Any river reports

[bigyooper]

I am heading to the river on Sunday, has anyone been out?

I am wondering how far down the fish are?

[upnorth]

Was out today with a friend and we were getting fish above the hwy 23 bridge, and they were some really nice clean fish.

[Northlander]

Nick drop me a e-mail. I may have some info you can use.

[captshorelunch]

Quote:

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Was out today with a friend and we were getting fish above the hwy 23 bridge, and they were some really nice clean fish.

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They're still that high, eh? I would think the low water would push them down to at least Spirit Lake

[Mistermojo]

Hey guys - heading to the river tomorrow. What's hot and where? The father-in-law was out today and got skunked so I hope not to have a repeat. We are thinking of trying by Barker's tomorrow, but have never fished there.... I can use all the help I can get!

Thanks,

Mojo

[Northlander]

Troll the channel edges with bouncers,spinners and crawlers. You should have no problem catching a bunch of 15-17" eyes. Also try a spin n glow with a leech. After you find a few in a area dont be afraid to drift a jig n minnow or jig n leech over them.

If this fog ever leaves thats where Ill be.

[SKIPPERS KID]

Steve the fog will be with you for some time . This weather has to go soon .

[Mistermojo]

Saturday we tried above the 23 bridge since it was pretty windy we didn't want to get blown all over. The water was really shallow in a couple of spots, we stayed far left all the way up and made it, although the 9.9 kicker had a tough time with the current. No fish to speak of, and nobody near us caught anything either.

Sunday we took Northlander's advice and fished the edge of the channel near barker's and did decent. We ended up boating 9 with a couple more shoulda's. A few were under 15" but we kept 4 fish 16-20. Once the wind came up a little bit the bite was better, although we stayed closer in the same spot where we were catching fish so that may have been it too... Either way we didn't get skunked.

Thanks Northlander!

[nblasin]

We were out in the harbor last night from about 5:30-7:30. Fish seemed to be going pretty good. 3 of us caught 8 eyes and missed numerous others. Biggest was 19.5 and most were 16-18". All were C and R. The key for us seemed to be moving very slow!

[Northlander]

Your welcome mrmojo. It sure seems to have turned into a afternoon bite in the bay. I think it may be a water temp thing.

Nothing but a few small ones this AM in there.

[SKIPPERS KID]

Steve they are in a foot of water and in the weed's .

[Northlander]

No there not.

There in 12-19' of water chasing a new perch hatch by weeds.

The weeds are always good this time of year.

[Quickstrike]

The Bass bite is also starting to really pick up further up river. Time to bust out the fly rod and some poppers!

[Northlander]

Who cares about those weed carp anyways.

Kent you going to canoe it again? Another 2-3 weeks and they will really be goin up there.

[Quickstrike]

yeah, either canoe, or the pontoon kickboat. fly guys are doing really well up there already.

[Minnesota Fisher]

Good to hear about the bass, I was really starting to wonder. If you know of any places for largies on the river, I'd be happy to let you email them to me

[Northlander]

Only place I ever caught largemouth was in the back Wi. Bays while crappie fishing.

[scifisher]

Went out fishing today and it was really windy. It took a lot of effort to control the boat. Between the three of us, we caught 0. Yes, I know, not good. Here's what we did. We launched out of boyscout and moved the "walleye alley" where we drifted with the current with jigs and live bait. When nothing bit there, we ran up river to the 23 bridge and tried jigs and minnows and casting some lures...all to no avail.

Just a warning to people. The river is REALLY shallow up there. I have a 16 foot jon boat and we had to hop out and bounce it over a couple of riffles. I would suggest that people do NOT bring their big rigs up there.

Try a canoe.

Anyway, when we had had enough, we ran down river to try the channel below the Oliver bridge. The drifted in and out from 15 to 30 feet of water with bait and jigs and with bottom bouncers.

Lastly, we ended up drifting on the channel edges through spirit lake, trying to pick up what we could. We tried bottom bouncers and crankbaits (once we got into the marked channel on the WI side).

Again, nothing.

Our only solace is that we saw alot of other boats moving around looking for fish. It didn't look like anyone was catching anything out there.

[SKIPPERS KID]

Thanks for the post we need that info here. Again thanks we will be out in the am good fishing to all .

[captshorelunch]

Quote:

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Went out fishing today and it was really windy. It took a lot of effort to control the boat. Between the three of us, we caught 0. Yes, I know, not good. Here's what we did. We launched out of boyscout and moved the "walleye alley" where we drifted with the current with jigs and live bait. When nothing bit there, we ran up river to the 23 bridge and tried jigs and minnows and casting some lures...all to no avail.

Just a warning to people. The river is REALLY shallow up there. I have a 16 foot jon boat and we had to hop out and bounce it over a couple of riffles. I would suggest that people do NOT bring their big rigs up there.

Try a canoe.

Anyway, when we had had enough, we ran down river to try the channel below the Oliver bridge. The drifted in and out from 15 to 30 feet of water with bait and jigs and with bottom bouncers.

Lastly, we ended up drifting on the channel edges through spirit lake, trying to pick up what we could. We tried bottom bouncers and crankbaits (once we got into the marked channel on the WI side).

