Jump to content
  • GUESTS

    If You  want access  to member only forums on FM, You will need to Sign-in or  Sign-Up now .

    This box will disappear once you are signed in as a member.

Detroit Lakes & Pelican Rapids Area Summer fishing reports


Recommended Posts

Last night my son and out went out for quick panfish trip to a local lake after dinner. Did not have any live bait but we usually do well tossing small jigs/plastics. Surprisingly we were the only boat at the landing and the only boat out fishing on this heavily developed lake. It did not take us long to find the huge sunnies. They were really stacked in 4-6'. The lake was pretty calm and we could hundreds of them swimming under the boat. We didn't stay there long but they were very aggressive. I had one that touched 10" and a few others over 9. We did not keep any. Looking for active crappies we went to spot number 2. Again going super shallow we could see quite a few in 2-3' around there beds. They of course were pretty spooky and did not like the boat being so close. We backed out and tossed into and around lilly pads. We ended up catching about a dozen. All released. I wish I wouldn't have left my phone in the truck as I would have loved to get a picture. Just amazing how black they are right now! Again didn't stay very long. Just a quick trip to scratch the itch..

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I made it out last Sunday and did some searching for walleye. The search didn't produce any walleyes, just northerns and smallies. The water temp on the main lake was 58-59 with the bays being about 5 degrees warmer. The people I have talked to have had similar issues finding the eyes. We missed some fish that left the shiner all chewed up. Most of the fish marked were out in that 18-21 foot range which seemed pretty deep for this early. It could have been Saturday's cold front that pushed them a little deeper though. 

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Made it out last Thursday morning, did very well on area lake pulling shiners. limited out on nice eyes. Went crappie fishing Friday afternoon at noon with son and a neighbor kid. Did awesome pitching plastics into 4-5 feet. Spent the rest of the weekend turkey hunting, graduations a deck work. Need to get back out soon......

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Been chasing crappies quite a bit with mixed success.  They did not stay shallow long but that was a fun bite while it lasted.  Now getting them out in that 7-10' range out from the spawning areas....they will be moving to the cabbage soon once it matures a little more.  Best presentation I've had success on is the Strike King Crappie Thunder plastic pink/chartruese on a 1/16oz VMC UV moon eye jig.  All the lakes I have been on are super clear and less weed growth than normal for some reason.   Tight lines...Be Safe!

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

Greetings,  Sorry I haven't been posting lately something happened and I could view but I couldn't reply to any topics.  Rick got me fixed now so we are all good.  With that being said I don't know how many people know there is a premium membership which gives you access to more detailed reports and I am one of the people who will be contributing to those reports.

I suck at walleye fishing and have only touched one so far this year and it was my girlfriends 18.25" which had to instantly go back into the lake.  I have tried a ton but haven't had one into the boat.  Hearing it has switched to a crawler or a leech bite and a lot of action under bobbers lately. 

Lately I have been trout fishing and been doing really well.  We've caught a lot of nice eaters which have been tasting amazing and also been catching some big boys for the smoker.  I've caught 2-22" ones being the biggest so far this season.  

Blue gill action has been on fire!  They are either tight to the reeds or hugging the edge of the weed lines.  Soft plastics and live bait have been working well for both  I'm hoping to get out soon and start focusing on catch and release only for those big gills.  

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Many of you FM long termers remember FisherDog from way back...he used to post all the time before he moved to Florida.  He was up for a couple days this past week and we got on a good crappie bite in the area, he is a Crappie Guru and man we worked hard but had fun...boated well over 100 in 2 days on the outside weed edges...many absolute Donkeys. Kept a few smaller ones so he could have a fish fry for his family...couple of pics...he's in the blue shirt.

735084487_bigppeter1(2).jpg.8ecbf2da4b13b1b1f6051a05dc81f4c5.jpg

1176965094_bigppeter2(2).jpg.5b4dd0968e55de4e5d0a197fde833615.jpg

  • Thumbs Up 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awesome...Always was wondering what happened to him on here.  Sounds like the crappies are on fire back home and here I'm working day 9 straight

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have been out a few times this past week. Catching a few crappies here and there, loads of nice sunnies. The lakes are super busy with the hot weather and pleasure boaters. Lake temps are in the low 80's. Monday night My son and I were pulling spinners and gulp when he caught this old skinny 30.5" eye. We put here back and will get a replica mount for him. He was so excited!

Jack 30.5 eye.jpg

  • Thumbs Up 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 'we have more fun' FishingMN Creators

I bet he was excited!  Congrats!

