Metro Area Report 9-13 to 9/20
What a last couple of weeks of weather changes is all I can say! Sorry its been a while from my last report I had some vehicle issues early last week. Now those are taken care of and I have a new set of wheels I’ve been back on the grind here in the metro area! The only thing I have found consistent this last weeks in nothing is consistent! We went from dropping temps to rain now to a warm up, this has really thrown these fish into a funk! I thought the fall patterns would be starting soon but the warm up sent a lot of the water temps back up into the mid 70’s! The fish will still eat though you just may need to work for them a little harder!
We will start with the bass bite! I have found them very spread out, some deep and some still shallow! Now the bigger bass I’ve seen and had clients catch seem to be coming from the deeper water. We did catch a lot of cookie cutter 2lbers that were schooled up shallow chasing on bait however the bigger fish I found were in that 15’-20’ range on steep breaks! Also when the temps were dropping they seemed to really take to rocky areas. Best approach to get the deep ones was drop shots! I like to fish a 5” finesse worm or seiko on a 1/8-3/8oz drop weight depending on the wind. The lighter you can go the better I feel, as long as you can feel bottom. Also the schoolers you could see breaking on the surface chasing bait the best approach was throwing topwater plugs! If they struck and missed throw a small plastic jerk shad to follow it and generally these fish will eat! You can tell when these schools are eating because the gills will be breaking on the surface. Its simple cast to where they are breaking and you will get bit a lot of the time! We have had a few caught on dragging live bait for walleyes. The one picture I pulled that bass from 22’ and a muskie latched on!!
Now to the walleye bite…. Well it has picked up from what the dog days of summer had been. Most the walleyes that we have caught have been off the deeper breaks in 17’-24’ fow. The best approach I have found is using a one two punch. I’ll start with lead core and find the areas the fish are on and if they don’t eat the crank baits, Ill then run over them with a live bait rig with a shiner. Pulling lead I will troll generally between 2.2mph and 2.5mph. With the live bait rigs I go very slow! The max I go when pulling these is around 1 mph. Any faster I find the bait rolling. When doing this method the bait has to be alive I’ve found or it will roll! One more method that has gotten some in low light periods is just the standard jig and minnow in the shallows however this has not been a top producer. As the water temps start to cool these fish should start pulling up shallow and feeding heavy! Fall is my favorite time of the year to catch a trophy walleye!
Thank you to all who read my reports and like and share my page! Tight lines everyone the fall smackdown is nearing so don’t put your boats away yet best fishing can be once the docks are pulled!!
