mille lacs 2020 Mille Lacs Lake Fishing Reports

[Tweebowzer]

Regardless of the politics and the sex of fish, I have a 6 & 8 yr old, is it a good time to teach them the fun of catching eyes, and catch and release? We are up in the area all next week near Malmo, looking for tips, not your gps spots.

[CaptainMusky]

You will catch fish. Your Kidd should have a blast. Bobbering up on rock piles should keep them busy.

[Stick in Mud]

We had fairly slow night last night....got four walleyes in a bit over two hours, fishing everywhere from 12 ft to 32 ft, from shallow rocks and weeds to deep mud. Just couldn't find them, don't know why.

On a side note, the most exciting portion of the evening was almost getting hit by a couple of drunk guys who must've been looking at their depthfinder or something.

[pikerliker]

On a side note, the most exciting portion of the evening was almost getting hit by a couple of drunk guys who must've been looking at their depthfinder or something.

[BrdHunter01]

We had fairly slow night last night....got four walleyes in a bit over two hours, fishing everywhere from 12 ft to 32 ft, from shallow rocks and weeds to deep mud. Just couldn't find them, don't know why.

Evening bite was tough last weekend. Friday night was better than sat night. Saturday night was super slow for just about everyone it sounded like. But the early morning bite was much better than the night bite for me last weekend. We actually did pretty good on keepers. The ratio was about 60-40 big fish to keepers. It wasn't hot and heavy by any means but we did manage to bring home our 8 14-17 inch keepers for the 2 of us.

[PerchJerker]

Did a quick trip with my kid, he had a baseball game that night so we had to keep it short ..... but he's never rigged for walleyes before so we decided to give it a shot on the mud. We fished from 9:30 to noon and had 10 fish, biggest was 26", 2 of them were box fish, most of them were 20"-23".

[RIPN LIPS]

any tips on depth or color i am heading up tomorrow

[MattL]

Fished yesterday with my dad. The bite was slow at times, but there were some good flurries of action. We managed 19 fish throughout the day. 9 of those were over 24". We kept 2 15" and threw back 1 short fish.

We caught the majority of the fish on the edges of deep gravel, 28-32'. Color didn't seem to matter much. We got a few rigging and bobber fishing, but the rest on leadcore with smaller cranks.

[RiverDewey]

Fishing was slow on my lake so I headed over to Mille Lacs last Friday (6/22) afternoon. Fished the flats out of Garrison and caught 5 nice walleye between 20 and 24" by sunset. All the fish I marked on the fish finder were in 30-31 FOW on the bottom. After supper, I moved in closer to shore in 20 FOW and picked up one 24" walleye on a leech and pink hook. The others were on the edges of the flats (Lindy rigging with spinners and 9' leader). I did try trolling with a deep Tail Dancer on the edges of the flats but got nothing. As someone else said, it seemed like it just shut down at 10 PM. Even the launches were quiet.

[RIPN LIPS]

fished the mud flats yesterday from morning to night caught fish from 17-28" all day. only 1 slot fish. fish were on the up wind side of the reef and scattered all over the top in 23 to 26 ft of water. spinners worked but 7-8ft snell with orange hook and bead and a leech caught the most. we hit about 8 different reefs and the results were about the same on each one. you would pick off 4-6 fish then its time to move. the first 3rd of the reef seemed to hold more fish than the back 2/3's not sure why but thats what we noticed. good luck and bring your camera.

[Stick in Mud]

I went out yesterday with my dad to try out the new leadcore set-ups I bought...took us about three minutes to catch our first fish, and then we were doing something wrong...went a while without getting them. Switched up to larger lures, and moved to a different flat, and we whacked 'em. Got 8 fish in a bit over an hour (which, considering it takes me a long time to get all the line out, means we were getting them just about as soon as the lure got down to the fish), including two doubles. After that, it was pretty consistent for a few hours before we went in to get out of the heat. Most fish caught on top edges of flats.

[deepwaterfishing]

Been reading here for awhile...never posted before. was reading some that said there's no feed in the lake......if so, then the fish must have JUST cleaned it up because the ones we've been catching are the fattest walleyes I've ever seen. I've two questions....when you get into a spot catching 23-27 inchers, do you wait it out, or move & try to find smaller fish? And lately the fish have been swallowing the hooks. What are you guys doing? cutting the line, or trying to get the hooks out? I've been seeing fish with hooks stuck in their throat unable to swallow anything....skinny fish with food stuck on the imbedded hook. I've been able to remove the hooks w/o bleeding the fish....I wonder how many like that are out there??

