What Bait?

[Poutwhacker]

Looking fora little advice...My wife and I (and 2 Labs) are camping on Rainy next week on the U.S. side in Voyageurs NP (east of the Narrows). 

What is the current bite on? Leeches and worms or are you using minnows also?

Thanks

[Xplorer]

My .02,

We will be on Blueberry island this Saturday to Wednesday.  I am taking crawlers, leeches and plastics.  With the heat I'm not even attempting to keep minnows alive.  

Im in a black Tyee/175 Verado, will be all o er the east end for eyes and smallies. If you have a VHF give a shout on 16 for Xplorer and we can compare notes. 

Which site are you in next week?

[Tofishem]

Was up last weekend and crawlers were working for me. Used jigs or lindy rig. 2-1/2 ft leader.

[lzika]

Hi guys,

Five of us camped on Blueberry Island West from July 26-29th. We fished the main lake reefs in 24-35 fow. We had two boats. We averaged about 20 walleyes per day per boat-kept 10-12, 13″-16″ walleyes each day. Fishing was not fantastic, but ok. My boat fished more vertical with a jig/minnow and slip bobber. Our other boat fished lindy rigs exclusively with crawlers and leeches. Crawlers were a little better. My boat ended up with more eaters, but our other boat caught bigger walleyes-more 18″-25 inches.  We had two big fish fries, which is always a highlight for me while camping. We had beautiful weather.  The mosquitos came out each night around 9:00, so bring a screen tent if you have one. 

Good luck!

[Poutwhacker]

Thanks for the input. Sounds like the usual standard summer pattern.

Staying at Finlander. Tan Skeeter with 2 white labs in the bow...

Sounds like great weather coming up.

[Mike Walerak]

I was on Rainy all last week and leeches dominated for us.  Some on crawlers and a few on shiners.  Mostly ran Lindy Rigs and jigs.  Fished reefs all the way from Fox Islands to Blueberry and had roughly the same success all the way. Slow but steady. 

mw

[Xplorer]

Just got back late last nght from Blueberry Island. Weather was great, but was calling for a cold front and rain coming in overnight so took off while it was still decent.  I hate packing up wet when you're tent camping. 

Fishing was awesome!!  Over half of our fish were 19"+, with a ton of 19-21" fish. No big girls, 23.75 was the biggest. Leeches were better for me and my son but my wife caught her share on crawlers.  All we did was Lindy rig.

Had a great meal of fish on Monday night, and had plenty of eaters and there is also a good yearclass of 12" fish.  Good news for the future. 

Best depths for us were 29-34, with fish in 25' early in the morning. 

Fished all the way from the 3 sisters east to Kettle but mostly within 15 minutes of camp.  We did go out every night from after dinner to dark and fish smallies and pike along shorelines, caught numbers but not much size.  Had great fires each night and the mosquitos finally died down so we could sit out as long as we wanted.

Back up on Namakan next Thursday to Sunday on a "guys" trip. Hoping for even half as good of fishing as this trip 

Edited August 10, 2016 by Xplorer
Sp