Who's Hit the Lake?

[Drake]

Was anyone able to spend some time on the lakes during the long weekend? Blackduck Lake the past few days has been more productive in the daytime for the walleyes verses the evening bite that it was earlier last week. Many of the walleyes being caught are the smaller ones, but we had a couple of anglers who hit the duck a couple of days ago and they caught and released not only the small ones, but also kept their limits of good size eaters. Leeches and minnows are still working, but work the bars because you'll find some decent ones in a little shallower depths.

The other lakes in the area are giving mixed results after some rain and wind stirring things up the past few days. Benjamin Lake has produced some decent rainbow trout (with the largest weighing in a little over 2 pounds), with fishing at Benjamin doing better in the deeper water for those on the boats verses the anglers fishing from the dock and shoreline. Gilstad produced good numbers of the panfish (working the weeds along the shoreline), but with Gilstad the numbers are there but the size is small (at least of what we caught), but it's a great lake for the young anglers to get action and learn their fishing skills. On Gilstad you can really tell the increase in the water level, with the water being almost even with the dock. The weather seems to have affected the walleye fishing in the area; many of our anglers hitting some of the smaller lakes in the area said that they have hit their favorite spots and they did do well, but they really had to work at it because things were really stirred up.

Upper Red Lake has been pretty choppy the past couple of days, which has slowed down the crappie bite but definitely hasn't affected the walleye bite. We were out there yesterday with some of our guests (going out of the public landing) and only a few crappies were caught, but we did have one couple who accessed out of the southshore that said that they were able to find a spot where it wasn't as windy and choppy and then were able to do pretty well. We're looking forward to a calm day up there!

[fivebucks]

I logged about about 12 hours on Island Lake over the long weekend and SLOW was the key word. I picked up a couple small northerns, couple smallies, couple perch, but no walleyes. I tried from 8' - 25' but it didn't seem to matter. It was just a tough bite.

[woodman]

Fished Big lake and did really well. My boss took me out to try and teach me how to fish. That did not happen. I had the first fish before he had his rod out of his storage locker. We kept 9 good eaters and released aprox. 30 others. Took the wife out in the afternoon and only caught perch. This lake is very clear, therefore, the eye bite is early early morning or at dark and into the night. The lake is full of Muskies so it will be a zoo this weekend. We did have one surfacing around us most of the day and was kinda cool to watch.

Have a good one and let's hope the weather stays steady!

[Drake]

Fishing here in the Blackduck area has been going pretty well over the weekend. Upper Red Lake has produced some good numbers of crappies, with a better crappie bite in the morning hours (before 10) and in the late evening hours. The walleye and sheephead have given folks plenty of action throughout the day. The smaller lakes in the area have also kicked in with nice numbers of sunnies and gills (in the 6"-9" range being kept) being caught in the shallows for those working the weedbeds, with a bite yesterday kicking in in the early evening hours (starting around 5pm), but slower during the early afternoon. Rain came through late yesterday afternoon, but that didn't stop the fish or the anglers. Today we've rain off and on, but tomorrow is looking to be a pretty nice one to hit the open water!