Turtle Lake Fishing Reports

[Natty Ice]

sloppy as of last night.

Thanks for the updates. Might have to pass on Turtle for another week or two.

[BillyBoy23]

Does anyone know if this is open of ice yet? Thanks

[squeedunk]

If you are talking about the Turtle Lake in ShoreviewI believe it was ice free as of Tuesday morning. I drove by it this afternoon and it looked GLORIOUS out there!

[DT10 Guy]

Any crappie reports from Turtle Lake in Shoreview? I think I may get the kayak out tonight after work.

DT10

[Maximum12]

Greetings All, thinking about hitting up Turtle on Saturday for the bass opener.

Our last outing on Turtle last year featured us literally scraping the bottom of the boat as we poled past the rock pile in front of the landing. Anyone been out this year? How is the landing? Is there enough water to float a boat out onto the main lake?

[Ralph Wiggum]

A friend of ours parents live on Turtle. Her step-dad said that water is really low again this year.

[KTroller]

Does anyone know if this landing has hours that it is open? dawn to dusk etc?

Thanks,

KT

[skolfoppa]

KT- 1/2 hour before sunrise- 1/2 hour after sunset. The water level is lower than last year with more exposed rocks. Good luck. Skol.

[Maximum12]

Skol, you've been out?

Anyone know if you can get out onto the main lake?

[skolfoppa]

Max- I was out last night for a few hours. Made it to the main lake but you need take your time crossing the "reef", or have a john boat. Skol.

[skolfoppa]

Anyway, bass were active the other night. We were in 10-12' tossin 1/16 jigs w fatheads. I'm heading out tomorrow sometime... gray Rebel SS w Yam 25. Skol.

[Maximum12]

We were on the lake by 8AM & out for around three hours, had a good morning, numbers but not much size to them (shocking, since we describe any 11-13" bass as a "Turtle" sized beast). They weren't chasing much, most of them came on wacky rigged plastics & a few on shallow running cranks. Little pike were around but not aggressive, lots of flashes near the boat but only one actual hit.

Lake is still very low, but up, maybe a bare few inches, from late last fall. Saw some kids walking their pontoon over the shallow bar, probably a good idea, not much room for error in there, I pulled my motor all the way out of the water.

Any lack of rain is going to make the lake unfishable. C'mon, rain!

[BizzityB]

Hey Maximum12 that was us!!

we had a good day out there lots of bass but like you said nothing of any size. I think the low water levels is stopping growth in the lake seems like the fish just havnt been big in there the last couple of years.

[wormdunker]

Do you guys pretty much stick to the weedlines?

[Maximum12]

BizzityB, funny! If I had a pontoon, I'd have done the same thing.

Wormdunker, we caught all our bass that day shallow, five feet or less. Tried out deeper & the weedlines, nothing doing. Might have changed by now, though.

[Zaraspooks]

Normally fish them shallow but made a point to try and fish water no less than 10ft this morning. Outstanding morning on the water. Lots of fish and the fish are definitely bigger than the ones caught shallow.

[BigMike]

I fished Turtle a couple weeks back for the first time in a while... not much has changed: I swear there are no bass over 14'' in that lake! All cookie cutter 10-14inch fish. They hit everything from topwater to spinnerbaits, to cranks and plastics. Fun catching but wished there were some size to them. The sand/rock bar out from the launch is starting to get nasty to cross over.

[River Rocket]

Can you launch a bigger boat at the lauch, say a 21 footer? Last year I couldn't get my boat off the trailer. I love the lake, just couldn't get on it last year.

[BigMike]

River- you'll be hard pressed to get your 21footer over the sand/rock bar out from the launch. You could launch it now (water is up a bit from last year) but you will probably struggle to get over the bar. My friend dinged his prop pretty bad 3 weeks ago - he has a 17'Alumacraft w/60hp.

[Zaraspooks]

River -

I run an 18ft Lund but I've seen guys with their 21 ft Ranger/Tritons get on without a problem. Here are a few tips:

1) Only use the right side of the ramp next to the dock.

2) When backing in, angle the trailer between the two ramps when you reach the water.

3) When going to the main lake, cross the sand bar next to the blue bouy marker. Cross to the left side when going out and to the right side when returning.

4) You can make it through if you trim up your main motor as high as possible but I would recommend using your trolling motor.

Good Luck

[River Rocket]

Thanks, I will have to give it a try.

[Lip'em]

The size of the fish in this lake as severely dropped off since they instituted that catch and release on bass. Back ten or fifteen years ago 5 and 6 pound bass were not that uncommon out there. The lake is now plagued with thousands of small, skinny, ravenous little bass that don't have enough food to support them all. Real easy to catch, they attack anything that moves, but tough to get decent sized ones.

[Zaraspooks]

Lip'em -

I would have to agree with you. Ever since the catch and release rule has been put in place, the quality of the bass fishing on this lake has really declined. I remember evenings whe we caught numerous bass pushing the 5lb size before the rule was instituted. However, I have been able to get a few decent sized bass recently by fishing deeper water.

[BizzityB]

Maximum,

Yeah we were not about to try and sneak around the rocks so we just said we will walk it through. It was a good day. Yeah lots of stuff shallow. We tried a couple deep weed beds but no luck.

[Fishhawk150]

I was down at the boat landing last week, it looks like the water is up a little from last year. How's the sandbar? Can you get an 18 foot boat across it?

[Maximum12]

You could get a boat across a month ago, with all the rain I suspect it's at least the same if not higher. As a last resort you can always pull the motor completely out & take a stroll! Where there's a will there's a way.

[jwhjr]

Any recent reports on the water level? Thinking about heading out there on Saturday.

[Zaraspooks]

Don't go there on Saturday. This weekend is the Turtleman Triatholon. I think they close down the launch.

[jwhjr]

We didn't end up going which sounds like it was a good thing.

[johnnybighit]

I never been to Turtle and I took the small boat out to check it out. The water is VERY low. Exposed rocks and very hard to get out from the ramp area to that actual deep water. This lake is only good for Jetskiiers right about now. The water is probably 7 feet low just by seeing where the water line used to be. And to add, the water is dirty dirty. Maybe 2 feet tops on clarity?