(00:00:00) I think we're going to talk about fall fishing today. But with the temperatures are forecast for this weekend. I'm not sure that's going to be very accurate description Chad Myers fishing enthusiasts and co-author with several other guys of the book called bass and in fisherman Handbook of strategies, which is now on it's probably what 15 to 16th printing something like that. Uh-huh. Is it with us today? We used to talk with Chet around the time of the fishing opener when everybody's thinking and getting excited about fishing in the spring of the year, but fishing can also be a pretty engaging fall Pastime as well. So if you are an angler and want to visit with chat about fishing today, we will pop up the phone lines and just a moment and give you that opportunity chat. Let us chat for just a few moments here first about the sort of a post-mortem on the summer fishing season the impact of the drought and low lake levels on fishing what happened. Well, I'm not sure exactly I didn't spend a lot of time fishing summer was so hot and I don't think a lot of people did it was very uncomfortable. The interesting thing. Is that water levels. We're different throughout the state. I did spend some time in the Boundary Waters and they happen to get when we did have rain through the state as you notice through your weather reports that came through the northern part of the state. And we also didn't experience a lot of fire hazard in that area. So the water levels were up in the fishing was generally pretty good in the central part of the state and particularly around the Twin Cities in the lower part. It was hot and that made fishing uncomfortable. I don't think it bothered the fish too much there were some fish kills early in the year and that occurred on those hot calm days when there was a lot of calm weather and a lot of hot weather the Lakes deoxygenated in the fish will die off particularly. Some of the pan fish. There were a lot of big fish kills on the city lakes in terms of crappies and bluegills, but luckily when it was hot. It was also windy most of the summer. So the Lakes did get oxygen so we didn't lose as many fish as we could have but I think it was probably the fish were probably fine. It was just probably too uncomfortable for the Anglers to be out and doing a lot of fishing. Well, I remember hearing in the news of Deal of reports at some point this summer about a lot of fish kill on Lake Pepin in the rivers. There were there was a much bigger fish kill in there in the rivers. That's true has things have things come back to normal pretty much now that the rain is back somewhat, I think so the lakes are experiencing their turnover. They've already turned over in the northern part of the state and they will be turning over in this part of the state pretty soon. I think some of the shallow Lakes have and that usually is an indicator that the cold weather fishing season is here and that's a really good good time to be out fishing and I think levels have come up a little I know on area lakes because of the rain that we're still down quite a bit. I think the water table is still a lot lower than it than it's been in a long time and we need a good need a lot of snow and heavy wet snow this winter and some light spring rain so that the that water can sink into the water table not just simply run off, but I think the lakes are in terms of level summer coming back, but they're still below normal in this part of the state. Sure, for those who are unfamiliar with the term turnover? What does that mean in the lake? Well, it causes a lot of confusion and it's it's an interesting phenomenon that occurs in our lakes in Minnesota. Actually, it occurs in leaks all over the country. What happens is that in the summer you have a thermal climb develops in the lake which is a it's a dense layer of water that sort of compressed that separates the top part of the lake from the bottom part of the lake and the interesting thing about that is that it impedes the oxygenation of lower levels of the lake so that in in Lakes where there are a lot of weeds and lakes that are not real deep maybe 30 40 feet deep the lower levels candy oxygenate in the summer particularly and that's what causes the fish kills particularly during those hot calm periods. And the fish will die off that thermocline breaks down as the waters cool off in the fall and allows the oxygenation from the wind and stuff to And go through the rest of the lake and that really is a big change in Fish locations. So you can find fish in certain places all summer long and then about the time of the turnover which in I just talked to Marv kept up north who runs the the kept guiding service up there. He said the Lakes turned over there the last week in August and at that time for about a week or two the fish are very disoriented the fishings awful. In fact, I wouldn't even go out during the turnover and fish but after that turnover has occurred the lake settle down again there re oxygenated throughout and the fishing really starts to pick up and can be really good and that's when you're good early fall fishing starts and that's that's what we're getting into right now and the fish are real active and the big Northerns become active for the first time all summer big bass big wall as you get a lot of good fishing this time of year. Did you get some indication from their fellow you talk to how the fishing is up north fishings doing very, well. He said that they of course the patterns differ from different lakes, but