Again, nothing.

Our only solace is that we saw alot of other boats moving around looking for fish. It didn't look like anyone was catching anything out there.

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I have not done well on the river this year or last. Maybe the fish are being wiped out?

[vermilionwally]

I was out yesterday fishing off the boy scout landing and was suprised that there werent many people fishing off there like normal. I found out why shortly. I caught one little fish and i couldnt figure out what it was, i think it was a smelt or something it was about 5 inches long and had a little rainbow color to it. Yes im sure it wasnt a ruffe or a goby . It didnt have the sharp dorsal fin it kinda had a fin like a trout. Anyone know what it couldve been? I shouldve taken a picture of it. I caught it on a leech. I only saw one boat come in with a fish and it looked to be about a 20 inch walleye.

[biff]

Yeah, this year has been slow...yes, fish are being caught but not the fantastic numbers as in years before. Last year I blamed it on the high water...this year, low water? I think maybe just some poor year classes as the usual hordes of 14-16 inchers seems to be absent. I have seen as many 20 inchers this year as 14 inchers.

As for the guy fishing of boyscout...yeah, the catching off there has been more like august than early june.

[pastfan]

Went above 23 today on foot with the fly rod and waders to go after bass and ended up hooking into a 5 lb cat on a streamer. I've never caught a cat on the fly rod before- pretty darn fun! I talked to a couple of guys up there that also caught cats today in the same area on shad raps. Kinda odd.

[Northlander]

One hint would be that most of the bites are coming in the harbors and bays and the afternoons seam to be better than mornings lately. Work the sharp channel edges in the harbors either with spinners or troll some small sticks/cranks in orange/gold or blues or greens.

Its not as easy as it was 3 years ago but last years high, fast and dirty water took its toll on some parts of the river and the low/warm water this year seemed to have gotten a lot of fish out into the lake quicker this year.

[verb0026]

Hey everyone I am new when it comes to fishing around the Duluth area, and I am wanting to experience the St. Louis River/Bay for some walleye fishing. I have a 16 foot boat with a 25 horse motor and am wondering where a good place to launch my boat is. I looked at the DNR map of boat launches but couldn't read it clear enough. Any help, and or directions would be awesome.

[Northlander]

Rices landing under the highbridge on Garfiel Ave. is your best bet. Its free too. Its close to some good trolling areas now. The bay between Barkers and the airport has been good in the afternoons for nice eating sized eyes. Its not hot and heavy but you should be able to pop your 2 eyes trolling spinners. Best time for me lately has been after 5pm.

Hammered Copper hatchet blades and crawlers.

Good luck.

[captshorelunch]

What has been going on with the river this year and last? before that it was nothing to go and get your 2 walleyes. My youngest son did manage a small sturgeon but that's it. Looks like I am sticking to the bay. Make a quick run out to the big lake

[scifisher]

Alright, I went out fishing again yesterday and I had to get my report up before it got to outdated.

I launched my boat out of the sandlot on Kilner bay and my plan was to head for Pokegama for some sunfish. I heard a guy talking that they sometimes get some back there and that it was kind of a neat place to go...lots of wildlife and very secluded. So I brought my brother and my daughter and off we went.

First off, the water is really low. It's really tough going with long stretches of water in the 3-4 foot range, this coupled with lots of weeds really slows you down. If you have a bigger boat, you probably want to stick to the channel. Even I got hung up and I have a jon boat with a 15 horse kicker.

We poled our way into Pokegama and dunked some worms, nothing.

Next we motored up to the channel behind Cloughs island. We tried the channel edges where the weeds met the deeper water and switched bait from worms to leeches. Still nothing. Although, I think I'm going to go back and try that area for bass. If I covered a little more water with something more bassy, it might produce.

Lastly, we tried some of the back bays around Cloughs Island, but the water was really shallow and muddy and we didn't catch anything.

It's tough when you have a five year old along and you don't get anything. At least we had some minnows for her to play with. We also ended up getting out on Cloughs Island and happened across a bunch of ruined foundations. That was kind of fun for her because we got to make up stories about what they used to be.

Does anyone know the real story behind that stuff? And if anyone can turn me on to some panfish in the St. Louis, speak up?

I don't know what to do about this shallow water. It makes the bay look really deceptive. I've got a map of the bay that shows all of the depths and alot of the stuff that we were finding just isn't on there. Another thing we found is that our map was consistently two feet off with the depth. We had to run slow and use the depth finder quite a bit in order to get an accurate read.

Anyway, I'm going to try Kimball's bay in a day or two. There's a huge white boat parked on a point over there so I think I'm going to be able to get my rig back there without too much trouble.

[Northlander]

Be careful there are sandbars all over the entrances to those bays. Try little Kimbals for gils if ya get in there. The bays are down quite a bit so take it slow.

If you want fun with Rockbass e-mail me and Ill put ya on a spot that I almost always get rockies on and you have a small chance at other fun species as well.

[scifisher]

Thanks Northlander. I'm probably going to hit Kimballs this afternoon. My boat has a very shallow draft with the motor up. I'll bring the oars to get over the sandbars.