Better Late Than Never

Here's a picture of Leech Lake taken by my neighbor John Newman from my property looking south in early December. The ice is already 10-inches thick and is blanketed with nearly a foot of snow. I haven't received any ice-angling updates from either John, or Tom Malay, so for this post I'll dig back into my notes from my mid-October visit. I know, that's nearly two months ago, but that trip did provide some excellent late season walleye fishing. Better late than never.

Day 1: Friday, Oct. 12, 2007
I arrived in Bemidji around 4:30 p.m. CT and proceeded to go straight from the airport to Gander Mountain. My goal was to buy an aeration unit for my minnow bucket because I planned to buy a scoop of shiners, and without a good supply of oxygen, shiners tend to die over night. After my stop at Gander, I made a stop at the grocery store, liquor store and finally, Bluewater Bait. I picked up two scoops of fatheads and one (very generous) scoop of shiners. Once home the shiners went into the aerated minnow bucket and out to the cold of the garage. Just the ticket to keep shiners alive.

Day 2: Saturday, Oct. 13, 2007 (Happy Birthday Melissa)
I awoke to a beautiful day with a light wind out of the southwest under partly sunny skies. John and I drifted from Second Duck Point to the "Birches" several times pulling fatheads on Northland Fireball jigs and Johnson Beetle spins with very limited success. John caught a few small perch and I was skunked. Rarely do I have to use this old saw, but today it was right on the money, "the worst day fishing is better than the best day working." It's rare that I don't catch anything, but today was one of those days. Still, I love being out on the water of Leech Lake.

Day 3: Sunday, Oct. 14, 2007
I didn't record the exact weather conditions for this day, but I can say it was windy (small white caps) from the north. I fished by myself in my Lund Pro V 1800 IFS using jigs and shiners and had a much better day. I caught five beautiful walleye, including a very nice 24-incher. I also caught a perfect 'eater' walleye -- 16 1/2 inches -- that I kept for dinner.

Day 4: Monday, Oct. 15, 2007
Today I fished with Tom Malay. That outing yielded only a few perch, but it was fun to be out on the water with Tom. I always enjoy angling with Mr. Malay -- either in a boat or on the hard water. After returning to shore for a mid-afternoon snack, I went back out onto the water by myself to battle the cold (mid-40s) and windy (20 mph winds from the north) conditions. As is often the case, these nasty conditions can provide some of the year's best fishing. I caught four walleye in about 1 1/2 hours, including a nice 23-inch beauty.

Day 5: Tuesday, Oct. 16, 2007
Went out onto the water myself again today and caught five more walleyes. All were caught on 1/4-ounce, long-shank shiner jigs (that I purchased at Cass Lake's only bait and tackle shop, Froggy's) tipped with shiners. The fish were fairly well dispersed between the "Birches" and Second Duck Point, including a nice 24-incher caught right in front of my house.

Day 6: Wednesday, Oct. 17, 2007
Another solo trip out onto the cold and choppy water. Water temperatures had dropped to around 50 degrees, and the air temperature was a good 5-10 degrees cooler. The wind had calmed some, but there was still a good "walleye chop" to the lake. I caught four eyeballs using the same jig and shiner set-up as the previous day. The biggest fish of the day was a 23-inch beauty taken in front of the Newman's cabin. It was an interesting catch because as I was drifting along I felt the classic "weight" on my line, so I let out 20-30 feet of 6-pound, Trilene XT line from my Shimano Symetre, closed the bail, set the hook and BANG, the walleye was on. But before I could get the walley' in the boat, it came off the hook. I quickly began reeling in the jig for another pass over the spot. The jig was in sight, a foot or so under the surface, when I saw a flash! The walleye, or a walleye, appeared, inhaled my jig and shiner, turned and headed toward the bottom. This time I didn't mess around with feeding him any line and instead immediately set the hook. A few quick turns of the handle on my reel later, I netted a beautiful golden walleye. That's the first time I had a walleye chase my minnow back to the boat. It behaved more like a largemouth bass that a finicky walleye. A great way to finish another day out on Sucker Bay.