On 7/16/2018 at 6:10 PM, bbfenatic said:

Many of you FM long termers remember FisherDog from way back...he used to post all the time before he moved to Florida.  He was up for a couple days this past week and we got on a good crappie bite in the area, he is a Crappie Guru and man we worked hard but had fun...boated well over 100 in 2 days on the outside weed edges...many absolute Donkeys. Kept a few smaller ones so he could have a fish fry for his family...couple of pics...he's in the blue shirt.

735084487_bigppeter1(2).jpg.8ecbf2da4b13b1b1f6051a05dc81f4c5.jpg

1176965094_bigppeter2(2).jpg.5b4dd0968e55de4e5d0a197fde833615.jpg

How's Pete doing?  Nice crappies!

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

After a long 13 days straight of work we got out and did a little fishing!  Felt AMAZING to get back out on the water.  We chased panfish Saturday evening and pretty much struck out and went Sunday with the old man and got into a big ol mess of panfish.  Buddy of mine opened up his jig company in Vergas, MN and it's called Panfish Pirates, check him out on facebook.  Hes got a soft plastic called the Kraken that I have never seen before and boy did the fish eat them up!  We didn't use any live bait during the 6 hour trip out fishing and we landed hundreds of gills and crappies.  We landed 6 gills that were 9.5" sadly we couldn't find any big crappies even though the girlfriend lost one at the boat that was over 13".  Fish were on the edges of the weeds either lilly pads or down in the cabbage.  This Kraken has 3 legs behind it and it has natural bouyance within the plastic and it allows the jig to be swam through the weeds slower which was key yesterday.  Dad was in the front of the boat and a few times he had to stop and put his rod down because his arm hurt from fighting the fish and a few times his finger tips were hurting from taking the fish off of his hook but regardless he had a blast fishing.  We used 6 mm jigs tipped with the Kraken pitching from 4-14 feet of water.  Few times we were vertical jigging and my big blue gill pictured below came vertical jigging in about 12 feet of water.  All the gills were returned safely and only 6-7 crappies were taken home for dad to have a fish fry.  Pike must have been starving because I had about 6 blue gills get attacked by pike at the boat as i was bringing them in!

20180722_131336.jpg

20180722_132327.jpg

  • Thumbs Up 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

He's doing well...even talking about getting to the point he may consider buying a an ocean boat which is quite an investment...they bought a nice condo on a lake up here but this year only got up here this one time...he's looking forward to the kids getting into college and/or a little more independent so he can spend more time up here..and that is not far away....time flies!  He is definitely coming up to ice fish this winter...that's his real passion.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 'we have more fun' FishingMN Creators

Good to hear.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • The title was changed to Detroit Lakes & Pelican Rapids Area Summer fishing reports

Got out Saturday evening around the Dent area.  Fishing weed lines with jigs and plastics.  Crappies and Gills were a little inactive but still managed a few to bite.  We will be targeting them for the next 2 weeks for a tournament so hopefully we can get a few more to bless us with their appearances.  Saw a few guys up next to reeds dropping lines down like cane poles catching a few for the dinner table.  Heard they slowed some but then my buddies on a different lake are showing them on fire.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Got out fishing Saturday mid day to try to catch some Gills.  I tried about 4 or 5 different spots in the wind till I finally found them in one spot.  Vertical jigging with a jig and plastic was the key presentation.  Girlfriend landed 5 gills over 9 inches long in the 6 hours we were out there.  Was a blast.  Few crappies were mixed in but they were either 12" plus or 8" or less.  Orange Cream Kraken from Panfish Pirate was the go to color and lure.  I tried every other color and the girlfriend just kept catching them left and right.  Needless to say we have 2 more saturday's remaining so we will hopefully get up there on Saturday and catch a few more.  She was 16th with her online tournament as of Saturday morning and as of last night she was 2nd and only trailing by 0.25" so it's time to get serious. 


Sunday we tried south of town a ways and got into a mixed bag.  First place we tried we caught 2 small mouths and a walleye.  Tried a few other spots and we were getting a mixed bag of fish.  Other than a pike and a perch we caught 6 species of fish.  Most were caught on jig and plastic.  Nothing big for gills but we caught a bunch of 12-14" crappies that were instantly released.  Attached are a few pics from this weekend.

