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Hit the water yesterday afternoon around 5pm, water temps were 69 deg. We trolled 5-12 FOW with Shad Raps, Minnow Raps, and X-Raps (many different colors). We also trolled spinners with Gulp Crawlers. Speeds were 2.2-3.0 GPS. We went 7 for 8, 6 walleyes and 1 bullhead. Walleyes were 16-20" and the bullhead was 5", bullhead was released!

Josh

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Reluctantly hit Shields Lake this evening..on a tip from a friend who lives on it. (I despise the lake! lol)

Well, I took his advise, found the 'spot', and a spot I had never fished. Mud to gravel bottom, 15 FOW. No other boats around. Had 2 20+ inch walleye boat side before the broke off (my daughter and my wife, and me not being ready with the net!) within 30 minutes of being there. I had a nice swing and a miss, and a sheep head....

Kids n wife wanted to head in after just an hour or so there, but its a place I'll be going back to!

Vertical was key, with just enough weight on the jig to stay that way. Slip bobber tipped with a crawler worked for the Daughter.

Unfortunately, that ends my Southern MN fishing for the next 10 days, as I head to Riviera Maya for some R and R and some deep sea fishin! Bring on the Sail Fish and Cudda!!!! smile

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Reluctantly hit Shields Lake this evening..on a tip from a friend who lives on it. (I despise the lake! lol)

Well, I took his advise, found the 'spot', and a spot I had never fished. Mud to gravel bottom, 15 FOW. No other boats around. Had 2 20+ inch walleye boat side before the broke off (my daughter and my wife, and me not being ready with the net!) within 30 minutes of being there. I had a nice swing and a miss, and a sheep head....

Kids n wife wanted to head in after just an hour or so there, but its a place I'll be going back to!

Vertical was key, with just enough weight on the jig to stay that way. Slip bobber tipped with a crawler worked for the Daughter.

Unfortunately, that ends my Southern MN fishing for the next 10 days, as I head to Riviera Maya for some R and R and some deep sea fishin! Bring on the Sail Fish and Cudda!!!! smile

You're missing out on one of the area's most productive lakes my friend!

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Oh hell Nate. Kyle and I hit a so called lake you were talkin bout while you were up on the Rainy! lol

Nice fish BTW you caught! Excellent pics!

Lemme know when ya wanna hit that 'one' lake.

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your fancy boat must just scare the fish away, need to go low-pro like i do...

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your fancy boat must just scare the fish away, need to go low-pro like i do...

Very true! Whenever I fish with Matt we get skunked... When I take my boat I hammer em.... confused

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Had a good morning this am. I went out to chase some panfish and I must have forgot how to catch them.

So, I was marking some fish a ft of the bottom in 10fow. I put on a Lindy shadling and shazamm, 4 straight 16-18" eyes.

Turn out to be a pretty good morning even thought I caught no gills.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Any new reports? I can hear the crickets in here! Everyone must be one some HOT bites and have tight lips! laugh

I have been deep sea fishing the the Caribbean, so my report wont hold up to well here. :p

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Spent Sat. eve on Kelley/Dudley. Very slow, the few fish were small. did catch a 4lb pike (DNR tag).

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Spent 4 hours on Clear Lake today. Crappies were suspended in 12 FOW, but small. The sunnies and small bass were in the pencil reeds and very aggressive, but also small. We didn't bring any dinner home, but the wife and kids sure had a heck of a good time.

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I only got in about 1 hour of trolling on Fathers day. The kids were antsy!

Didn't catch anything, but marked a lot of large arcs in 14 FOW, (right off the bottom) on the outside edges of the weed lines. I have a pretty good wpt trail set up on my graph now.

If the weather holds off tonight, I will be out this evening till dark..fingers crossed....

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I hit a local lake this am looking for some nicer gills.

I was pulling spinners with crawlers in 9-12fow. The nicer gills were about 2ft of the bottom. Caught probably 40 gills and a limit of crappie along with one eye and 5 sheephead.

Very nice morning on the lake. There were plenty of boats out today.

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Well harvey i didn't have as good of luck yesterday as you seemed to have had. Very few fish boated. Mainly slow trolled with crank baits with minimal success, and didn't get a single one in the boat when i was pulling spinners w/crawlers. Didn't have a hard time finding the fish...just getting them to bite was tough. Sheephead were hungry - arrrg

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Gotcha. I did get a few taps while pulling blades. Speeds ranging from 1.0 to 2.1. I was running Foam Walkers, keeping the blades off the bottom about 6". Were you running yours right on the bottomm, dragging a weight?

Wish we could get 3 solid days of wind from the same direction...that'll bump the bite back up again!

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I used a red & white blade with a crawler harness. I simply ran two split shot so I could long line it and dropped it until I felt the bottom and then pulled up a ft or so. My speed was approx 1.8 the majority of the time.

This typically how I catch all of my better gills on the lake I was fishing.

Most time the gills hit hard when I am fishing this way but yesterday it was a bit tougher to detect a bite as they seemed to be biting light and I took along a med walleye rod by mistake as I usually use my light action rodf for this.

I missed many fish with a very light tap and simply did not hook up or lost them on their way to the boat.