Day 7: Thursday, Oct. 18, 2007
This is beginning to sound a bit redundant, but I fished alone again today, there was a slight chop to the cool water and the weather was cold and grey. But the fishing was again good. I caught several perch and four more nice walleyes. I didn't keep any, but I did finally clean the fish I had caught earlier in the week. I planned to have a nice Friday-night fish fry.

Day 8, Friday, Oct. 19, 2007 (Happy Birthday Kathleen)
I had planned on pulling the boat out of the water today, but it was so windy that all on-water activities were scrapped. No fishing today. I spent the day cleaning up around the house, and began the "winterization" process for the house and cabin. For dinner I had a fantastic meal of walleye fillets! Mmmmm.

Day 9, Saturday, Oct. 20, 2007
The forecast for today was light winds in the early morning, but picking up as the day went on. Therefore, I decided to pull the boat out of the water early. By 8 a.m. John Newman and I were on the water's edge putting my boat onto the trailer. By 10:30 a.m. I had pulled the boat out of the water, cleaned out all the tackle, rods, and other miscellaneous items on board, drove into town and dropped it off at Corner Sports where she'll be housed for the winter. Later that day I cleaned out the gutters of the house and did various other chores before joining John Newman and his boys out in the woods for a beer and a look at his new deer stand (the picture below). We then all went home, got cleaned up and went to the Ottertail Peninsula Fall potluck. I can't believe this was my seventh potluck. I'm getting to be an old-timer.

Day 10: Sunday, Oct. 21, 2007
More cleaning around the house -- fireplace, bathrooms, kitchen, etc. Around 3:30 p.m., Tom called and asked if I wanted to go out fishing one last time before heading back to California. You bet I did! By 4 p.m. Tom and I were out on Sucker Bay trolling Rapala Minnow Rap crank baits. We only had one good hit. Just before dark I had a big fish on. The way it fought and rolled, both Tom and I thought I'd hooked a northern pike. Since neither of us like having "northern slime" in our boats, I reached for the fish glove so I could take the "snake" off the hook without bringing him into the boat. But as the fish got close to the boat, we could see it wasn't a northern at all, but a big walleye. Quickly we scrambled for the net, but too late. The momentary slack in the my line was all the time the big eyeball needed to unbuttoned himself from my lure. We both got a good look at the fish, and by our humble estimates, we put him at roughly 25-inches. We didn't get the fish in the boat, but it was nice to hook a big walleye one last time on open water in 2007. The next day Tom drove me to the airport and I caught a plane to Minneapolis then San Jose. As I type this I am already looking forward to my visit to Leech Lake in February for some hard-water angling. More then. <*)))><

Summer Update

I visited Leech Lake in mid-July and then again the week after Labor Day. The walleye fishing during July was good, but most of the walleye caught came while trolling Rapala Minnow Raps in the evening.

The fishing during the week after Labor Day was fantastic!! Once again "the Birches" proved to be the hot spot. In addition to a plethora of perch, the Birches held a good number of good sized walleyes and an amazing number of pound-plus crappie. One early afternoon, my daughter Melissa and I found a large school of hungry crappie and we managed to coax dozens of the paper lips to bite our jig and plastic presentations. Both Melissa and I were using 1/8 ounce Lindy Techni-Glo Max Gap jig heads tipped with 3-inch Northland Slurpie Swim 'n' Grubs in Firetiger Cutworm and Crawfish Cutworm colors. We kept 9 of the beauties which was enough for two separate fish fries. Very tasty.

My new boat (pictured above with me at the helm) performed perfectly after the early-season repairs to fix a leaky seal around the front livewell pump. Everything from the livewells to MinnKota Maxxum Pro 80 electric trolling motor to the SmartCraft features on the Mercury Verado motor performed without a hitch. With the addition of the SportTrak brackets on the gunwales, I could attach rod holders on either side of the boat, which made trolling even easier (if that's possible!).

