Sunfish in shallow yet?

[fishlips]

I don't make it up to the Perham area as much as I'd like to, but may bring the family this week. Are the sunfish bedding this time of year, or is it too soon?

thanks...

[Paul Rohweller]

You should be able to find some shallow. I caught some crappie fishing in the bullrushes last week. Keys to look for are bullrushes close to shore with submerged timber/brush. Plain hook line sinker and bobber combo was doing the trick, We used minnows but might want to have leeches or worms along as well. Good luck and good fishing!! Paul

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Paul Rohweller
Pine to Prairie Guide Service
218-962-3387
http://fishingminnesota.com/pinetoprairie

[Guest]

I was out on Marion Lake on Wednesday, and they were in about 3-4 feet. Some dandy ones too! 7-8" were common. I think the water has finally warmed up to the point that the fish will be more active now. At least I hope so, planning on some major bass fishing this weekend on Rush Lake.
good luck!

[Deemo]

I live on Rush for the summer and the guys have been pounding the sunfish. Me its not my game but 3 guy's in my campground clean up there! Early morning bite is best they say 20 fish each in 3hr. thats good on this lake. Try it and if you want to go for walleyes e-mail me I'm out there next week wed. thru fri. good luck .

[deacon]

The sunfish bite is on, they are starting to make their spawning beds and fishing should be nothing but excellent the next week to 10days. The fish are typically in 3 to 6 ft of water. Good Luck.

Deacon

[This message has been edited by deacon (edited 06-19-2002).]

[fishlips]

Thanks for the replies, Paul and others.
I was up in the area the weekend of 6/15 and the sunfish were just starting to move shallow. The kids had fun - tons of rock bass!
A couple questions. The sunfish and rockbass seem to be very wormy this year, worse than I have seen. Any reason for this? Also, the kids caught a couple of sunfish that were pretty strange looking, almost looked like a hybrid. They were not rock bass or punkinseeds. Looked like a stocky punkinseed with a larger mouth and slightly less color...any ideas on what type of sunfish this was?

[MuleSkinner]

Fishlips, I was fishing walleyes on Big Birch by Melrose. Caught a 9" sunfish that looked like you described. Was quite uniformly pale in color, barely olive colored, but definitely some kind of sunfish, healthy as a horse. I don't fish sunfish that often, but this guy looked like one of those green sunfish that don't grow very large...

[Guest]

Could possibly have been a Redear Sunfish (aka Shellcracker)? I know they get a little bigger than 'gills or pumpkinseeds. Distinguished by a red ear flap.

[Gissert]

I think these are hybrid sunfish. You sometimes see these showing up in DNR test nettings. They have a slightly elongated bluegill body with a bass type mouth. My brother calls them "bassengills." We catch them fairly often on South Turtle.

[fishlips]

Gissert -
you're exactly right - they are slightly elongated and you can lip 'em like a bass.
I'll assume they are hybrid sunfish...not sure what a redear is as mentioned above, but they do have a little red on the gill flap.

[Gissert]

I am pretty sure that redears are uncommon in Minnesota. They are targeted at the Shanty Gathering in Michigan every winter, however.

[Guest]

The sunfish were on there beds thick around Fergus Falls! They are huge. My wife caught one that would have filled the bottom of a 5 gallon bucket. She caught it with a spinnerbait going for bass. I just left them alone...they are important for reproduction!

We caught crappies on a small lake in about 6-8 feet of water, weeds, with minnows. That was in the middle of the day. Worms and leeches would not catch a crappie. Little beetle spins worked wonders for locating the crappies! Give it a try.

[Biggestfish]

The type of sunfish you guys are talking about is called a "green" sunfish. I too caught some a while back and wondered what kind of sunny they were. At 1st I called it a Sunbass. I had to find out what they were, so I bought one of those fish books...and there it was.
Also has anyone else noticed that there really is not a lake in Otter Tail Co. that does not have a ton of sunnies in it.?

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Just Having Fun!
Love to Fish.