Mille Lacs Lake Fishing Report by Burch's Guide Service

[Pat Burch]

I use treble hooks. If using euro larvae I put 2-3 on each hook. If using wax worms I hang 1 on each hook. White was best. I had good luck on the rainbow color with the white back rattlin fyler and the white frostee jigging spoons. Caught some on green frostee spoon too, but white was best

[MinDak Hunter]

Thanks for the info.

[perchslayer29]

What side of hennipen were you on east west north or south and could u get there from the cedar creek access u think or is the ice not safe there?

[Pat Burch]

Hey Perchslayer, I wen out of hunter winfields and followed their stakes out for awhile then crossed the pressure break on my own., I ended just south and east of Hen. Isl. Not sure on coming from the east side. Your best bet would be to call Kevin McQuiod at Macs twin bay or Paul at Appledorns and get the latest update on coming in from the east side. I would highly Recommend going out of a resort access during these current ice conditions.

[Pat Burch]

The mud flat bite is going strong. Good mix of walleye, perch and tullibee 28-34 feet, working the edges and out to the basin. Over the weekend Hunters Point resort had roads accessible by 1/2 ton trucks to allot of the popular mud flats. However, with warm weather this week I would contact them if you are heading up just to be sure nothing changes. Best bite for walleye has been on the typical colors of gold, orange and perch colored jigging spoons with a minnow head. Allot of guys are also pulling walleyes with full minnow on a float or tip-up. Should be a nice week to be out hole hopping, good luck to everyone.

[elusivecrappiecatcher]

The mud flat bite is going strong. Good mix of walleye, perch and tullibee 28-34 feet, working the edges and out to the basin. Over the weekend Hunters Point resort had roads accessible by 1/2 ton trucks to allot of the popular mud flats. However, with warm weather this week I would contact them if you are heading up just to be sure nothing changes. Best bite for walleye has been on the typical colors of gold, orange and perch colored jigging spoons with a minnow head. Allot of guys are also pulling walleyes with full minnow on a float or tip-up. Should be a nice week to be out hole hopping, good luck to everyone.

I am planning on fishing this saturday. What resort is the best to get to the flats? I am coming from Willow River, MN. We will have the wheelers but want to be safe. Not looking to deal with any sketchyness.

[Pat Burch]

Fishing over the last 4-5 dys has really been up and down, As you can see by some of the reports on here some are having good days but the majority of guys are struggling right now. By far the best walleye bite lately has been evening and throughout the night on the mud. Guys on the mud flats in the sleeper houses are getting good numbers of fish. Setting up on the top edge of the flat at night has been best. The daytime walleye bite is getting to be a real grind, if you want to catch them you gotta hunt, guys that are getting allot of daytime walleyes are drilling well over 100 holes a day and moving around allot to find the right area. Our best daytime bite has been on the gold 1/8 oz rattlin fyler tipped with a fathead minnow head.. It has been hard to find a pattern, some times they are biting on top of the flat in 26 feet, then next spot you pick off some in 33 feet off the bottom edge.

Perch bite has slowed a little bit for numbers, but the size has been really good latley. Allot of females filled up with eggs making some 12 inchers look like sows. This time of year we are fishing perch on the deep tranistions lines from hard bottom gravel to soft silt/mud type bottoms in that 31-33 foot range. Best Perch bait for us has been the 1/8 oz frostee jigging spoon perch colored front with a gold back using wax worms or larvae.

If you are heading to the lake please check with a resort, the roads to the mud are changing daily

[Pat Burch]

Hey everyone here is my opening weekend report. Started out Saturday morning at 6am in the typical opener spots on the north end sand breaks and rock/sand tranistion areas areas from 10 feet to about 22 feet. Fishing in this area was very slow, I will admit I was a little slow at switching my tactics as well. I beat up 4-5 of my favorite opening weekend fishing spots with only 5 fish to show for in 4 hours. So at 10am I took the customers out to some of the secondary shoreline structures and fish were there to be had. Found fish on mud, gravel and deep rocks. We ended up boating around 35 walleyes saturday with 9 under 17 inches that we could keep. We lindy rigged the enitre day. Lindy no-snag sinkers in 1/2 oz with 7-8 foot snells. Pink, Chartuse and Red were the preffered hook colors. 50/50 on fish being caught with minnows versus leeches, crawlers did not produce as well. Sunday was the same story I took some customers out from 8am - noon caught 23 but only 2 we could keep. Went out Sunday evening with family and the bite was very very good. Thill Splash brites in 19 feet with a 1/32 oz lindy jig and a leech was the ticket.

[Tanker]

Awesome report Burch thanks alot.

