Grindstone Lake Fishing Reports

[luap]

Thanks for the report!

[KG243]

That makes me very excited for trout opener!!

[KG243]

Who's going to be on the lake for the opener?

[reinhard1]

so far my plans are for the weekend or monday for sure. i prefer weekdays for the opener gets pretty busy at times. but i will be on the lake a lot from opener till closing. good luck.

[Redlantern]

I might give it a shot. Only been on it once before and that was on softwater.

[KG243]

I am thinking I wont be able to hit it until 20th or 21st. College sucks!

[reinhard1]

there are a lot of reasons one cant make it fishing as often as one likes and your reason is a good one that will be important in your future. the 29th or 30th look good for the getogether. you said you had to work on sat. lets see who votes for saturday or sunday. i will be there beginning next week and of course on the 29th or 30th for sure as well. good luck.

[MinnesotaMike]

Reinhard1,

What time are you going to Grindstone on Sat the 15th?

I have never fished for trout through the ice but want to give it a try.

I have a kitchen pass so I will be up there Sat.

Mike

[reinhard1]

i'm not sure i'll be up sat. but i'm looking at monday or tues for sure. we got grandkids this weekend. my email is [email protected] i can give you my number and give you some ideas. hard to give specific locations in a post. not that i would not post them but at a certain time when i type my lines start to drop out of site, so its probably telling me i have used enough room. grindstone can be challenging, that's why i like the lake. i will be there quite a few times this trout season. give me a call if you like. good luck.

[MuntzAngling]

Anyone drill or drive across the middle yet? It would be nice not to have to load up the ATV for the trip.

16-18" on the sides but maybe not as much in the middle? Deep water worries me a bit.

See you all for opener out there. I'll be after some lakers! Hopefully I'm luckier this year. Last year I guided my friend to 3 lakers and I got none!

-Minner

[reinhard1]

grindstone is not your average lake. it is deep and has springs near shore. one poster has said there was 16 inches on the lake. that may be the case but like you said that is not uniform accross the lake. i drive the wheeler most of the time depending on the snow depth. also whatch out for the spear holes by the red barn, the guys are pretty good about marking them with brush. good luck.

[irishwalleye]

reinhard --

How do you fish for smelt?

and see ya on the lake Saturday, not too early tho.

[reinhard1]

i guess we got the grandkids this weekend so i wont make it sat or sunday. i love it when they come. it's best to be out in deeper water. i usualy start at 70 ft. and check for them suspended. as a rule they usualy are 25ft down, but it does vary a little. the flasher will show a red wide mark much like seeing crappies suspended. my favorite way is to use a pimple and a minnow head. drop it down to the smelt and jig it a couple of times and stop. usualy on the stop you will notice a tap and then set the hook. also you can use eurolarva[a couple on the hook of a pimple or small jigging spoon] also with a bobber and crappie minnow set at the smelt line. but i like the small pimple and minnow head the best. you may catch a laker or a crappie while your doing this. for smelt down size you pimple and jigging spoon. i use no larger than 6lb. test. i hope this helps you. good luck.

[mille lacs muskie bum]

I'll be out there for sure. All my buddies ditched out on me so i'll just be draggin my one man along. should be fun tho! god i love that first strike of the morning out there!!!

[walleyecheeks]

Never caught a laker through the ice in Grindstone or any other lake matter of fact. Is there any kind of structure I should look for? Depth? Bait? Lures? Time of day? Any help would be appreciated.

[reinhard1]

there are some good threads specificly for lakers here on hso, especialy on the northshore/ely forums. get a good contour map of grindstone. there is realy no need to fish deeper than 60 feet this time of year. one area i key on is suspended lakers in the smelt line. find the smelt and the lakers are with them. white tube jigs or jigging spoon with a minnow head will do when they are active. there are humps surrounded by deep water, also a good choice. we have caught them as shallow as 20ft. and suspended in deep water, say 80 feet suspended at 30ft. when things are slow i put a shiner off the bottom on a hump i fish with a tip up and fish for rainbows just under the ice. good luck.