20180804_144322.jpg

20180804_162558.jpg

20180805_131112.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Fished Saturday central Becker County lake for panfish.  5 mm Panfish Pirate jigs with Push Up (Orange Cream) Kraken plastics were the ticket.  Got out there after eating breakfast in Frazee and the fish were biting instantly.  We landed a ton of big gills and upgraded the girlfriend from who had 5 sunfish 8.5"-8.75" up to 9.0" then as we kept fishing we upgraded 9.0 up again to 9.25".  She was excited to say the least.  She probably landed 20 gills 9.0" or greater on saturday alone.  She landed a few 9.5" and they were denied via the photo because the nose wasn't touching the front of the board which is hog wash but it is what it is.  Saturday no wind water temps were 81.0 and fish were up in the weeds tight!  Didn't keep anything and fished till about 2 ish.


Sunday I took my father and his friend out from Texas.  His friend doesn't fish much so when he had my top of the line UL rod in his hands he didn't know what to think.  Didn't take long though and he was on fire.  We each took a different color and I put dad on Push Up but they wanted Bubble Gum (Pink Cream).  I did get a few on Moby (White) but Push Up was the key color again.  We ended up only fishing from 9 till 11 and kept 8 bigger gills from 8.5-9" all the big boys were thrown back but enough for a few meals of fish is all we were going for and we accomplished that goal.  

 

We will be hopefully fishing Friday evening if I can get off of work early enough and Saturday.  Tournament ends on Saturday so trying to upgrade a 9.25 to a 9.5" to hopefully secure 1st place in the tournament.  

 

A more detailed report is in the Members Only page and I encourage people to please become a member and a lot of people are putting some really great reports on there for the members.


Have a great week!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The tournament the girlfriend has been fishing ended Saturday night so we were able to take off early Friday and make it out for an evening bite and again Saturday morning.


Friday night fishing was good but a lot of 6-7" gills but we did land a few 9.75" and 9.5" gills.  Really tough bite had to cover LOTS of water to find them.

 

Saturday morning the crappies moved in and were really aggressive but they were 6-8" with only a handful over 10". We landed a few more 9.5" but we had to cover miles of shoreline jigging trying to find them.  Boats next to us weren't even catching a blue gill it was a tough bite.  Very negative bite.

 

We left the water Saturday and was instantly approached by the game warden.  I was working on my trailer prior to loading the boat and he was asking the typical questions about fishing because he's seen my trailer very often at the access.  He was pleasantly surprised that we didn't keep a fish.  He said everyone has been keeping limit after limit and he's seeing the size drop from almost 9" average down to a group that morning had kept 7" for 4 limits.  Told him we kept 8 fish last Saturday for some meals and that was it in the 3 weeks we've been fishing up there, needless to say I think he was shocked and proud that people weren't just taking limit after limit home.

 

Tournament ended Saturday night at midnight for the girlfriend.  The app keeps track of everyone's best 10 fish and her length at the end of the tournament was 95.5" which puts her in first place. Second place is at 91.5" and third place 91.25" so unless something major happens and they don't like our pictures she should have the win!  It was interesting in the beginning to be excited for 8" gills then after we got 10 of them they jumped to 8.5" then to 9.0" then 9.25" then pushing for 9.5".  Was a lot of fun.  I believe she has 2-9.25" and 4-9.5" with remaining being 9.75".  The final 10 fish were all caught in Becker County on one lake and were let go to swim again.  I stress a lot catch and release and keeping only what you want or NEED for a meal but during this tournament we caught the same fish 4 times.  He is blind in his right eye, big beautiful blue gill and I caught him week ago Saturday and again Sunday and the girlfriend repeated me on Saturday and Sunday this weekend.  Each time he measure 9.25" so we either caught the same fish 4 times or we caught 4 different gills all the same length in the same area of the lake.

 

All fish were also caught on Panfish Pirate 5 mm lead jig in Lipstick color with either Push Up or Bubble Gum soft plastic Kraken.  We are waiting for an official announcement from the organizers that these scores are official and I'll report back at that time!

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Went out Sat Sept 1st and found the crappies just outside the Cabbage in a little deeper water...also found some suspended on the depth finder half way down schooled in 25' but they were not active...the feeders were still hanging around the cabbage and the big ones were plumb full of minnows...kept a limit for a fish fry and let the big ones go...pics of a couple of the big ones...my buddy holding a 13" and me holding a 14.5" before releasing.

1447766288_MikeS.BigPine.jpg.d169d34bf9da1cbc98b4bddd682b0ea9.jpg

1500540119_IMG_20180901_184635985_HDR(1).thumb.jpg.f8ef1c959a43974854382bece23eea1f.jpg

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Restore formatting

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.



