Minocqua Area Fishing Report
It is shaping up to be a regular summer, finally. Water temps are in the mid to upper 70’s (saw one lake hit 80 degrees on a warm Saturday). The higher water temps are pushing some fish deeper, while making others more active.
Largemouth Bass: Very good. The largemouth population continues to grow here in the Northwoods. With high populations, these bass are covering a large area and hitting a wide variety of live bait and lures. While large leeches and crawlers on 1/16 oz. weedless jig are hard for these bass to resist, don’t rule out artificial bait as well. Try working 3” Power Bait Ripple Shads and pre-rigged 6” worms over cabbage tops of 6-10’. Flukes and Breakin’ Shads are also hot right now. Yamamoto DH/T Grubs and Chompers skirted grubs rigged Carolina style as well as wacky worming Yum Dingers and Senkos when necessary to get into the weeds. With the hotter weather top-water action has picked up on both hard (Jitterbugs, Hula Poppers and Skitter Pops) as well as soft baits (Lunker Hunter Combat Frogs). The top-water action is best at dawn or dusk.
Bluegills: Very good. They can be found suspending around deep weed edges and on top of broad leaf cabbage in some areas. It’s a great time for poppers and dry flies as bluegills have been seen taking small insects off the surface in many locales. Small leeches, thunderbugs and worms can’t be passes up, even catching some larger gills on small minnows.
Smallmouth Bass: Good. Action is improving as the water warms up. While off-shore rock/gravel holding some fish, deep coontail edges providing better action to anglers drop-shotting Yum Crawbugs and Jackall crosstail shads. Look to 14-18’ edges for best action.
Musky: Good. Blades are working best. Bucktails and spinnerbaits over weeds in 8-12’, and despite movement deeper, don’t leave out shallow inside weed edges in as little as 3-5’ Topwater action is good with tail-type baits such as Pacemakers and Top Raiders scoring for evening anglers.
Walleye: Good. Got to play the sun and wind, but, walleyes relating to cabbage. Anglers working low light times using shallow running cranks to “tic” weed tops coming up with jarring strikes. The traditional jig and crawler or XL leech doing well as is slip bobbering the same baits into pockets of weeds. Deep rocks just starting to give up some fish. Use big leeches or crawlers on 1/8-1/4 oz. jigs.
Crappie: Good. Working deep curly leafed cabbage tops with small, flashy jigs such as Gapen’s Freshwater Shrimp, VMC’s Boottail or Curltail grubs or a jig/blade combo such as Northland’s Crappie Thumpers, Charlie Bees or Road Runners. Use these to locate crappies then relax with some small minnows and floats.
Perch: Good. Best sized fish deep over sandgrass flats of 14-22’. Try Lindy rig or slip-float with a frozen soft shell craw. Half a crawler will work when soft shells not available. Nice eaters of 10-12” with some near 13” caught this week.
With the exception of storms and occasionally too much wind, summer patterns are setting up nice.
Kurt Justice
Kurt’s Island Sport Shop