles Point.  You can see what happened with all of snow that fell in the last three days, though the open water could have been wind driven. Hard to say. .  
    • SkunkedAgain
      Black Bay had great ice before but a few spots near rockpiles where there were spots of open water. It looks like the weight of the snow has created a little lake in the middle of the bay.  
    • LakeofthewoodsMN
      On the south end...   Thanks to some cold spring weather, ice fishing continues strong for those still ice fishing.  The bite remains very good.  Most resorts have pulled their fish houses off for the year, however, some still have fish houses out and others are allowing ATV and side by sides.  Check social media or call ahead to your favorite resort for specifics. Reports this week for walleyes and saugers remain excellent.   A nice mix of jumbo perch, pike, eelpout, and an occasional crappie, tullibee or sturgeon being reported by anglers. Jigging one line and using a live minnow on the second line is the way to go.  Green, glow red, pink and gold were good colors this week.     Monster pike are on a tear!  Good number of pike, some reaching over 45 inches long, being caught using tip ups with live suckers or dead bait such as smelt and herring in 8 - 14' of water.   As always, work through a resort or outfitter for ice road conditions.  Safety first always. Fish houses are allowed on the ice through March 31st, the walleye / sauger season goes through April 14th and the pike season never ends. On the Rainy River...  The river is opened up along the Nelson Park boat ramp in Birchdale, the Frontier boat ramp and Vidas boat ramp.  This past week, much of the open water skimmed over with the single digit overnight temps.   Areas of the river have popped open again and with temps getting warmer, things are shaping up for the last stretch through the rest of the spring season, which continues through April 14th.   Very good numbers of walleyes are in the river.  Reports this week, even with fewer anglers, have been good.  When temps warm up and the sun shines, things will fire up again.   Jigs with brightly colored plastics or jigs with a frozen emerald shiner have been the desired bait on the river.  Don't overlook slow trolling crankbaits upstream as well.   Good reports of sturgeon being caught on the river as well.  Sturgeon put the feed bag on in the spring.  The bite has been very good.  Most are using a sturgeon rig with a circle hook loaded with crawlers or crawlers / frozen emerald shiners. Up at the NW Angle...  Ice fishing is winding down up at the Angle.  Walleyes, saugers, and a number of various species in the mix again this week.  The bite is still very good with good numbers of fish.  The one two punch of jigging one line and deadsticking the second line is working well.   Check with Angle resorts on transport options from Young's Bay.  Call ahead for ice road guidelines.  
    • CigarGuy
      With the drifting, kind of hard to tell for sure, but I'm guessing about a foot and still lightly snowing. Cook end!
    • PSU
      How much snow did you get on Vermilion? 
    • Mike89
      lake here refroze too...  started opening again yesterday with the wet snow and wind...  very little ice left today...
    • Hookmaster
      A friend who has a cabin between Alex and Fergus said the lake he's on refroze. He texted me a pic from March 12th when it was open and one from 23rd when it wasn't. 🤯
    • SkunkedAgain
      I don't think that there has been any ice melt in the past few weeks on Vermilion. Things looked like a record and then Mother Nature swept in again.   I'll give my revised guess of April 21st
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