  • Your Responses - Share & Have Fun :)

    • Brianf.
      I'm not there, so I can't tell exactly what's going on but it looks like a large area of open water developed in the last day with all of the heavy snow on the east side of wake em up Narrows. These two photos are from my Ring Camera facing north towards Niles Point.  You can see what happened with all of snow that fell in the last three days, though the open water could have been wind driven. Hard to say. .  
    • SkunkedAgain
      Black Bay had great ice before but a few spots near rockpiles where there were spots of open water. It looks like the weight of the snow has created a little lake in the middle of the bay.  
    • LakeofthewoodsMN
      On the south end...   Thanks to some cold spring weather, ice fishing continues strong for those still ice fishing.  The bite remains very good.  Most resorts have pulled their fish houses off for the year, however, some still have fish houses out and others are allowing ATV and side by sides.  Check social media or call ahead to your favorite resort for specifics. Reports this week for walleyes and saugers remain excellent.   A nice mix of jumbo perch, pike, eelpout, and an occasional crappie, tullibee or sturgeon being reported by anglers. Jigging one line and using a live minnow on the second line is the way to go.  Green, glow red, pink and gold were good colors this week.     Monster pike are on a tear!  Good number of pike, some reaching over 45 inches long, being caught using tip ups with live suckers or dead bait such as smelt and herring in 8 - 14' of water.   As always, work through a resort or outfitter for ice road conditions.  Safety first always. Fish houses are allowed on the ice through March 31st, the walleye / sauger season goes through April 14th and the pike season never ends. On the Rainy River...  The river is opened up along the Nelson Park boat ramp in Birchdale, the Frontier boat ramp and Vidas boat ramp.  This past week, much of the open water skimmed over with the single digit overnight temps.   Areas of the river have popped open again and with temps getting warmer, things are shaping up for the last stretch through the rest of the spring season, which continues through April 14th.   Very good numbers of walleyes are in the river.  Reports this week, even with fewer anglers, have been good.  When temps warm up and the sun shines, things will fire up again.   Jigs with brightly colored plastics or jigs with a frozen emerald shiner have been the desired bait on the river.  Don't overlook slow trolling crankbaits upstream as well.   Good reports of sturgeon being caught on the river as well.  Sturgeon put the feed bag on in the spring.  The bite has been very good.  Most are using a sturgeon rig with a circle hook loaded with crawlers or crawlers / frozen emerald shiners. Up at the NW Angle...  Ice fishing is winding down up at the Angle.  Walleyes, saugers, and a number of various species in the mix again this week.  The bite is still very good with good numbers of fish.  The one two punch of jigging one line and deadsticking the second line is working well.   Check with Angle resorts on transport options from Young's Bay.  Call ahead for ice road guidelines.  
    • CigarGuy
      With the drifting, kind of hard to tell for sure, but I'm guessing about a foot and still lightly snowing. Cook end!
    • PSU
      How much snow did you get on Vermilion? 
    • Mike89
      lake here refroze too...  started opening again yesterday with the wet snow and wind...  very little ice left today...
    • Hookmaster
      A friend who has a cabin between Alex and Fergus said the lake he's on refroze. He texted me a pic from March 12th when it was open and one from 23rd when it wasn't. 🤯
    • SkunkedAgain
      I don't think that there has been any ice melt in the past few weeks on Vermilion. Things looked like a record and then Mother Nature swept in again.   I'll give my revised guess of April 21st
    • leech~~
      As I get older it's really not just about sending bullets down range.  Some of it's just the workmanship of the gun and the wow factor. The other two guns I have really wanted which I'll never have now because of their price, is a 8mm Jap Nambu and 9mm German Luger.   Just thought they always looked cool!  
    • jim curlee
      I had a guy hit me with a lightly used 1969 BAR, he wanted $1650 with an older Leupold scope. More than I think they are worth, I made an offer, he declined end of story.   You know if you look at the old brochures, a grade II BAR sold for $250 in the late 60s, $1650 would be a good return on your investment.    Why would anybody want a 50 year old gun, they are heavy, have wood stocks, and blued metal.  I guess mainly to keep their gun safes glued to the floor. lol   You can probably buy a stainless rifle that you never have to clean, with a synthetic stock you never have to refinish, is as light as a feather, and for half as much money, perfect.   I'm too old for a youth gun, although I've shrunk enough that it would probably fit. lol   No Ruger 10/44s.   Jim      
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.