Chill Fishing Report

Cody Hill

If at first, you don’t succeed try and try again until you do! With the recent temperatures warming our local lakes the fish have become very aggressive but can be very selective. Keep changing baits and presentations until you find what works, and when it “slows” down start trying new things.

This past weekend I had the privilege of taking some Minnesota Gopher football players out fishing and it was awesome to watch them light up as they were catching fish in the Lund.  What customers don’t always see is the hours prior to the trip. I spent hours scouting the lake to find fish and spent hours trying about 10 different combinations of lures, baits, and presentations.  What was the winning presentation? A 1/16 oz black jig tipped with a leech casting over the schools of fish in 10-20 feet of water.

Using side scan on mid lake structure on a brand-new lake to me I found fish roaming in huge schools.  Lake was known for small mouth, so I was excited and started pitching jigs with a minnow. Then hair jigs with a minnow. Minnows were soon removed for about four different styles of plastics and colors. Still nothing!  

Finally, I looked in the rod locker and had an ultra-light I had been using to catch bluegills rigged with an itty bity jig and figured WHY NOT? Seconds later I was pulling in my first walleye of the day. The schools I was finding were all walleyes roaming saddles between sunken islands and were moving fast and if you caught one or two, they would move 50-100 feet in seconds.

Fishing is fishing and some days can be extremely tough even with all the technology in the boat. The one thing I have found is that if you don’t try something you will never know if it will work. Sunday, I had a group of three in the boat and when I arrived at the lake the water was floating with mayflies. I knew I was going to have to work hard that day. 

The previous bite was a plain lindy rig with a night crawler. Started with that nothing. Soon all three fishermen had something different on their lindy rig till we switched to jigs and leech like the day before.  

Seeing fish doesn’t always mean they will eat, and it is important to not get frustrated and keep moving till you find fish willing to bite. Right now, a lot of different presentations are working and the important thing is keep trying and if you don’t get any results keep moving and trying different spots because the next school might want what you are using.

Walleyes are starting to slide into mid lake structure but are not too far from the baitfish. Our best action came in that 10-14 feet of water on the edges of weed lines or sharp breaks. Walleyes were also over mid like sunken islands roaming but I believe they were just following bait fish because they were very suspended on top of structure. Small jigs with a leech worked best but when the wind picked up casting jigs with soft plastics produced fish also. When it was calm the walleyes were very spooky of the boat and longer casts were key to get away from the boat or lighter jigs to coax them into biting.

Bass were near cabbage, and I don’t claim to be a bass guy but our best luck came on hair jigs pitching near cabbage. Clumps of cabbage are holding fish and after a few casts move onto the next clump but save them on the GPS for later because they might be more active in the afternoon.

Bluegills were out deeper on the lakes I was fishing and we vertical jigged them with small jigs tipped with a piece of night crawler. I couldn’t believe it but we were catching bluegills full of eggs getting ready to spawn.  We would cover water trolling with a night crawler till we would find the schools then spot lock on top and vertical jig them.  Since we were out deeper, we didn’t have to move too often, and the fish were not spooked with the boat on top of them.

Rainbow trout has really started picking up as of lately but getting out early in the morning is the key for getting numbers of trout.  

July is right around the corner, and it is still not too late to plan those last-minute trips! Contact Cody today to book a trip that will make memories that will last a lifetime. 

For more information visit www.chillguideservice.com or call (218) 443-3813.