he said in some Lakes they were catching walleyes and doing real well and 30 feet and some Lake Mille Lacs has turned over I understand and I think they're getting fish in seven to 10 feet up there now. So the fishings really good. The the reason I love the fall fishing Bubba's we've got the lakes to ourselves. I mean after Labor Day people go away and it's a wonderful time to be at it's a beautiful time of year to be out and you have you don't have to competition with water skiers and windsurfers and things like that and it's amazing to be out on a lake just completely by yourself. I was out on Calhoun just a week ago and after battling windsurfers most of the year if you wanted to fish it was just it was a beautiful evening and it was not one boat on the lake and a city of you know, however many thousand hundred thousand. There are in Minneapolis. Nobody on the lake fishing. Hmm. It's great check Myers is with us. And if you have a fishing question for him today, you can give us a call in the Twin Cities area. The phone number is two two seven six thousand 2276 thousand in the Twin Cities elsewhere within Minnesota one 865 297001800. Six, five two nine seven zero zero and if you're outside the state of Minnesota called us directly in the Twin Cities. It's a cheap call on Saturday. Area code 612 2276 thousand we've got those phone Banks available right now. And Chad Myers is willing to share his advice in his experience with you do the number of fishermen declined substantially in the fall. Everybody makes such a big deal about the opener but then by Fall is a pretty well evaporated. Yeah, it really has and that's always been a mystery to me because I think the opener is probably one of the toughest times to catch fish. It's certainly not the best time fall fishing is one of the reasons that fall fishing is so good is that the food chain has slowed down there's not as much food available. So the fish are going to be more enticed by which you present. It's a question of supply and demand really and that's why the fall fishing is good. But again after Labor Day, most people, you know, batten down the hatches on their cabins and kids are back in school and people just don't fish and they know it's good. But but they just don't fear so I Have any problem sharing fall fishing secrets because I know that not many people are going to take me up on. All right. Well, let's give it a chance to share some with a few folks who are calling in right now. Hi, you're on the air. Chad Myers is listening. Go ahead, please and we have trouble with that telephone system. Usually first crack out of the box. We have a little problem with that what you say, there's not as many people out what happens to the what of the how do the fish behave differently in the fall then they do say around the time of the opener. That's a very good question fish metabolism does slow down the fish are less active, but you got a better chance of catching because there's less food available. So it's sort of a contradiction there. It may seem at first but there are number of patterns that develop that are pretty generalizable for most species first. There will be a shallow water movement generally after the turnover, you'll have a lot of big Northerns and walleyes will start coming into a lot shallower water than they have been all year. You'll have bass moving in and out of the shallows in the fall on warm days when the sun's out they may move into the shallows during the night. Cools down they move out of the Shadows those kinds of patterns are pretty generalized for the first part of The Fall season as a fall season moves further and further along and you get into ice fishing season the fish metabolism slows even more the fish movement is less and the big big change in fall fishing is that the fish really get tightly grouped they get very very tightly grouped. So whereas a school of All Eyes might Rome over a bar, you know, a hundred yards long and be scattered throughout that bar during the summer in the late fall. You may find a hundred walleyes in an area smaller than this room. So you got to find him if you can find them you can do well but fall fishing I've spent day a typical fall day for me in the late fall is that I'll spend oh two or three or four hours without a fish checking out a few places that I know pretty sure have fish and just waiting for the fish to get to turn on and I'm a fish three or four or five hours without a bite and then in 15 minutes limit out on big fish so you got to be To put in your putting your time in the fall fishing. Let me say for the record. This room is about 10 by 12. Okay, not very big not very big at all right now, let's get to the phones and see if we're having some success technically. Go ahead please you're on with Jack (00:09:11) Myers. Yeah the crappy to start doing a little takes but I have a question about legality. Is it legal to fish with like floating lights at night to track crappies? (00:09:22) That's a very good question. I'm sure I know it isn't certain parts of the South because you go into bait stores in the South and reservoirs and they've got these big styrofoam things with these huge spotlights in them and the Styrofoam floats on the water and the light shines not I don't know in Minnesota. I would ask you to check with with your DNR. I've got the regulations here and I remember reading through it. I don't remember seeing anything in there on lights, but I think it would be probably a good a good idea to check and find out but