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The fish have not exactly been on fire over the last week; many of our anglers are reporting mediocre or hit and miss success on most lakes. There are some exceptions though with Basswood being one of them. For outside the BWCA, the walleye bite on White Iron has been more on than off, especially near the river mouth. The walleye are not very deep, 8-12 feet and hitting on both minnows and leeches with the success rate of the leeches getting better by the day. Snowbank has also been yielding some big walleyes, look for steep drop structure around areas like the 3Sisters Islands. Fish a large leech on a spinner of Jig or even a simple slip bobber.
Northern pike have not been as aggressive as usual, but big pike are still being caught regularly. You will find them in their usual haunts, the smaller snake pike are up shallower in weedy bays while the bigger fellas are a bit deeper, 10 feet or so, or patrolling the river mouths. Most pike anglers are targeting them with large sucker minnows or flashy spoons. Others are catchingthembyaccidentwhilefishing for small mouth or walleye.
Smallmouth are starting to move up on their beds. A crawfish pattern is going to be the most effective approach. Find shallow, rocky flats or 3-8 feet of water and jerk the crawfish crank bait over the rocks. If the bass are up on their beds, they will hit the crawfish out of nest protection and not only when they are hungry. A Keitech or Rapala soft plastic swim-baits will also produce great results. Ned Rigged or Whacky Rigged soft plastics will also be effective for both large and small mouth. Both methods are very snag resistant and easy to deploy. If you need a quick rundown or lesson on how to rig one of them, stop in and we will be glad to show youourselvesoryoucanwatchitonour continuous streaming instructional videos in the bait shop.
If you’re looking for lake trout, frozen smelt are the way to go, jigged at 30-50 feet of water on a large white and red tube jig, bucktail jig or large spoon. You can also troll large Reef Runners, (Wonder Bread pattern has been working quite well), or deep diving, large Salmos, or large spoons like Little Cleos or Dr. Spoon.
As June approaches and the beginning of summer sets in, more varied tactics like top water crank baits will become more and more effective for large and small mouth bass and northern pike. The minnow bite will begin to slow and the leech bite heat up.