Yesterday when I was out, I saw many bobber fishing with very few fish. I did see one other who was jigging but he had a dead trolling motor so I am sure it was tough for him to drift as the wind was next to nothing after about 9am.

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Today was a totally different day. I used a gold spinner and caught my better fish half way up the water column in 10-12fow.

I was marking some bigger fish that would not hit my crawler harness and crawler so I put a shallow Shad rap on that ran approx 4ft deep. Boy did I lay the smackdown on some nicer crappie.

The gills were fussy today as they would only hit the crawler if I had a complete crawler on the harness. I tried with a inch long piece on the last two hooks and the nicer ones would not hit it. Take it off, replace with a full crawler and shazaam, more nice gills.

Overall, a picky day with the fish, but a beautiful morning on the lake.

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Think i know what to start out with saturday morning. I was getting those fish to bite in 10-12fow consistently, but that has slowed for me the last week. Will have to try keeping those harnesses up off the bottom. Great reports Harvey, thanks.

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Hit a local lake yesterday and took Harveylee's advice with the crawler harnesses. What a blast. We started out in about 9 - 10ft of water and bobber fished them for an hour or so and had a good half dozen or better in the basket. Monster sunnies in my opinion. That slowed down so we put on the spinners and slow trolled and hammered another 10 or so in any where from 10ft of water to 20+ft of water. Caught a few nice sheephead also. We were using an orange and silver spinner and a hammered gold spinner. I was using large leeches and my girlfriend was using crawlers. She started using half crawlers because they were hitting to short and getting free meals. I hooked the leech several times so that a smaller portion of the tail was sticking out and had much better hooking percentages. Beautiful day on the water and a bit of a sunburn to boot. Caught one little slimer on the harnesses also.

Came home with 14 big, fat gills for the pan and had a nice fresh meal of fish. mmm mmm Good.

On a side note... Every sunny i cleaned was full of eggs. Thought they already spawned. Heard a rumor that they may spawn again due to the early spawn already this year. Any truth to that??? Some egg sacks were pretty gray though. Too late now and they tasted awesome.

Watched the sheriff load his boat and that was very cool to see. Never knew they had remotes for the winches. He hooked the winch strap up to the boat and got back in his truck and didn't get back out til it was loaded and out of the water. Very nice guy. We sat and watched him in amazement at how he could load the boat on the trailer from the cab of his pickup.

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Nice report and congrats on the success.

I've heard on several occassions that bluegills may spawn a few times each season.

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Seems to me and talking with a lot of other people, area lakes are tough right now trying to get walleyes to hit. Am I in the same boat as a lot of others? I know a few lakes around here very well, and the walleye fishing the past two weeks or more has been no existent. I have spent a lot of time on French, Shields, Fox, and Mazaska and have not been able to land an eye the past 5 or 6 times being out. Have been marking a lot of fish, just getting them to bite has been more than a challenge. Have tried everything, from salmos, lindys, spinners, jigs, three ways, you name it. The sheaphead are hitting basically everything, and usually those walleyes are in the same area. Am I doing something wrong? Fishing anywhere from 8-25 FOW.

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josMN I have been having exactly the same luck as you. I have fished Madison, Tetonka, German, Shields, and Hanska. I have boated ZERO walleye's. My son caught 1 nice 17 inch walleye when he was with me on Hanska. Other than that it's been multiple sheepshead, an occasional pike, and a bullhead or two. That's it!! VERY frustrating. I too have fished anywhere from 7 to 30 feet of water, I've tried lindy rigging, trolling plugs, jigging, slip bobbers and a big NOTHING for me. Wish I could help you out, but I can't.

~piker

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When I have targeted eyes this past month, I have been pretty happy with my results. I have been on numerous lakes and the Minnesota river.

On the lakes I have been fishing, I have been getting my eyes close to the weeds or right above them trolling crankbaits.

I believe for southern Minnesota lake eyes, one has to work the weedlines or edges.

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You guys are fishing too deep. Try the 2-6 ft range for the same amount of time and then see how you're doing...if nothing then...there's always bass!!

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Harvey I have heard this before but on a lot of the area lakes the water is stained and I have no idea where the weedline is? When I have gotten shallower I know there are weeds around because I'm snagging them, but I have no idea if I am on the weed edge or right in the middle of them. When you say you are trolling plugs over the tops of weeds in water all less than 9 feet I'm not sure where you are? It seems like most lakes 9 ft or less the weeds are right up to the surface?

Thanks ~piker

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I have been fishing some lakes lets say that the water depth is 8ft. There may be weeds on the bottom up 4ft. I pull my plugs right above the top of the weeds.

Other times I will pull my cranks right along the outside edge.

Many times I will pull a shallow running shad rap where it may run at 3-4ft and the weeds are 5-6ft down.

One can also cast and retrive shallow running cranks like the floating raps above the weed tops.

One can see many of these weeds on your sonar.

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I have been having the best luck trolling 6-10 fow with a salmo hornet #4. Pulling in everything from sheepheads, sunnies, crappies, bullhead, northern and walleye. The walleyes are usually 16"-20". By the end of the night we have been lucky enough to clean three different species of fish for the freezer.

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