that is a technique that they use in the South and in certain parts of the South. I understand it's legal or somebody's making money selling something illegal. All right now, it's your turn to talk to Chad Myers. Go ahead, please. (00:10:01) Yeah, you have the North Shore Salmon Run started (00:10:03) yet. That's something I don't know. I'm not a trout and salmon fisherman. So I'm going to have to beg off on that. There are some guide services that operate out of Duluth and I would urge you to give them a call. There is typically in the Great Lakes. You do have your trout and salmon again will make a short word boom it and they'll come in to the to the to the cooler Waters along the along the shore and those fish are very very tempered temperature oriented during the summer. In other words when Anglers are looking for them in the summer. They're looking for certain temperature breaks in the water. So they use these temperature probes to get on and find them but that I'm not sure about I haven't called I just talked to Mark kept as I said with regard to walleyes bass and Northerns in the central part of the state, but I'm not really big into into salmon and trout fishing on the Great Lakes, but there are guiding Services up there that and Charter services that I'm sure could let you know about that. I suppose you got to say something for your retirement, don't you? All right on the your question, please hello there. (00:11:04) Good morning. I'm a live bait fisherman. I've been fishing the Minnesota River and the Cottonwood River a tributary to them all summer long and I promise is I keep catching catfish and I can't seem to catch anything else. You got any suggestions for me. (00:11:21) Well, I think that (00:11:22) one of the things that happened in this this summer is that the Lakes have the ability to informing that thermocline to sort of separate upper warm levels of water from lower cool levels Rivers don't have that and the rivers got really really warm and I think it turned off a lot on walleyes and smallmouth bass. I think they were really hard to come by except in some sections of the lower sink or where the water was really really deep the Minnesota River in some of those rivers are not generally very very deep. So it's it could it could just be tough fishing. I would expect that the fishing you haven't probably done anything wrong, but the fishing is simply going to improve as a result of the temperature changes. The waters are in the 60s now you'll find in rivers generally wall. We'll start making Upstream movements. They'll be moving from the lower sections of their up towards the dams. There's a lot of concentrations of law lies around dams or inlets or streams that are coming into major rivers and live bait is the best technique in the fall. The fish will make a switch from crawlers 22 minnows now right now up in the Brainerd area. They're still going on crawlers leeches and Minnows, but again as The Fall season winds down and the water gets colder, they'll stop hitting on nightcrawlers all together and then I'll stop hitting on leeches and you'll just be going with minnows. So I would and I would just suggest that you stay with your traditional spots and fall spots and stick with live bait Fathead minnows things of that nature and the fishing should be in should be improving and you do pretty well Downstream of the dam. Yes, the we're not sure why walleyes like to move up to the dams in the fall. Some people think it's a pre spawn movement that they're actually getting ready for spawning in the spring and that's months and months and months ahead of time, but Don't know for sure. Although we know is that they do move up towards the dams. Another tip for fishing rivers in the in the fall and lakes also is the best walleye bite will almost always be right before Sunset you can be on a lake all day and not do anything on walleyes and particularly if it's a clear lake and right towards Sunset the fish just turn on like crazy and they'll go for maybe 20 minutes maybe an hour and then they stopped I know sections of the st. Croix River where I fished walleyes in the Mississippi River also where you just have to be there at Sunset you want to be there about an hour before Sunset and Fish Tale about an hour after and that's about it. And you do really really well. So that would be another tip for River angers would be to try to hit that that sunset time for walleye looking for that little bedtime snack just like the rest of us and Chad Myers is with us as we talk about fishing today. We've got a couple of folks on the line and some lines of opened up again in the Twin Cities area. The number is two two seven six. Two two seven six thousand four Twin Cities area callers, in other parts of Minnesota. The toll-free Line is 1-800-695-1418 now and you're on your waiting, thanks and go ahead (00:14:17) please I'm heading up to the Boundary Waters for the first time and we're going to take on some lake trout as you're passing of the buck for trout extend into the Boundary Waters from Lake Superior. I'm I guess I'm interested in oh Lords bait fishing depth time of day anything like (00:14:34) that. I have done some lake trout fishing. I can't say that I'm completely ignorant about it that the fall fishing in in in the body water should be should be improving a lot for Lake Tahoe most of the lake trout in the Body Waters during the bulk of the summer is in very very deep water. You want to be in Lakes? You're not going to find too many lake trout and shallow