Grand Rapids Fishing Reports MN

[Greg Clusiau]

Brad Brown (pictured), Grand Rapids, joined me today for some crappie fishing. The first lake was a bust and I didn't want to stick around and see if they bit better toward late afternoon/evening so we headed to another lake and pounded out a limit of crappies in less than an hour.

One thing people should be aware of is the thin ice that many smaller lakes have. We drove trucks on Winnie last weekend, 15" of ice, and today the small lakes had 9 1/2 - 10".

[mizzblondiie]

Going to try Little Moose Lake tomorrow.. will keep you posted as to what we find! Friend caught a few nice size crappies there earlier so we'll see if we can keep up!

[hookset 31]

Fished pokey this A M with little luck. Marked fish on the locator but very few takers. Cold and windy this mornin but thats winter in minnesota. Lookin forward to lake trout openin soon and hopin the slush isn't real bad on the trout lakes. Anybody fishin any panfish? Don't want to know where -just wonderin if there is a bite. Ice (or slush) conditions would be a good thing hear about too. Good luck.

[Greg Clusiau]

Panfish are biting but most of my "go to" lakes are snowmobile only. I haven't been on them since shortly before the big snowfall so I expect it to be sort of tough going, even with a sled, because of slush problems. That's what I'm hearing anyway.

On the other hand, there are some local lakes that anglers have beaten a track to with their trucks and it's easy to get out on the lakes but venturing too far off the beaten track could lead to getting stuck, slush again.

Precisely why I'll more than likely be fishing plowed roads, like out of High Banks, for a while until things freeze up, if they will?

Also, please remember that many of these smaller lakes don't have a whole lot of ice for trucks, etc.

[bmc]

I was out on Sylvans Bay on Wed. It reminded me of a scene from "Grumpy Old Men" out there w/ all of the houses. Also alot of slush out there, but there is a plowed road out to the "City". We got away from the crowd and caught alot of gills, but you would have to do ALOT of sorting to get some keepers, unless you like scaling 'gills.

On the way home, I stopped by the Tioga access on Pokegama. There was a narrow plowed trail going out towards Chisholm Point and there were some guys by the beach on a snowmobile.

Yesterday afternoon, I walked out on Bass Lake off of Co Rd 62 for a couple of hours. Luckily, snowmobilers have a pretty good trail beat down heading out there and I didn't find any slush, until I started popping some holes. Started off w/ a nice 9" gill and he must of told his friends about his experience, because the few after that were sniffers and wouldn't bite. I'm pretty sure I could have drove my 4 wheeler on the snowmobile trail, but wouldn't got ventruing off trail.

If you do a little scouting, there's spots to get out.

Brian

[mixxedbagg]

You must define "keeper" a little differently than me.

By the way, if you're reading this....thanks to the guy who let me know about my headlights being ON at Sylvan and gave me a ride back to the access so I wouldn't have to leave my boy alone in the portable for too long.

[Derek Vos]

That was me on the snowmobile in front of the beach. We caught 1 gill and 3 smelt. Haha that lake has something against me. There was a ton of slush out there too. We were fishing the only dry spot around.

[bmc]

It looked like a mess out there Derek! If you head more north you should get into more smelt if you're interested in catching them.

I haven't tried it yet, but plan on it sometime this winter.

Brian

[Derek Vos]

The only thing I like em for is tip up bait on pokeg

[hookset 31]

Derek- those smelt need to be certified now to legally use them for bait. Talked to Tom S about that and he did say that was the new rule on smelt and ciscos. Really a slap in the face when you can catch smelt in the lake but can't put them on a hook unless they are cured and certified.

[Derek Vos]

Really? Laws like that really make me mad. It's not hurting anything or anyone. The lake is full of these ROUGH fish, what kind of damage could I possibly be doing by putting one on a hook? It's not like I'm transporting live ones to other lakes.

[mixxedbagg]

Any day bites happening in the area? I don't care what kind of fish (except grubby perch ), but my Winnie plans collapsed about a half hour ago and now I need a plan B for tomorrow.

Don't blame you if you don't want to post a reply on that request. Either way, I'll figure something out and put holes in some lake or another.

