Swenson Lake

[Roop-Dogg]

little crow angler,
i enjoy your posts. keep up the good job.
i dont have as much time to fish in the summer/fall as i used to. am able to get out qite a bit more in the winter tho. if i cant fish, i still enjoy reading other peoples posts. thanx.
i heard that they caught a lot of big crappies on swenson last winter. did you get in on that?
------------------
Roopy

[This message has been edited by Roop-Dogg (edited 11-21-2001).]

[The Little Crow Angler]

Roop-Dogg
Thank you for the kind words. I am not much of a ice fisherman as I used to be. I have never fished Swenson Lake for those Big Crappies thru the ice. Last spring we caught them close to shore using white ice ants with red dots. If you talk nicely to the owner of JB Lures, he might make you some with larger thin wired hooks. His business is by Wintrop,MN off of highway 15. Most ice flies are just not made big enough for crappies.
I used to make them with splitshot and white cut rubber made from Netcraft Lure company. The paint was sprayed on white epoxy. Again, I cannot say enough good things about JR Lures. He shared with me a few of his secrets on making rock hard jigs that really look good. For best results with crappie, go light-light with a small bobber shaped short and pencil like. They cast the best on a modified 8foot fly rod attached to an ultralight spinning reel. I really like to go as light as possible. Some fly rods are heavier than I like for holding any long period of time. Mike Oleson, out of Spicer makes beautiful custom made rods at a very reasonable price.(320-354-4646)
In the past, my friends and I went fishing almost every weekend all over the state in the wintertime. It currently is alot of work drilling lots of holes. The GPS has helped a great deal with the work recently however. My best crappie lakes were, RUSH,STAR,DEAD, LAC QUI PARLE,and SPIDER(by Nevis). UPPER RED has yet to be fished.
Question: Whatever happened to those huge sunfish Diamond Lake was famous for?? Is it that the weeds are so thick that they just are harder to catch??? That lake really used to be A-1 for walleyes and panfish. This was when the bullheads were rampant.

[This message has been edited by The Little Crow Angler (edited 12-01-2001).]

[The Little Crow Angler]

One of my buddies and I tried Swenson Lake for walleyes. After catching 5 walleyes of 14 to 15 inches(catch and release), my buddy who knows this lake quite well told me that on the north end we would see something not usually seen by most anglers.
The frogs were migrating into the lake. Following his directions we put on frog colored hula poppers and proceeded to catch 5 largemouth bass. This was a real enjoyment watching the swirls. All of them were released. Most were on the smaller side with one weighed out at 3 pounds. We tried a little deeper for walleyes but were unsuccessful. We graphed alot of fish suspended. This lake is relatively shallow but aerated in the winter. It is not fished very much, because of the sizable number of lakes in the area. It is 10 miles northwest of Willmar.
The water clarity is excellent. We were anchored and wished we had an underwater camera. It is at times like this that it sure would be fun to have. Guess what I want for Christmas??
One of my friends just got back from Lake Minnewaska. They limited out on the north side in 14 feet of water. I promised him I would not be too specific location wise. Hobo Park is an excellent place to launch your boat. It is just south of Starbuck.

[walleyewacker]

I have noticed the decline in the sunfish and walleyes in diamond the past year as well. Diamond is near the only lake I fish all summer long every weekend and I have been producing excellent numbers until this year, of walleyes. The main reason I beleive was the huge decline in a weed growth this summer. The weeds started late and never developed to full potential. This made fishing tough. All my summer spots were somewhat weed orientated and the same spots I could pull fish all summer were dead. This also led into suspended fish that I had to deal with.

[BLACKJACK]

I tried fishing Swenson for crappies a couple of times early last winter with no luck Guess I was in the wrong spot at the wrong time.

[The Little Crow Angler]

Blackjack:
You are correct about Swenson. It can be a hit and miss proposition. I tried it 2 times when first fishing the lake with the same results as you. On the third trip, my friend and I went again. We caught crappies. My friend is a real die in the wool ice fisherman who drills lots of holes. For the first hour, it was work-work-work. Each hole got about 10 minutes and then you moved to another hole. For 14 crappies, we really huffed and puffed. We marked the holes with pieces of wood. On the very next day, we caught 3. All of them were not even close to where we caught them the early evening before. Suspended crappies move around alot.
If I were going to do the trip again, I would of checked out each hole with an electronic fishfinder and not fish until I saw them. It is better after causing alot of commotion noise wise on the lake, to wait awhile. Stay away from other fishermen. Noise does scare fish, especially in shallow water lakes like Swenson. I have yet to catch Big crappie thru the ice on Swenson. In the spring, they seem to be bigger and definately easier to fish.

[This message has been edited by The Little Crow Angler (edited 12-01-2001).]

[BLACKJACK]

Checked out Swenson on the way home Friday, no ice yet, or even close. Also checked out Monson tonight, light ice on the bays, maybe a week of 20 degree weather would do it....

[32 degrees]

Walleyewacker, your right about the reduced weed growth on Diamond but I think the walleye populations benefitted from this. Fishermen struggled all summer long to locate fish on Diamond which means that the fish were in places a lot of people did not look. That means less fish were caught and this winter and next spring should be outstanding fishing. The late fall fishing has been spectacualar. All of the 12-14" walleyes we caught last winter have had the chance to grow up a little. Remember the story about me and my buddy at first ice last year when we caught 132 walleyes in three days with not one over 14"? This coming year is going to be fantastic. But
dont tell anybody.. hehe. As far as the sunfish go.... Man, what a bad subject to bring up. Diamond used to be great for sunnies and now she stinks!!! The crappies seem to be coming back a little but overharvest is a major problem for both of these fish. I really wish people would show more respect for the crappies and sunnies in Diamond. They both can get 'huge' if they are not slaughtered by greedy fish hogs. I hate to say it but the sunfish will never come back the way they were. Anyways, Diamond Lake has been my home my whole life and I hate to see the way the panfishing has suffered in recent years. Everyone loves catching those 2lb. crappies and 18 ounce
sunnies but please, but some back!!!!!!

[walleyewacker]

32,
I couldnt have said it better myself. Anglers and yes even I struggled with the walleyes this season. My years of fishing there I have never run across a situation where the only thing I catch is those 12-14 inchers like you said and nothing else. My biggest surprise was, who woulda thought you would be fishing suspended walleyes like they talk about on mille lacs and such on diamond lake. But thats what had to happen. This pop. boom secret is safe with me. And about those greedy people, I cant stand to see it. ESPECIALLY with the crappies. I have yet to hear of a crappie bite in the summer on the lake but the winter is a totally different story. But as far as this summer went, I did have a harder time with bass and northerns as well. But in this case, the ones I did get on to were above nomal size surprizingly. I guess nothing was norm this year really. Well if you see a 17 year old kid fishin in a new white lund every day he has a few hours to spare, its me. later