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I have $50 to spend on Musky lures for a 14 year old boy. Last fall he caught a nice musky, from my kayak, and was unable to land it to get a picture. He did get it up to the kayak several times so he got a good look at it and has been bit by the Musky Fishing Bug. I am looking for suggestions for the young man and was hoping to get some help here.

For current Lake Vermilion Fishing Reports - Click Here. I have been thinking it would be nice to have a thread for fishing reports specifically on the West End lake. Everyone knows that the east has more walleyes so it seems most of the reports are geared toward the east end. Not always, but it often seems The fishing report from the east vs west can be very different and I think a separate thread might help people (myself included) out who fish the west end.

So whats your best guess for ice out this spring or summer. http://www.lakevermilion.com/iceout/contest.html

On the last day to target predator species during this Ice Fishing season I went out on Lake Vermilion. I setup for the morning on a break where I usually catch Walleye's with a few Yellow Perch mixed in but on this outing I caught mainly Jumbo Perch! Plus one bonus fish that took me over 4 minutes to get up the hole...

Coming up for our annual "boys" fishing trip June 30 - July 4th. Staying on Frazer Bay fishing for walleyes. Was up a month ago but only managed 4 keepers for a fry, no slot fish. We were there primarily to repair docks for my brother-in-laws folks place so we only fished a couple of times. This time will be primarily fishing. Sounds like the mayfly hatch will be over by the time we arrive, hope to read some fishing reports after this weekend. Our past success is usually slip-bobbering the reefs in 20 FOW with what ever bait is recommended at the time. Thanks! Kevin

If you want a new fishing report just ask right in here. If you have questions or would like to post your report feel free... I'm here to help. I suppose now that it's June I should start my 2012 fishing report thread on here!! I am supposed to maintain a thread on here as part of my duties with HSO so let's get after it! There is a ton of good information on here regarding fishing on the V and cabins, restaurants, resorts, boat rentals and just about anything else you can think of. So if there is any obscure question about anything else like electronics, rigging, willow cats, bullhead fishing or what the current boat house count is in stunz bay... Let's have some fun and post it in here! I probably don't have many good answers but I will attempt to make something up! Tight Lines! Captain Casey

Hey everyone, coming up on friday and wanted to see if anyone has been catching any around the pike bay area what techniques have been working and if there has been any smallies been caught around that area also? Thanks!

The walleye bite has been very good most of August for me. Most of my walleyes have been caught on sand/rock reefs located in the main lake basins. The standard depths has been 16 feet to 23 feet with almost nothing coming from water deeper then 26 feet. A few walleyes have been caught in 8 foot to 14 foot sandy areas also. The average size of the walleyes has increased a little. Most of our keeper sized fish are now running 14" to 16". Not as many bigger slot fish showing up in our daily catch now though. Maybe one or two a day that are in the 18" to 22" range. Lindy rigs baited with 1/2 crawler is still my go to presentation, although the past week I have been using Uncle Josh Pork Crawlers on my rigs with great success! I tried this bait on a whim just to see if it would work and have found it to be just as effective as the real crawler! A real advantage is that the Rusties cannot eat it off of the hook and I can easily catch 6 to 8 walleyes on one piece before I have to either re-bait or re-hook it! It also tends to float a little which makes it even more effective! Good fishing! Cliff

With the earlier ice out this year has that moved up the mayfly hatch. Were coming up this weekend for a week for our annual trip,

My wife and I continue to venture out on a fairly regular basis. We've only missed one day since the last post. The water continues to warm and has been holding pretty steady in the low 70's. We have been continuing our bobber onslaught and we have definitely noticed a pattern of fewer bites and smaller average fish. We have still been catching a good percentage of 20"+ walleyes. I figure the fishing is going good when we can average 20-25% slot fish on an outing. The 15"-17"+ size walleyes that were making up a good percentage of our catch the past couple of weeks have definitely tapered off. We are beginning to revert to a 50% dink average Lots of smallish bass, 12"-14", have been showing up on the rocks with the walleyes. They're fun to catch but kind of a pain when targeting big walleyes. We've been eating more fish of late and the last meal or two involved walleyes that were absolutely stuffed with mayflies We are still finding the walleye in the rocks adjacent to deeper water. 18'-24' has been productive depths for us. We are going to change our method on our next outing. It's time for us to get back to the bottom bouncers. I've got a flat of crawlers that are just screaming to get into the game We will most likely stick with leeches also and add a floater to the terminal tackle in back of the hook and bead. I would think that most reefs with close by deep water will be holding walleyes. We'll keep posting to let you know what we find. Good Fishing, MarkB

