st cloud St Cloud Fishing Reports

[JeremyCampbell]

Wasn't very active for Natureboy and I today.We checked into a near by lake.Mostly the fish swam up and swam back down.Here's one of them from today on a Trigger Orange plastic.

[Rick G]

Jeremy, where were you guys at, for some reason that looks like a chain crappie.

[Genofish]

Nice fish Jeremy, looks like you have had some success the last few outings

[Tom Sawyer]

  Rick G said:

Jeremy, where were you guys at, for some reason that looks like a chain crappie.

Well we know for sure they weren't on Little Maple from the looks of that whopper.

Only pushin 12.

[JeremyCampbell]

We were planning on going to the chain but at the last minute drove to Pearl .Hardly anybody out there today

[Tom Sawyer]

  JeremyCampbell said:

Hardly anybody out there today

I hope you understand why now. Last time I was out there, like other times in the past, the fish bit late. The bite window was so small with even stable weather, haven't been back since. It has always been a night bite, or prime time (dusk) bite lake. In high school we'd have are best luck during the North Star game, and later.

How late did you stay?

[JeremyCampbell]

I met a guy probely in his 70s out there today.We got to chatting and this guy hits a lot of lakes.From the sounds of it he probely goes almost as much as Rick.I thought is was funny.

[Vitreus]

Pearl today as well. Small window is right… Small walleyes also.

[eyeguy 54]

that crappie possessed??

[Rick G]

Hadn't planned on getting out today, but had just a little free time to kill, and knew of a couple others that had the itch to get out. We had every intention of toughing it out and setting up portables, things didn't go quite as planned, I had forgotten my Big Buddy heater at home whoops.

Plan b was to head over to a nice warm wheel house that has been on top of a nice school of crappies for a while. It only took a short time once we got set up for the action to start. We had quite a few doubles

And even a triple or two once our other friend arrived Best bait for the crappies was the Custom Jigs plastics on the Lindy Toads, a few other baits got fish too, including a good old no.10 hook, split shot and a float, sometimes they still like the tried and true methods too

After darkness set in the cats started to get active as well, we even had a couple doubles on them too it was one of those evening where everything worked out just right, caught fish till we were sick of them and had some real good friends to share this bite with, does it get any better

[Genofish]

Looks like a great time Rick, I think I know the spot

[JeremyCampbell]

Nice turn out you guys had.Where do you get custom jigs plastics?

[Rick G]

  JeremyCampbell said:

Nice turn out you guys had.Where do you get custom jigs plastics?

Jeremy, you can pick up the Custom Jigs brand plastics at all the big box sporting goods stores, most bait shops carry them too.

[Tom Sawyer]

The Bait Den has every color of Custom Jigs and Spins Finesse Tails.

[Fish'nMan]

Hit pleasant lake today with jdkeslo. Found small schools of crappie in 30 feet suspended around 5 feet off the bottom. Fished from 8am -3. Caught several short and a few bigger crappie. I caught 2 just over 13 inches. Jd had a few northerns hit his jig on the drop. He did manage to bring in a 14 inch northern. Overall a very good day. Just had problems towards the end with some kids who parked and set up 10 feet from us. I don't mind it normally but their flashers caused us a ton of interference. Just sort of rude..

[Genofish]

nice catch, what type of baits were working for you?

[Fish'nMan]

We used a lot of white and perch colored jigs with waxies or waxie type plastics. Most of mine came on white frosty jigs. Thought about going and getting some minnows but they havent worked very well this year for me.

[JeremyCampbell]

Got to love the fish in sink shot.Nice fish.

[Genofish]

Plastics for me also, with spikes if needed

[Rick G]

Got out after the crappies again today, they were a bit more tight lipped than they were yesterday. We still got plenty though

Got some smaller ones

and some medium ones

and even a few large ones.

They were biting on plastics or spoons tipped with minnow heads

I had a dozen friends, spread out in 8 houses, at depths ranging from 20-30ft, the mid 20s seemed to produce the most fish today.

[Rick G]

Was a coooold one out there today but the fish didn't seem to mind too much. ended up getting quite a mess of crappies, and even a few bonus walleyes We were in a nice warm wheel house, well as long as we kept the heat on it was warm. I have a 30lb tank I keep in a rack on the front of my house, the line from the tank to the heater kept icing up, or my tank couldn't build up enough pressure to keep my heater lit, either way my heat kept going out. We fixed this by bringing the tank inside and running a Big Buddy. I have only had this happen one other time, and it was -30 that day. When we left the lake my thermometer on the outside of my house said -20 brrrrrr

[Horseshoe_Don]

I had a 20lb tank freeze up at -22 last january. I was using my small clam with a big buddy at 18,000 btu's and it just kept it warm enough, but my holes kept freezing up. I stayed close to the cabin due to the extreme cold. My honda wheeler that always starts would not when i was done fishing and I had to pull the rope start.(not fun). Oh yea I didn't catch dump. Very little action on the sonar until 5 then all cats. Didn't want cats though.

I am done til it warms up.

Don

[soft]

Hi Don.

Have you seen any big trucks out by the Meth hole yet?, i plan to drive the surburban out to the Meth hole for some cats this Saturday thinking after this cold snap the ice would be plenty thick....

Thanks.

Soft

[Horseshoe_Don]

There have been big trucks at the meth hole for several weeks. Ice is about 2 feet +

You could probably drive a dump truck out there.

Don

[jigginjim]

I'm looking for a catfish that is at least 24" minimum. Can that be beat? What is the average length?

[Rick G]

Jim, the one in my avatar is 32in, it's a winter Chain fish. I have only gotten around a dozen this winter over 24in. Average size is only 16-19 this year, but we get nice ones from time to time.

[aanderud]

  Rick G said:

Jim, the one in my avatar is 32in, it's a winter Chain fish. I have only gotten around a dozen this winter over 24in. Average size is only 16-19 this year, but we get nice ones from time to time.

I'll concur with this size breakdown. The over-24s aren't common, but they are there. But, the shear numbers of 16-19s are amazing. And when you factor in that pound for pound they fight much harder than other species you're likely to get in that size range (read: walleyes), it's probably similar to catching 18-24 inch walleyes all day, I'd say.

[Horseshoe_Don]

  jigginjim said:

I'm looking for a catfish that is at least 24" minimum. Can that be beat? What is the average length?

I would say the best areas to catch cats that are 24" and greater are sharp breaks away from the meth basin on shoe. Find a good walleye break and fish it after dark. They seem to move into those areas about 30 minutes after dark. You can also find them mid day in those same areas but not in the numbers that are there after dark.

Don

[Horseshoe_Don]

I never measure(maybe I should) but in the areas I mentioned above I have 7 cats this year in the 4-7 pound range.

Don

[JeremyCampbell]

Tried over at Pearl.Trigger orange and Makki plastics got them to bite.Wasn't great but managed to pull in 8 crappies.I think the biggest was around 10.5".Stayed in depths of 12'-15'.I didn't see any more bites after 7:15.Fish were suspended a couple of ft off the bottom and in some areas six ft .Chilly Willy cold! Sorry My phone was low and I had no flash