lakes in The Boundary Waters there needs to be 60 70 80 feet of water and they will be coming up on 2:00 feeding on to what we call sort of food plateaus are areas where there's food available and feeding during the day again early mornings a good time for lake trout. I would suggest jigging having some jigs along so that you can get down because your fish probably aren't going to be in 5 10 feet of water that that's something that you'll find very early in the spring in The Boundary Water Lakes soon as the ice goes out. You can catch lake trout on standard spinning tackle and lures that you might use for walleyes or Bass But even in the fall it it takes pretty late on before. They come in that shallow and they lake trout is a false Bonner. I don't they won't be spawning for a while yet, but they should be active. I would take Jigs and Minnows and and start Prospect. I think you're going to need a depth finder portable depth finder. It's it's difficult. You need to find the summer location of the lake trout, which is going to be in deep water and then look for those shelves and sunken Islands particularly that come up in those immediate areas and I'd be jigging and I take some heavy jigs like quarter ounce half ounce jigs 3/8 ounce jigs take some minnows along salted minnows because you can't take minnows into those Lakes. It's illegal for one thing. And also we don't want to encourage the development of fish that aren't normally they're naturally there, but you can take some salted minnows in or dehydrated minnows and I would try jigging over those drop-offs close to the drop-offs another fall pattern that most fish exhibit because they don't like to move a lot in the fall is it they want to be where there's deep water nearby and you Most always find fall fish on a break a sharp break into deep water that's adjacent to a food shelf and rather than swimming long distances as they may be willing to do in the summer. They'll simply float up and down there just like a submarine they can just float up and down and they'll do vertical migrations up and down and then Cruise along those Food Shelf areas, but I would expect that and then also there is I said, the lake trout is a false Bonner. So if you can familiarize yourself with lake trout spawning habitat, that would be a good thing to so that you know, where they were they come in to spawn pretty complete answer for guy says he doesn't know much about it. Well always fake it 28 minutes past the hour. Let's take your question on fishing. Hi there. Thanks for calling (00:17:18) some questions concerning fly-fishing and I believe that the exceedingly warm weather is produced a lot of real variable conditions and most of what worked last year doesn't seem to be working this year long the fish behaviors as altered pretty drastically and you know fly fishing being pretty Pretty precise type thing and wondering if you have any hints that maybe with the cooler weather and with the change in terms of what bugs are coming out and you know what law they are out there any hints that might help those of us who've been frustrated over the past couple of months. (00:17:52) We need to start this program Bob with a caveat trout or not my specialty. I really don't know much about trout. I am a walleye bass northern pike pan fisherman, and I really don't know how to answer that question and that's when I won't try to fake. I would refer you to a good friend of mine Tom helgeson who teaches fly fishing and runs a fly fishing shop called breakwaters. And Tom is very good very knowledgeable about those kinds of patterns and things and you can find Bob is located bright Waters as you can find at the Minneapolis phone directories in the Twin Cities on Grand Avenue, so you could give him a call but I really wouldn't know what to say about fly-fishing. That's something I just don't get into I have an I have enough. Keeping on top of all eyes and bass and Northerns with spinning and baitcasting tackle. So for the rest of you out there who are interested in fly fishing. This is this is not the man to talk to. Okay, let's move on to our next questioner. I there Chad Myers is listening and you're on the air with (00:18:49) him. Hi there. We live on our boat on the Mississippi about twelve miles below downtown st. Paul and the Sunfish have been biting like mad and we've been catching them and bacon is the bait of choice how safe is it is is it to eat these Sunfish? (00:19:07) Well, that's a good question. I'm glad you asked I have before me a part of a booklet from the Minnesota Health Department fish advisory fish consumption thing. It has a booklet that advises people with regards to fish that they should and shouldn't eat in the state of Minnesota. Most of the fish that have been tested for pcbs and mercury and things of that nature are found in the rivers. That's generally where those Of toxic things accumulate is through the river systems because sadly we still use our rivers of sewers. We just dump stuff into the rivers. So fish that come out of the Mississippi River in the downtown area, I would be I would be real hesitant to eat. The bluegill may not be as bad as some others the fish that are bad to eat out of out of the rivers are those that have fatty accumulations things like carp and buffalo and catfish those fish accumulate the the pollutants much much more than do the leaner fish which is like the smallmouth bass or son Fisher or crappies or walleyes, but I would be real careful. I would check with the there is a book that