Since our guests left, lots of things not related to fishing has been going on. I've been recuperating from a heart procedure and my boat has been recuperating from Aronson's replacing the damaged motor parts. Both of us are much better now, so, my wife and I ventured out and tried our luck this afternoon. I'm not supposed to lift over 10#'s for a few more days and it took me most of the morning to convince her that the anchors only weighed 10#'s. Anyway, it was good to get back out again. We left the house around 4:00 and actually started fishing at 4:30. We were home by 7:15. It seemed like boat traffic was about normal and Daisy Bay water temps were 69.5 degrees when we left. The warmest water we saw on our outing was 71.5 and the water we fished was 69.5 degrees. I drove straight out to a reef we've been fishing on and off for the past couple of weeks. A slight breeze out of the SE made anchoring easy and we were ready to go. My wife uses a casting reel and while she is excellent at trolling, I usually cast her line while bobber fishing to hold down the back lashes. Prior to casting her line, I had to re-tie her because she broke off on a northern just as we quit during our previous outing. I estimated the bobber stop depth, baited a leech, and cast her out. As I was reaching for my pole, her bobber went down and she missed the fish. I re-baited her and cast her back out. Before she took the pole from me, her bobber went down again! She missed again! This scenario went on for ~1/2 hour! I never got my line in the water, she missed maybe 8 fish, lost 2 halfway to the boat, landed 3-16.5", a 21.5", and a 22". It was unreal! I finally got baited and threw into the same area. I got 2 bites in the first hour or so. Obviously something was wrong with my set-up. I lowered my stop another foot and started getting bites. This fishing was as good as it gets. We ended up landing 12 walleyes and one northern. We caught 5 slot fish from 21.5"-24", and 7 others from 14.5"-16.5". The 14.5" walleye was actually 3/4 of a fish. A really BIG northern grabbed the fish after it was hooked and I fought the northern all the way to the boat where we got a real good look at it. When the northern finally let go of the walleye, I reeled what was left on in. The walleye was almost ripped in half and its entrails were pretty much gone! I've had several big muskies grab walleyes on the way to the boat but that's the first big northern I've had do it. I've said that speed is the key to success when trolling. I am now saying that depth is equally important when slip bobber fishing. If someone in your boat seems to be getting all the bites and catching all the fish, reel in your line and theirs and match the depth setting exactly. Last thought, we travelled a fair distance today and saw no evidence of mayflies except for hordes in the water column in places. Good Fishing, MarkB

The Smallmouth action was pretty good for us over the weekend. We spent some time chasing Muskies, however we spent most of our time pounding the Smallies. Docks were the most consistent locations, especially those with reeds near by. To my surprise, most of our fish were caught on spinner baits. We did get a few on sencos and I caught 2 on a Husky jerk. I did my best to find a few that would take a top water, however all I got for my trouble was about a 15" Pike. We did manage to boat 8 or 10 that were in the 18 and 19 inch range but most were 12 to 16 inches. One funny little tid bit is that we saw more Muskies while we were Smallmouth fishing than we did Muskie fishing. "Ace"

I'll be up on the Cook side of the lake in a couple of weeks and really haven't seen any reports on how its been on Wakemup, Norwegian or Wolf, Head of the Lakes bay. I'm hoping its going to be as good as the lower part of the lake. Any reports would be appreciated.

Looking for any action for our wives................. any help appreciated. McKinley Campground is where we will be launching from. Panfish smallies........ dont matter just some action. Have a pontoon and looking to anchor up somewhere. Thank You!

Hello Friends: What a beautiful last few days, only wish the fish were cooperating! Has anyone noticed an improvement in water clarity this year? Perhaps it is my turning 50 and my eyesight is actually improving, but at least from our dock here in Smarts Bay, close to Frazer Bay (our point), it really seems much clearer this year. I can actually see the fish laughing at my slip bobbers as they swim by. Has anyone else noticed an improvement? Andy

It's amazing how fast time flies when people,fish, and good times mix together perfectly My cousin and his Buddy arrived here last Saturday and, this morning, they left for home. I always get a bit edgy this time of the year in preparation for their annual outing: pre-visit fish location, most effective angling method, peak activity periods, etc. Fortunately, everything came together and they enjoyed what they termed as one of their 3 best trips ever! I found during the pre-visit fish location that the walleyes were located on reef tops. During 5 days of fishing, we fished reef tops ranging in depth from 6'-18'. Specifically, we fished one reef at 6', another at 10', one at 15', and a fourth at 18'. Clouds and wind dictated the preference for a particular day. The reefs were strung out from Frasier Bay to the east end of Big Bay. I had two people ask if we fished the Comet Island reefs and the answer is we did not. I always marked fish before we spent much time on the deeper reefs we fished. The shallow reef was pull up, throw out the anchors and fish. The most effective angling method, hands down, was slip bobbers. We caught fish trolling but the guys I was fishing with weren't accustomed to snaggy rocky reefs and the experience with constant snags was frustrating. So, we used slip bobbers and had phenomenal success. We set the hooks for 2' shallower than what the sonar read(except the shallow reef) and caught walleyes, smallmouth, and northern. The only bait we used while slip bobber fishing was leeches. There were spots we fished that were swarmed with mayflies in the water column. Our peak activity period was most definitely evening from ~5:00-9:00. We fished mid morning time slots but found the bigger fish were mostly caught very early morning and the above mentioned evening time. Mildly windy days helped the mid-day bite but nothing compared to 5:00-9:00 in the evening. Me, my cousin and his Buddy fished for 5 days and caught over 100 walleyes during their stay. We caught 23 slot fish from 18"-26"(lots of 21's and 22's) and we ate walleyes twice during their visit. We caught 5 northerns with the biggest at 32". The bass fishing was spectacular and while quantity was no problem, the biggest we could muster was 17.5". It was a blue ribbon trip and great fun was had by all........ Good Fishing, MarkB The attached pictures are not included because of gargantuan fish size but because the parties involved probably appreciated the lake as much as anyone will this season..............