We had very enjoyable visits with our neighbors the Malays and the Newmans, and even had a visit from my parents, who joined us from their home in Grayslake, Illinois. Come on now, no FIB jokes.

I'll be at the lake again in mid-October. Sometime after that visit I'll file my final fishing update of the 2007 open-water season. Until then, may you stay loose and your lines stay tight.

Leech Lake Memorial Day Visit, 2007

My first open-water visit to Leech Lake occurred during the Memorial Day weekend. My good friend Rick, who now lives in Brisbane, Australia, met me in the Minneapolis airport and we flew from there to Bemidji on the same flight.

Once in Bemidji, we went to Corner Sports to pick up my new boat (that's it pictured with Rick). We couldn't launch the boat until Sunday, May 27, because of poor weather. Once the boat was in the water I unfortunately found several things that were wrong with it. Not the least of which was a leak around the fore livewell intake that forced the automatic bilge to turn on every 15-20 minutes. I've been assured by John Brake at Corner Sports that he will have the boat repaired, and fully watertight, before my return in early July.

2007 Minnesota Walleye Opener

Today is walleye opener in Minnesota. As is tradition, the Governor of the state selects one lake within the state to host the Governor's Fishing Opener, and this year Leech Lake is that lake. Here is some early coverage of the 2007 Governor's Fishing Opener.

My Top 5 Leech Lake Fishing Experiences (so far)

In July 2006, Kathleen and I celebrated our fifth year of having a cabin on Leech Lake. We've had countless memorable experiences during that time, in all seasons. But since I have a special affinity for fishing, I thought I'd take a look back at my top 5 most memorable fishing moments during the past 5+ years. So in reverse order, here we go:

#5: I've known my friend Rick since high school. He was the best man at my wedding. So for his birthday in 2003 I decided that there was no better way to celebrate it than on the water hunting big muskies. I took no chances and hired famed Leech Lake guide Al Maas to lead the expedition. At approximately 10:30 a.m. on a clear, sunny September day with just the hint of a breeze, Rick hooked into his first-ever muskie; a fantastic 50 1/2" horse. Check the February, 2005 archives for a picture of this beautiful fish.

#4: My son Joe and I have enjoyed many fishing trips on Leech Lake -- hot summer mornings fishing for bass, cool autumn evenings trolling for walleyes, and many days on the ice hooking jumbo perch. But in May 2003, just after walleye opener, we had a particularly memorable fishing experience. I had read that casting crank baits and jerk baits in shallow water just after dark was a good way to target post-spawn 'eyes. On this evening, Joe and I decided to venture no further than the end of our dock to try our luck. We both were casting Rapala Husky Jerks (Joe was using the jointed model) and we absolutely nailed some big fish. We both caught our limit of beautiful walleyes in the span of no more than 45 minutes! We kept only two eater sized fish, which we did indeed eat. There's nothing better than freshly caught walleyes for dinner.

#3: I've often written here about my good friend and neighbor Tom Maley. It was with Tom and his son Sean that I had one of my two most memorable ice fishing experiences. It was Easter Sunday 2004, and we made it out onto the lake a little past noon. The weather was perfect -- sunny, temps near 40 degrees, no wind. Just the same, we set up Tom's portable fish house and went to work. It was one of those bites that you have maybe once or twice per season if you're lucky. Between the three of us, we must have caught several hundred jumbo perch. Each of us hooked into several perch weighing more than a pound. Sean caught a 1.4 pounder, and Tom caught a beauty that was 14 inches long. We kept 15-20 of the medium-sized fish and had a wonderful perch dinner to celebrate Easter.

#2: My second most memorable fishing experience on Leech Lake happened just a month ago, the winter of 2007. I won't go into detail here, but rather direct you to my March 1, 2007 post.