[jay83196]

I have seen the same thing the hooks I have seen were easily removed not sure why people leave them when it can be removed without damage or raking mire than 10 seconds. It's been my experience if I'm getting big ones I go shallower and that at times helps. I almost always get bigger ones on the mud. Most of the fish I have caught are skinny kinda rough looking healthy as they fight like hell but skinny almost like they just spawned...

[deepwaterfishing]

Jay.....really? what part of the lake are you on? We've been west of Hennepin island, the fish are shaped more like bass than wallys....hurts 2 pitch 'em back....one fish would be dinner for my family. The only skinny ones have been the ones with hooks stuck in 'em. Wished I knew howta put pics on....got some nice ones.

[BrdHunter01]

Been reading here for awhile...never posted before. was reading some that said there's no feed in the lake......if so, then the fish must have JUST cleaned it up because the ones we've been catching are the fattest walleyes I've ever seen. I've two questions....when you get into a spot catching 23-27 inchers, do you wait it out, or move & try to find smaller fish? And lately the fish have been swallowing the hooks. What are you guys doing? cutting the line, or trying to get the hooks out? I've been seeing fish with hooks stuck in their throat unable to swallow anything....skinny fish with food stuck on the imbedded hook. I've been able to remove the hooks w/o bleeding the fish....I wonder how many like that are out there??

If the fish swallowed the hook and its clearly in there stomach you should cut the line. Seeing $40,000 boats trying to dig a 10c hook out of 25 incher makes me sick. They have a much better chance at living if you cut the line as close to the hook as you can.

Fish usually travel in schools of the same size. Those smaller fish are hard to find this year. Good luck

[jay83196]

I agree on hook if in stomach etc, however I have seen them in mouth with line cut. I mostly fish north side been out few times on June caught 40+ fish kept 7 and 70% have looked on thin side and many darker in color, kinda rough looking.

[Stick in Mud]

I have hooked very, very few fish in the stomach because this year we haven't needed to give them any line...we've just dropped the rod tip for a second and then set the hook. If I do hook it deep, I'll almost always cut the line.

[Stick in Mud]

Went out this afternoon with my dad for a couple hours....right away, we got five in a bit over an hour trolling leadcore. Then we were doing something wrong....only one fish in almost two hours. Switched up to spinners and whacked three in 45 minutes before we had to go in so I could....go work.

[Austin_Schorn]

On Wednesday my dad had the day off and asked if I wanted to go fish ML and I sure would be crazy to say no to that offer! Got on the lake at around 9:30 in the morning and shot to an area that we worked previously on Father's day weekend and it paid off! We tried rigging right away with leeches and with only a few fish to show for we decided to pull bottom bouncers and spinners and cover a little more ground. That was the right choice landing a double almost instantly. I was using crawlers with a harness while my dad was using a leech. Crawlers were definitely the ticket putting 3 fish in the boat for every 1 with a leech. I also caught two of my personal bests that day landing a 27" and my new PB a 28". We were mainly fishing the edge of a flat but did find plenty of fish on top as well. We caught fish anywhere from 24 to 30' deep and easily caught over 20 fish.. BUT not a single box fish, our smallest for the day was 19" and our biggest taped 28". Can't wait to get back up there!! To see more photos from this outing as well as from previous outings PLEASE check out and "Like" Unleashed Outdoors on Facebook. Thank you.

https://www.facebook.com/UnleashedOutdoors

Here is the 27"

My dad's 25"

My new PB 28"

Smallest for the day

A solid ML fish..

[GSP4ME]

congrats on the nice fish

[Austin_Schorn]

Thank you!

[RIPN LIPS]

Might want to try flattening the barb. Problem solved..

[Finlander]

No eaters, but alot of fun!

[sweept]

Nice pics and great report!

[maxpower117]

Might want to try flattening the barb. Problem solved..

Best suggestion yet. It should be mandatory.

Leaving the hook in their gullet doesn't do them many favors. These hooks nowadays a corrosion resistant.

[mrklean]

Great report

[Austin_Schorn]

Thanks you guys!

[Wish-I-Were-Fishn]

Nice!

[fetch]

picked up 12 missed 2x that many bites.. fished the mud leeches 10' snell trolling 1mph plain hook a few on spinners as well with green night crawlers

[John Mickish]

Went out yesterday with an inexperienced Mille Lacs angler and picked up 16 on the mud. We struggled in the morning, we where in his boat and boat control is not his best strength so that could account for the low number. After a little coaching the bite picked up in the late morning on leeches but then died off. We switched to crawlers and spinners and it picked up again.

At 2:00 we moved to some shallow rocks to finish off the day with a smallmouth or two and ended up with 2 15" (released) walleyes and no smallmouth! Pulled the plug at 3.

I'm been up there for 5 straight weekends and the leech bite is expectedly dropping off. Crawlers and cranks should be picking up. The water temp yesterday at mid lake was 76 degrees.