Finally a nice day to get out on the water! My clients and I left the dock at 8:30am and returned at 4:00 pm today We boated a total of 70 walleyes, 3 pike, and 3 perch. My clients kept their limits of 14" to 16-1/2" walleyes. 3 slot walleyes, 21-1/2, 20-1/2, and 18-1/2 inchers. All 3 pike were in the slot. 26" to 32" fish. Only one perch was big enough to keep, a fat 12" fish. All fish came out of 26' to 32' of water. We used leeches,chubs, and pike suckers on lindy rigs for all of the fish. With the weather forecast for the next few days, the bite should get even better! Cliff

My last post was 4 days ago and things are definitely beginning to change(at least for us). Water temperatures today were 61.7 degrees this morning. The days are becoming pleasant with warmer temperatures and lighter winds and I think it's having a very positive effect on the fishing. The big female walleyes are moving to the rocks, whether they be shallow or deeper, and the movement is bringing the higher-end eaters right along with them. It's time to chow down after the spawn, and the really good fishing is just beginning! My wife and I have been jumping around spots the past few days trying areas that offer basically everything: rocks, mud, sand, weeds, shallow water, deep water, and steep breaking contours. We've been catching a way higher percentage of 14"-16" walleyes and lots of slot sized fish. Usually, when we start catching slot fish, dinks are totally non-existent. We have had nice jumbos, gorilla smallmouths, and the occasional northern mixed right in with the walleyes. The fish have been coming from all depths(5'-35') and if I had to pick one specific depth and one specific type of structure, it would be 24' in rocks. There's lots of drawbacks to fishing rocks but that's where the big girls go to bulk back up! The last few days, we've fished a rock pile in the mouth of a shallow bay surrounded by ~22' water. The rocks top out at ~15'. It's a snaggy nasty spot that's been full of walleyes and jumbos. The best walleye we've taken from this spot was 22.5" and there have been lots of really nice jumbos and 14'-16" walleyes. This area has had the warmest water that we've fished lately (63 degrees) and leeches have been the bait of choice. There is emerging weed growth in this area. Yesterday, we tried a spot on the far east end that has a reef that rises to 15' and an adjacent 35' deep water hole. Yesterday it was bright and sunny and the walleyes were between 27' and 35'. No slot fish, but we boated 12 really nice eaters from 14"-17.5". All fish we released. These fish preferred big suckers and shiners. The Y Store has a nice mix of these minnows and I've gotten off the leech band wagon when conditions say otherwise. Today, my wife wanted to try an area that we usually wait until later to try. Good choice! We only boated 3 walleyes below the slot (15",15.5", and 16"). Our slot fish ranged from 19"- 23". We also took some HUGE bass that were down there with the walleyes. 20" was our best. We caught everything but one 15" walleye on big sucker minnows! The big walleyes were engulfing those 4"-5" suckers! Now, let's talk about the snags The snags were so bad, my wife asked me on the way home if I thought it was worth it. I'm sure she got snagged at least 20 times! and I was snagged at least a dozen times. I re-tied a minimum of 6 times! Was it worth it? Heck yes it was worth it and I can't wait to get into a school like that again! Today, we had clouds and a steady breeze and the walleyes we caught were 19'-24'. My dock fishermen are doing better on eater sized fish and they finally got a 22"er the other evening. As I said earlier, fishing is beginning to take off and I look forward to the coming season. Good Fishing, MarkB This is my wife's best walleye for the day. She wanted me to say that, although it may look like it, she DOESN'T have "man hands" The second picture is my best for the day.

Any reports on the bass activity are they getting close to pre-spawn or are they in pre-spawn will be up starting Monday the 1st and hoping they are going nuts. This is our annual fishing trip with my buddies to the cabin. Walleye fishing has been great the last few years but I am a bass fisherman at heart and with the late spring last year was really tough. Even up on Trout caught fish but not like most years. Just wondering if you guys are seeing them around and if so the depth. Cant wait and to catch some big bull Bluegills on Trout as well and have some fun with a good and sometimes loud group.