[Jari Razskazoff]

T-Minus two days. I'll be out there fo'sho! Me, Minner, and the guy with the golden rod, the b-rad (who by chance is not a member of HSO, or Fishingminnesota.com)... he's the type of guy who's been quoted as saying "What the !@#$ is the internet?!"

See ya there, swing on thru for some surebite.

[reinhard1]

sounds like a good group and i hope you do well. i will be up next week for i have the grandkids this weekend. hope you guys can make it up on the 29th for a little get together also. my brother also does not own a computer. good luck.

[MuntzAngling]

Walleye Cheeks, get some 1/2 or 3/4 oz glow jigs with stingers and tip with a fathead or small sucker and fish near bottom and reel up to suspended fish. I usually go with a pimple & minnow head as said above to fish suspended to near the top.

Electronics will help a lot! I target 40-90 FOW usually but have caught lakers in 10FOW and had bites as deep as 95FOW there.

Hope you find 'em!

[KG243]

Anyone have any luck today? How was the ice?

[sheephead2]

Caught 1 small laker and 1 brown trout

about 15 inches of ice in front of Red Barn 50 feet of water

some were driving trucks around not me I use the sled.

[Jari Razskazoff]

We were out today, drove all over deep water in my 2door Exploder, found the ice to be about 16 inches(15" solid), amongst 4 of us, we got 5 trout, and 5 smelt. Sitting on a hump of about 65ft of water. We'll be back tomorrow. Trout tastes good. Tomorrow we're going to try fishing 40-50ft or less.

[trappingaddiction]

How big were the trout and the smelt? What time of day were you fishing? I am thinking of heading up there this winter to try to get my first trout through the ice.

[slipperybob]

14" of solid ice. fresh light powder of about 4 inches. At the end of the day the lake looke marred with tracks and ice holes. LOL's

I caught 1 rainbow of about 12 inches and I crappie of 9 inches by luck since I concentrated on Smelt fishing instead. People created a traffic lane in the exact spot I wanted to fish so I had to go elsewhere. In the end I caught about 90 Smelts of only 6-9 inches. Well only two measured 9 inches the rest were less than 8 inches. That's actually bad since I remember that I normally catch most of them between 10-12 inches. Maybe they're running smaller this year or I didn't run into the mother school.

[KG243]

Thanks guys for the reports.

[RIVERCHASER]

didnt know you can even catch smelt through the ice- dont know how to approach catching smelt?

what do you guys use? what depths?

[Jari Razskazoff]

Catching smelt is fun, basically they run in schools, and can be found higher in the water column. I've found them in everywhere from 30ft of water, to higher up in 80 ft of water... they nibble, and toy with your lure... i just use my crappie, and walleye gear for smelt (actually, thats what i use for lakers in Grindstone too, I just hope I never get one of the big guy's on my crappie gear, well I do, but, you know.), but they are fun, caus' they will toy with your lure, and you sometimes gotta set it just right, and at the right time... but when you find one, you'll likely find 90. As for time of day, it seems that all the fish go to sleep at dark in the 3 years I've been fishing this lake... but maybe I'm wrong.

The lakers we were catching were small, I'd say the biggest we got was about a foot long, but plenty to eat, I guess.

[reinhard1]

were you at the smelt hole on the north east side in the bay? smelt are fun and i too generaly catch the larger ones. i usualy use a small jigging spoon and a minnow head. crappies tend to be with the smelt line as well as some lakers. thanks for the report. good luck.

[reinhard1]

sounds like you didn't find the humps but had some luck. did you see any suspended fish? good luck.

[reinhard1]

of the many years i fished grindstone i have never fished it after dark. i want to try it in the deeper areas, like the north east bay [smelt hole]. since it's a clear lake i wonder if the crappies would be more active. i do catch crappies along with the smelt during the day but not the slabs that are in there. good luck.