\/

[Corey20]

Talked to my dad yesterday and he was out in the spear house on pokegama, at about 11 he had 15-20 walleyes in the hole that had came off of the shallows(9') and where heading out into deeper water. He said they were chasing minnows and small perch around. So I would guess that they would be biting if a guy was set up for it?

[shogun]

Really? Laws like that really make me mad. It's not hurting anything or anyone. The lake is full of these ROUGH fish, what kind of damage could I possibly be doing by putting one on a hook? It's not like I'm transporting live ones to other lakes.

These new laws were put into effect because of smelt coming from lake superior are likely carriers of VHS - a disease that could potentially kill off a lot of fish. It is already in the great lakes, Lake Superior, and the Duluth Harbor. The DNR is trying to prevent it from spreading to inland lakes. A lot of people get their smelt for bait out of lake superior. Now that it is illegal, bait dealers need to show that the smelt they are selling do not come from superior, and are certified and properly treated for so that any viral disease would be killed.

[Deet]

A fishing report-

Fished Siseebakwet last night. It was extremely slow. We got a late start, were fishing by about 4:00. I caught three huge perch right away. They turned out to be grubby despite how healthy and clean they looked. Perch disappeared, one walleye showed up around sunset, and that was it. My buddy set up about 30 ft away and his house got one walleye and two smaller perch. We left by 5:45.

Sorry I have no good news!

[Greg Clusiau]

I've been on a few smaller lakes lately and it seems they are freezing up pretty good. We took snowmobiles and didn't encounter any surface slush and once on the spot we were able to walk around without any difficulty. The big lakes (Winnie, URL), however, with plowed roads, were having some problems with flooding. It's supposed to be "unseasonably warm" this weekend so that should knock the snow down even more. Might be able to drive trucks out there soon?

[Deet]

...and are you catching any fish?

[Greg Clusiau]

The little lakes have been good for panfish but the large walleye lakes have been slow.

[JoeMag]

Ice conditions are finally really good and lots of guys are getting out. Hot crappie bite is going in the Third River and on Big Cutfoot. Gettin limits of big ones.

[Pinusbanksiana]

Is that a day or evening bite?

[Greg Clusiau]

Tried a small lake last night off shore and did well on the crappies. Water temp was 52º. It's only going to get better! Best bait was a Northland Tackle "Hairy Spider Ant", tipped with a very small piece of crawler. They didn't care for minnows one bit, not even pieces of minnows?

[Deet]

Wow. Greg, you are a panfish Master. Nice crappies. Were they up shallow, as in pre-spawn? I wouldn't have guessed 52 deg. water already. Good report.

[iceman16]

great catch! wow 52 is warmer than here down in the cities. ill be up next week fishing for crappies before the gov opener. cant wait!

iceman

[Greg Clusiau]

I started out by watching the Twins game this afternoon but their erratic play and pitching "forced" me to go fishing instead. It turned out to be a good call. It was another shore-fishing gig with Northland Tackle's "Fire-Fly Jig" doing all of the damage. Didn't have to tip them with anything. Just went "plain jane" and caught some decent fish. I noticed the male crappies are starting to sport their "blackish" spawning colors. It's not full blown yet by they're working on it. Water temp was 52.2º.

[CC Rocks]

Not much into shore fishing, but I am curious. Greg are you using a bobber when fishing with these jigs? How deep would you say they are when you catch them?

thanks,

[Greg Clusiau]

Yes, I'm using a bobber and the spot I have been fishing is shallow and one of the first areas to warm up on this particular lake so it's fairly easy to do. I'll do this for a while and then start using waders and walk the shoreline a ways. When I can't "reach" them anymore, I'll use a boat. Actually, I'm just doing the shore-fishing thing because I can and a boat isn't needed. It's a fun and easy trip that I can do after work, without too much work. I'm setting the float at about 12". If it was a little deeper, I'd adjust accordingly.

[CC Rocks]

would you guess the water depth at 3 ft or less?

[Greg Clusiau]

Not deep at all. I'd say 3-4 feet max.

[Greg Clusiau]

Went out after work again last night. Water temps up to 54.5º and fishing is good. In the photo is Mark Case, my guest for the evening.

[Deet]

Why such a lack of pre-opener chatter?