[Pat Burch]

Fishing over the last week or so has been excellent. This is some of the better fishing I have seen in years. Allot of fish under 17 inches are starting to show up a little more consistently now. We had hard SSE winds last week, So we fished south and east, then the wind switched to a hard NNW wind and we fished north and west. Whether your fishing rocks, sand, mud or gravel fish are biting. If you can get up here now is the time to do it. All techniques are working. I have been pulling Lindy spinners for the last 4-5 days and catching a ton of fish, but all presentation seems to be working. You can Jig, Lindy Rig, Crank or Cork and they all are producing fish. Use your electronics mark fish and fish them.

[Pat Burch]

As many have stated already the bite on Mille Lacs continues to just be out of this world. This is really a pig pen this year, So many 26in-29in fish are coming to the boat. Also catching many eaters everyday. Bigger fish are out doing the smaller eating sized fish at about 4-1 for my boat lately, but to me big fish are allot more fun anyway. Over the last 4 days with the various winds and storms I had to take clients west, east, north and south each day fishing a different area. All I can say is the fish are biting everywhere. If you find fish in the area they will bite. The mud is going, the sand is going, the gravel is going and the deep rocks are going, well that just about covers it all. Lindy Rigging leeches with a 3/4 oz Lindy no Snag sinker with a 6-8 foot snell on the sand, gravel and mud has worked well. Also, pulling spinners with crawlers silver and perch color have been best.

It will be a busy lake the rest of the week, with the Cabelas NTC championship in conjunction with the MWC along with an MTT this weekend there is allot going on up here. Good luck to all the guys fishing tournaments this week and this weekend.

[Pat Burch]

We still have a strong bite going on up on Mille Lacs. This year has just been crazy stupid good. A bad day is 20 fish a good day is 70 fish. Lots of year classes being caught, we have caught 10 inchers up to 28 inchers. The lake seems loaded with fish. Still catching fish with the normal June patterns. Surface Water temps range from 59 - 63 in most areas. The fish are going good on the mud with Lindy rigs and a leech/crawler or minnow. Spinners on the mud are also gong good. Hammered silver blades and Lindy golden shiner colors have been the best spinner colors for me. Most of the Mud fish are right on the top edge, or on the edge or off the deep edge in 32-33 feet, some of the flats we are seeing fish all over the top but not as many as on the edge and deep egdes. I would focus more on the top edge and out about 50-100 feet off the break line. The deep gravel and mid to deep rocks are also producing fish with bobbers and a leech or using a spinner and crawler with a bottom bouncer. We have had a few good days on leadcore, followed by slow days with leadcore that should improve and become more consistent as the summer wears on. Good luck to everyone, we have some extremely fun fishing going on up here right now.

[Pat Burch]

Wow what a busy weekend. It felt like opener with all the traffic. Rigs parked on the roads at all the landings pretty much tell the story. The fish are still biting. Mud flats are drilling going good but generally with bigger fish. Gravel and deep rock are good with a little better ratio of eaters but still more big fish than eaters. Evening bite on the tops of the deeper rock piles seems to be producing the most eaters. Lindy rigs have still been or best presentation. Bite still seems best on edges of mud and gravel but starting to see more and more fish up on top too

[Pat Burch]

Nice consisent weather over the last 4 days has been a welcome site. I have been running spinners and pulling leadcore on edges of the flats and gravel.

Orange river rockers in size 3 has been rocking fish. Golden shiner and tulibee Lindy spinners with a Crawler have been best spinner colors

[Pat Burch]

Hey Guys, we still have a strong bite going on up on Mille Lacs. Still catching fish with Lindy Rigs Spinners and leadcore. Surface Water temps are in the 76 -79 degree range in most areas. The fish are going good on the mud with Lindy rigs and a leech or with a spinner rig and a crawler. Most of the Mud fish are on the top edge 23-26 feet. I would focus more on the top edge within 50 feet of the break line. If it is flat calm the spinners seem to be better and if it is windy the lindy rig and leech seem to be better. Best spinners for us have been the lindy spinner in Golden shiner and the silver shad. We have had a few good days on leadcore, followed by slow days with leadcore. The fish on the mud seem schooled up pretty good still, so rigging and pullng spinners is a much faster and effiecent way to put fish in the boat over lead. More eater fish seem to be getting caught for us over the last week or so as well.

For you bass guys the small mouth bite good. The smallies were just of the edge of the main rocks in 5-7 feet of water. My clients did best on 4 inch yum dingers rigged wacky style. Good luck out there

[Stick in Mud]

Thanks for the report, Pat. Good to hear you're still getting them. I saw you taking your boat out of the lake a week ago, and I was going to say hello...until I figured that'd be kind of creepy.

[Pat Burch]

Hey carmike say hi next time. Its cool m

an I like chatting fishing with people

[Pat Burch]

Fishing has been very good over the last week. Water temp is down into low 70's and walleyes are getting more active. Lead core trolling is still producing the best. 28-32 feet depths