you can get from the got it right here Minnesota Department of Health. The telephone number is 6 to 3 5555. and if you call them they will mail you out a booklet and you can find out about the fish that you should not be eating but a lot of the a lot of the Not that many lakes are affected. It's more Rivers than it is Lakes. It's good to check your likes to though because sadly some of the lakes are getting those those those pollutants in the what else? Can you catch in? The Mississippi? Besides Cowboy carp and some of those other anything? I remember one summer. Few years ago. I went down to st. Anthony Main in Downtown Minneapolis fish for about 20 minutes and I cut seven species of fish. I caught Channel cat white bass Sagar small moth Moon, I carp and one other species which you can't remember but there's just about everything in the Mississippi River. It's really a wonderful fishery. It's just that I'd say from Anoka on down. It's pretty iffy with regards to eating it. Now, once you get down into Pepper and a lot of those things settle out in the early part of Lake Pepin and the water that flows out of the other end of Lake Pepin is actually I've seen some water quality studies is about as clear as the water that comes out of Itasca. It really clears up and a lot of the pollutants settle out but you do have to be careful about about eating fish out of the Minnesota and the Mississippi Rivers because of the toxins and Reena Chad Myers is with us as we continue chatting about fishing today. Hello. You're on the air with him now. Go ahead, please (00:21:52) thank you very much for your excellent and interesting program, especially about the chemistry and types of fish that are best to to use and wondering where is the best place to fish on Lake Calhoun and Lake the aisles and has the drought change things very much. Thank you. (00:22:11) Well, you're asking me to give away my fishing spots what you promised to do not shout. I'm going to hold you to it. The interesting thing about Lake of the Isles are very different lakes. I'll just talk briefly about them Lake of the Isles is a eutrophic like in geological terms. It's very shallow. In fact, it wasn't much of a lake. It was dug out years ago was just a series of potholes and mosquito breeding areas. The lakes are very very different the drought has done an interesting thing on Lake of the house and some other shallow Lakes. There's a water levels got low and as the algae bloomed gas is formed on the bottom and actually huge sections of that Lake of lifted up off the bottom and look like folding bogs that are just sort of floating along. And there, you know, you can't walk on them anything but there are these floating mats of things out there that are that are very very very interesting as far as the fishing goes again. I haven't done a lot of fishing because I release most of my fish and I didn't want to put any more stress on their life than they already had but there are some excellent lake maps available. Calhoun is a much better fishing lake than than Isles is if you're sure fishermen, there is a fishing dock on the west shore of Lake Calhoun. Those things are not put out randomly the DNR sets them out by looking at the structure of the lake and looking for places where their bars and food shelves and that's that's a fairly good place to catch fish there. Not many people again using it but you can catch some nice Northerns by fishing off of there with a sucker minnow and dropping it down. Oh three or four feet and moving it around. There are cones a very very complicated like in terms of bar. So I can't tell you exactly certain spots but another place that's that for sure fisherman. That's good in the fall. Is that right? The entrance to Lake of the Isles. We're Lake Calhoun. There's a little Canal that goes into like the else you'll find people fishing off of that for Northerns and in the fall the northern pike often run in there and again fishing with a bobber sucker minnows fine. If you want to just walk the shore line, you can probably catch bass and Northerns just by casting spinner baits and walking along the shoreline. You can still use spinnerbaits at this time of year. It's a Lor Lor that has held it like combination jig and Spinner and that's a good way at this time of year when the fish are still they're not in there. They're late fall patterns. They're still moving around a lot. I just walk along the shoreline and and cast with a spinnerbait because you're liable to find fish just about anywhere now series, isn't it kind of tough to fish on Calhoun particularly? Because they don't let use motors on the city Lakes. Well, you can use electric motors. Well, you can can use electric motors on the city likes and that's what I use and now you can get electric motors up to three or four horsepower. So it may be that the city mothers and fathers want to reconsider limits on the size of electric motors waterskiing will be next. Right, but you can use electric motors. You do need to get a permit from the city for both the boat and the motor to take it out on the city of lakes, but you can can use motors are and how deep do you find Calhoun in spots? Gee, I think as I remember, I think it's got up to 80 feet of water in it. Some places very very deep lake and a really nice like to fish. All right, let's go back to the phones and get some more folks on the air with Chad Myers. Hello there. Thanks for waiting around with him now. (00:25:17) Yeah Chuck. (00:25:19) He's here. (00:25:19) Yep, and I'm