Cannon Lake & River Fishing Reports

[stizoler]

I have heard many people have gotten into them. From your experience have they been shallow or deep? What type of bottom are they relating too? How far away do you think they can be drawn in from?

[KTapper]

The lake I was fishing for them on I was in 20-25 feet of water somewhat of a flat near shallower water.

[Scott M]

I have seen the 2009 sampling report. How do you think the low water levels may have affected your sampling sampling efforts? Do you think there was any sampling bias caused by this? You have any insights as to where the white bass are hanging out in the winter? It would be fun to get inot a school of these eventhough I realize that they are probably less likely to be catchable during the winter months. I have caught whitebass during the summer and have gotten into some big bites, but the following winter they are nowhere to be found except for the occasional strangler.

Low water levels probably didn't have much of an effect. There was still plenty of water to set the nets in the historic locations, so there should not be any low water level bias. Net catches didn't differ too much from other years. I hear about the lake being slow, but the fish are there. Never see too many boats in the summer (other than opener) or houses in the winter. Maybe folks are quiet?

You could probably find the whities if you spent the time. In my experience, in the winter the fish school up and keep moving. It's hard to be right on top of them. With the morphological shape of the lake, there aren't any great spots to intercept schooling fish. It would be easy to say a narrows spot, or a point, or a steeper breakline, but Cannon doesn't have much structure to it. Could be a sit and pray or hole hop till you find fish situation. Good luck. I've heard of people having success on Tetonka for whities, not as much on Cannon but it's certainly worth a try based on the numbers. Maybe a late ice hotspot?

[Natty Ice]

The 'gills I caught were fairly clean for the most part, did have a few with worms.

[magic_minnow]

where does one access the lake? Can you drive pretty much anywhere?

[Matt C]

There is a public access right off of Hwy 60.

You should be OK to drive anywhere. But be careful around the bridge...remember a river runs through the lake.....

[magic_minnow]

thanks for the info bunt! If i make it out i'll post a report. Hope its not a dead sea!

[luckycrank]

do you have gps?

[magic_minnow]

LC:

yes I do. But I wouldn't dare ask for coordinants

[luckycrank]

But I am offering! [email protected]

[engfish]

Crank, since you're being so generous, let me know where you're fishing this weekend so I can follow you around the lake.

[luckycrank]

mazaska, sheilds and roberds tetonka grey truck with a blue trap!!!

[luckycrank]

as it turns out my gps is on the frits and is just flickering when powered up i don't know whats wrong with it

[engfish]

That's the problem. You ice fish like you bass fish. Vroom! Vroom!

[luckycrank]

its up and working again and I do ice fish like I bass fish

putt together a "milk run" yesterday.!

[KTapper]

Whats a bass? Is that some sort of roughfish?

[lexifer]

Earlier in this thread someone mentioned a survey taken in 2009 on Cannon. The Dnr website does not have the info up yet. Can any one direct me to the results??

[Scott M]

I'd expect results will be up some time between April 20 and June 1. The local DNR office has to age the fish and write the reports for about 20 lakes over the winter. As simple as that may sound, it often involves a lot of tedious work in reading around 3-4 thousand fish scales and digging through files of information to observe trends among species or environmental variables or indicators, responses to management actions, or just a summary of the current state of affairs within the lake, to name a few examples.

[mainbutter]

I fished a spot on the Cannon River a few days ago.

The water was low and slow, and seemed to be fairly warm. I figured it was good conditions for sit-fishing. I used just a 1/4 oz sinker, about 12-18 inches of fluoro leader (to give nice movement in the current), and a sz. 1 baitholder J hook with about half a nightcrawler threaded on.

The carp were in there thick, but I couldn't get much of a reaction out of them at all. In a few hours of fishing, only a single fish took the bait. When I say "thick", I do mean that literally, I ended up snagging two or three of them on the cast.. lol.

I also had a couple tiny walleye ~12 inches take my worm, as well as an extremely nice ~20 inch smallmouth that fought so hard and used the current so well I thought it was a carp for the first two minutes or so. What a day to forget the camera. The funny thing is I've never caught any fish out of that spot except carp before, and I wonder if this very early spring warm weather + dry conditions are doing weird things to the fish.

I'm hoping the carp turn on soon, if they were biting well I could easily have had a 20+ fish day.

[MrCrappie]

I'm a little scared of the river. I remember having to save my younger brother from drowning on the Cannon. I was 13 at the time and he was 7. I wasn't a strong swimmer but my natural inclination/instinct to protect my brother saved his life! It wasn't smart now that I look back at it, because my father could've lost two sons.

[rlhs76]

I'll hopefully be fishing this weekend in the Faribault area. Don't have a boat this year. Any suggestions on where I should fish?

[JBMasterAngler]

The dams on the cannon river are pretty popular, mostly for silvers, pannies, and bullheads. There's also lot's of shoreline on cannon lake that can produce crappies sometimes.

[Rippinlip]

King Mill Dam, Cannon Lake shoreline by the bridge that goes to Bogsey Wells lake, almost anywhere on the Cannon River that you can get to.

Northfield between 2nd and 4th street bridges.

Just to metion a few.

[Matt C]

Try the bridge on Wells/Cannon Lake. It will be a zoo at times, but well worth it..

[dalden27]

What can a guy snag into from the bridge on Wells/Cannon Lake? whites?

[Rick]

Almost anything. Some by the bridge but don't be afraid to head down the shoreline.

Nice sunnies, crappies on rare occasions, eyes especially at night, a pike here and there, a channel cat every now and then, bullheads, perch and yes whites.

[Fly2day]

Going to Morristown tonight and was gonna try my luck what tactics do people use in the cannon? Worms and a split shot or would spinning gear be better? Never fished the cannon before so any help would be great..Thanks

[TrollnDrift]

Fished Cannon Lake tonight. Nothing great to report. Caught a dozen small perch and one small white bass. Used leeches and minnows. Minnows were more sucessful, i think because they were smaller.

[troutman72]

yeas many small perch you have to catch a ton of small fish for one big one got to keep at it been there 5 times over the last 2 weeks and only 1 19 inch eye bout 300 small perch (under 8 inches) and the best approch seeemed to be minnow but a mimic minnow was pulling a close second. also if this matters to anyone the frogs have started to move.

[Eric_Kruger]

curious about the frogs? is there a message or meaning to them moving?