#1: My number one fishing memory occurred in mid-July 2004. I have always enjoyed the outstanding bass fishing on the lake -- an often overlooked species on Leech Lake -- and one of my favorite ways of pursuing the bucketmouth is using a Texas-rigged, unweighted 5" Senko on spinning gear spooled with braided line. With this set up, I began fishing a patch of reeds on the east side of Sucker Bay. After a number of casts I caught my first bass, a nice 2 1/2 pounder. On my very next cast I had another strike. This fish mangled my Senko pretty bad so I replaced it, and cast the new lure back into the reeds. Right away another strike. After 10 casts I had hooked 10 nice bass. I couldn't believe it, 10 for 10. But my luck didn't stop there. Fifteen casts, 15 fish. My amazing streak ran to 21 bass on 21 consectutive casts before I finally cast and didn't hook a fish. I was actually laughing out loud at this point. I had never had such a run with any type of fishing, let alone big bass. And to this day, I've never had this type of run on the open water. That's why this particular angling experience is my most memorable.

Hot Ice Action

The ice fishing action on Leech Lake's Sucker Bay was 'hot' during the final 10 days of February. My son Joe and I spent President's Day week ice angling for jumbo perch and we were not disappointed.

As usual, I was fortunate enough to be in the company of my neighbors and good friends Tom Malay and John Newman. We fished primarily two spots: in front of Newman's house and at "The Birches." See my July 13, 2006 entry for more on "The Birches."

The fishing in front of the Newman's was slow and produced relatively small perch; hardly a keeper among the fish caught. But when we moved John's fish house (see picture below) to "The Birches," the entire situation changed dramatically for the better.

On Wednesday, February 21, Joe and I fished from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. CT and caught in excess of 200 jumbo perch!! As fast as we could put our fathead minnows on our lures and drop them into the holes in the ice, we were hooking fish. The action was so fast and furious that at one point Joe quipped, "I wish they'd stop biting for just a minute so I could get something to drink."

We were using fairly standard ice fishing lures. Joe was using a Lindy 1/16 oz. Techni-Glo Frostee Jigging Spoon in glow red, while I was using a Northland Eye-Dropper jig in a golden perch color. Both lures were baited with the common fathead minnow, which we purchased at Froggy's Sports in Cass Lake, MN. We bought four scoops of minnows (and for those you familiar with the area, the scoops at Froggy's are twice the size you used to get at Leroy's Minnows) and we still nearly ran out of bait during the week.

Despite the enormous amount of perch we caught, Joe and I kept only 8 fish (see picture above), just enough for a hearty meal. As I've written here before, there is nothing better than a meal of fish caught, cleaned and cooked within a matter of hours. And when those fish come through the ice, they somehow taste even better.

In addition to the perch, we also hooked our fair share of northerns and one 5-6 lb. eel pout.

All in all, another fantastic ice-angling adventure on Leech Lake.

Leech Lake Water Level Remains Low

The water level in Leech Lake is well below where it was a year ago, and significantly lower than it was in the spring of 2006. From April to June of last year we had relatively normal water levels in the lake. But the lack of rainfall during the summer, and the unseasonably hot temperatures, led to extensive evaporation and thus the lowering of the lake's water level. Click here to see a graph of the water level in Leech Lake during the past 12 months. The graph is from the Army Corps of Engineers at Federal Dam, MN.

Newman's Ice Angling Success

Here's a recent update on the Leech Lake ice-angling action from my friend and neighbor, John Newman:

"The weather was mild and perfect for outdoor action. The fish house performed beyond my wildest expectations in terms of comfort, ease of use, conviviality and, above all, angling success. We all caught plenty of perch all day long. Each evening from approximately 4:00 to 5:00 p.m. our 'Walleye Power Hour' produced exciting walleye action. Karen battled a 22-inch beauty to a successful finish, and I caught a nice walleye of approximately the same length; plus several eater size wallies were kept. Mixed in with the walleye were several eelpout. All in all it was a fabulous winter getaway that culminated with a picturesque 3-inch, day-long snowfall on Friday, December 29. With light winds and mild temperatures hovering around 30 degrees, it was a magical way to cap off of a great family fishing excursion."

NOTE: The fish house to which John refers, and is pictured below, was designed and built by John himself. I look forward to spending several hours in the warmth of the Newman fish house this February when my son Joe and I visit Leech Lake for some hard-water angling excitement.