heading up to Lake of the Woods ignore area. I was wondering if you could shed some some of your wisdom on you know, the types of depths. I might try types of fish. I'll be looking for tackle bait never have enough hair this late in the year mostly in the summertime, and I'd like to hang out and just with your answer if I could (00:25:44) I'd done some duck hunting up in Lake of the Woods in the late fall and one of the great things about late fall fishing and something that I we Take advantage of to to eat for lunch on dock fishing duck hunting trips. Is it the crappie start? The big crappies will start and they'll be in Bay area's and I would just take some take have some live bait available and some crappy rigs with maybe some spreaders on it so that you can fish a couple of hooks and a sinker and get in and fish start on the bottom and work your work your way up from the bottom and some of those Bay area's it maybe 30 40 feet deep and even shallower. You'll find your walleyes are going this time of year up there. The walleyes can be very very shallow again, they'll come in shallow at night. If there are any running water nearby there any rivers coming in or streams coming in that's a great place to fish in the evening for walleyes. But Lake of the Woods would be a very very good place to fish this time your it. The waters will be a lot cooler up there than they are down here. You're going to want to restrict yourself. I would say pretty much two Jigs and live bait fishing. I would use have some live bait rigs along like Linda Riggs Maybe. Maybe a little Joe spinner that you could put a minnow on and drag it around and I'd also have some Jigs and fish a jig and minnow but I think I'd stick with jigs and Minnows and Minnows and on live bait rigs up there. You might also try some crank baits or Rapa Lazar diving plugs like that in the shallows for walleyes because you can do with that. Also, the muskies could be going that that could be exciting to get into one of those Lake of the Woods muskies because they're they're pretty huge and they get going this time of year too. So it should be good fishing up there. I think you're in for again location is key ask about locations. Most people are very very happy to tell you about locations. I mean Lake of the Woods is huge gigantic. It's overwhelming if you're going out there and haven't fished before you really don't have much of a chance. You need to know where the fish concentrations are. So they'll be certain Bay area's or reefs where people will be happy to tell you. This is a classic fall spot. If it's been a fall spot in the past. It's probably going to be a false pot again particularly for crappies walleyes may move around a little bit but those spots are well-known and most people are willing to share it. Is again the fishing pressure is very very light this time of year. So I would ask but I would expect to do well on crappies and walleyes and also Northerns and maybe muskies under what circumstances you think. It makes sense to hire a guide to go out with you. I hire a guide when I'm on big water that that I don't know. I want to orient Myself by learning some landmarks so that I can find my way around so I'll usually if I go to Canada go into Canada, I will hire a guide for the first day or two. So I get to know that like if it's a big like if it's a small Lake you can pretty much work your way around. I mean lakes that are 400 500 600 acres you can you can work your butt you get up to lakes that are 56, you know, 10,000 acres and lakes that have islands and points and things you can get turned around and it's it's not so bad getting lost in the summer because you know, you may get bit up by mosquitos at night, but you're going to get back but you want to in the fall when it gets cold you want to know that you can get back also, it's important to have God because of reefs a lot of people will tear out the bottom units of their Motors by running over res that they don't know. They're there and the further north you get in the Boundary Waters are lots of Rocky reefs and lakes like lock Lacroix your wonderful fishing lakes, but boy, I wouldn't run certain sections of that Lake without a guide because you know, these reefs can pop up anywhere and you need to know even with a hydrograph mcmap. You better know where you are. You better have a good estimate of where that reef is if you're going out by yourself, so I'd say the first time out on a lake. I want to I want to get to know it. I'll hire a guide and and let him or her show me how to orient myself on it and you really only need a few key landmarks generally to find your way back, but that's important 20 minutes know before 12 o'clock. We're talking with fishing enthusiasts chat Myers about fall fishing technique equipment and all the rest of it. Go ahead, please you're next. (00:29:42) Yes. I trow for northern pike quite a bit and I was wondering if I troll with large lures with that increase my chances of Seeing larger Pike and also is our Lord color. How big of a factor is that in the fish biting? Thanks. (00:30:03) Those are both good questions. There's been a debate that's gone on for a long time about big. Lure Big Fish whether using big lawyers will help you catch bigger fish. I've caught some big Northerns on some very small lures and I've got some small Northern Zone very big Wars Northerns are not when they're going. They're not very discriminatory. So you can be using a really big lower and have a small Northern clamp down on but I think you do increase your odds of getting a bigger fish if you use a bigger, lure, I really do I think there is a better chance of nailing a big fish if you use a big Lor you will be discouraging also a lot of smaller fish will be discouraging a lot of smaller fish. So you may have to fish longer particularly true for using live bait, like if you're casting with the jig and minnow and the minnows only three or four inches long you could catch about anything on it. If you start still fishing with a one Pond to Pond sucker, you're cutting out. A lot of fish that aren't going to take on a one or two ponds sucker and and people who fish muskies and cast suckers for muskies, which is an old time-honored technique. I don't know a lot of people who else to do it, but it's a good technique. They're throwing a sucker that weighs a couple pounds and they're not that's discouraging some of the smaller fish with regard to color the importance varies depending on species and depending on water Clarity. If the water is very very clear colors and more important factor than if the water is murky generally with regard to species color can be very very important with regard to the trout and salmon when you're working salmon and trout on the great lakes. And again, this is secondhand experience through guides and and a little first-hand experience fishing lure color for salmon and trout can be crucial. I mean some days they'll be going on green some days. I'll be going in pink. Some days will be going on blue. And the guides will talk to each other over walkie-talkies and intercoms or whatever, you know shortwave radio to find out what color the fish are going on. That's really intriguing. Yeah with regard to Pike in that there are some times when color can be important for Pike and walleyes and bass but the more important aspect of that is having lower at the right depth and going about the right speed and having the right action. I put color pretty far down on the list in terms of that. There are some days when color can be real crucial but I'd say for most Pike Northern walleyes color subtlety is not a big thing most of the time. More efficient questions for Chet Myers your turn next to (00:32:32) Lowell. Yes. My question is I'd like to know what she thinks of the impact of fish finders on The Fishery. (00:32:41) Well, that's something I know that's been debated by the Minnesota Legislature. And there were times when people consider Banning Fishfinders Fishfinders that there are two kinds on the market. First of all their depth finders. Generally the first kind of came out was a flasher unit which is like a sonar unit which reads the bottom and shows you the depth if the fish happens to swim in between it shows up as a blip on the middle in the days when when most when 95% of all that fishing that was done with depth finders was done using flash or units people really weren't looking for fish that much they were looking for drop-offs and weed growth and bottom conditions, which you can read on a summer a number of years ago. The graphing unit came out which does show fish does indicate fish fish will show up as little hooks or little bars depending on the number of pixels. They call them a Little Dutch you have on the Liquid Crystal things or depending on the sensitivity of the graphing paper, which is another mode of graphing so you can't actually find fish with them. I I don't think the, you know, the impact is important particularly for great. Danglars, I mean the Great Lakes guides would be pretty lost with that. I think without the graphing units to find the trout and salmon with regards to the how its impacted on fishing. I think, you know, I can't say that it's been detrimental to fishing. Certainly. I don't think it's help wipe out fish species. I don't think it's done much more than sensitive Anglers to where the fish are. One of the frustrations is and I experienced this up in the Boundary Waters to Summer looking for lake trout one of those few times when I did fish trap, we went out over a reef and saw some what looked like lake trout at 50 feet on a depth finder. And if you know there there you're going to stay there, but they may not be biting and I've talked to other people who you'd grab graphing depth finders and they'll say yeah, the great frustration is I can see the fish but if they're not biting so what so what if I had a flasher unit, I'd probably run over try it and leave with a graph. I'll sit there for three or four hours and I won't catch a fish even though I know they're there so there are negative aspects to it, too. It's a quarter to twelve and we'll move on to your question next time it shuts listening. (00:34:41) Yeah, this is Jim Conrad conservation officer. Yeah, and I had a clarification on the question of whether you could use artificial light. Well good tracked fish (00:34:51) good. Thank you very much for calling in. Sure. Well, what's your what is it? (00:34:55) Well, it is use artificial lights is prohibited 97 C .3 35 State Statute reads that a person may not use artificial lights to lower or attract fish or to see fish in the water while sparing so it's very clear that you can't use those floating lights to attract panfish. (00:35:12) Good. Thank you very much you betcha. Yep. Thanks a lot. Tell who called in with that question heard the answer to it. We'll move on now to your question of all there. (00:35:22) Well, I've got a couple pretty basic type questions, but What I've always heard is that the color of the lore attracts the fishermen to buy different lures if you're using one color with no success switch to another color and that's how you find out but I've always been confused about the pound test of lines because it's labeled with a certain number and people get humongous fish that are much heavier than what it's labeled and oh you mentioned muskies and some people get pretty huge muskies on pound test lines that are pretty small. I would imagine that they stretch these lines until they break but I'm wondering with the kind of fishing that you do what kind of different pound test you use (00:36:18) good. That's a good question. Let me respond to the first part. First of all, you don't it's not as if you figure the weight of the fish you want to choose the Test line most fish cannot exert their own weight in water to break that line. The only time you're going to break a fish off on the weight of the line would be if you're fishing for pain test and you try to lift the northern out of the water, you know, without a net holding that for pond line in the Lorry will break off then but you can catch very very big fish on on lighter weight line by setting your brake on your real to the breaking point of the line. And that's the key so that when the fish makes a run the line will break the bridge or the line the break strips on the real using break in two different contexts there. The break is at the base of your real usually on a spinning reel. It's a little thumb screw that you can screw to lessen or increase the tension of the line on the spool on baitcasting reels that usually a star drag on the side so you can catch huge fish. In fact, some Anglers have made a hobby. I think Ted Williams who is a baseball player. Also a great fisherman did some fishing for tarpon. And cut, you know, very very very large Tarpon on like four five six pound test as long as you've got open water and a lot of time you can do it. There may be other occasions when you need to use heavy pain test for small fish if I'm fishing in Table Rock Lake in Missouri for largemouth bass in the timber with there's a lot of Timber and brush and the bass only way a couple puns. I may be using fifteen pound test simply because I need that strength of line to be fishing under those conditions so that if the Lord gets caught or the fish get in there I can pull the fish out if I'm fishing in The Boundary Waters where there's no weeds and and rocks but not many trees or brush. I can catch a big fish on very very small pound test line. I generally spool my reels with the spools are interchangeable on most spinning reels and I usually have a spool of 8 10 and 6 so I can go to three different weights depending on the conditions in Clearwater. I'll use a lot lighter line in murky water like unlikely the owls in the summer. I'll use I can. Ten pound test without a problem if I go over to Calhoun. I may have to go to 6 because it's a much clearer Lake but that's a good question with regard to my I think for most people under most General fishing conditions for Bass and walleyes and panfish eight pound test is a good that's a good rough figure to stick. What about the collars the observation that color lures the fisherman not the fish. I think there's a lot of truth that the they're really they're thousands of lawyers on the market and if you can break them down into families of maybe four or five families of lawyers and what's important is that you have the different families of lures that you'll there are Lord knows how many spinner baits are on the market. You don't need to buy one of everyone get the ones that you feel comfortable with and try a couple of different colors some days generalizations about color on on Bright Days generally used brighter colors on Dark Days General use darker colors. That's so the Lord will silhouette better. If you're fishing really really murky water. You want to fish with a black color because it's so It's against the available light in the fish can see it better in very very clear water. You want to go with more neutral colors? Generally unless you're fishing for trout or salmon. But yeah, there's a lot of hype that goes with marketing fishing lures and things and they can make them look real attractive to you and it may not make that big a difference to the fish stick with basic patterns lights and darks and maybe a few colors 10 minutes before the hour here is we continue taking fishing questions for Chet Myers. Thank you for waiting around the are now. (00:39:55) I've been fishing on Medical Lake round pretty close to Minneapolis here trying to catch some reasonable size Northerns than little bit of trolling with Daredevils and lazy Ike's little still fishing with minerals tried a number of things that I haven't heard of cut any fish at all. I usually fish from about six o'clock to 9:30 in the evening after work. So I'd like to know if I'm wasting my time on that lake or some lakes around here or do you have any suggestions on how I might get some fish? (00:40:26) Well I've got Suggestions General suggestions for Northerns in the fall late summer, but I don't I'm not know much about Medicine Lake for with regard to that. You can call the DNR and they can give you a printout of the lake in terms of fish that have been netted fish that have been stuck there. It's important to choose a like that's God good population of the game for sure going after obviously. So I don't know what the population of Northern Pike in medicine like is one tip. I might suggest is it generally it's a little better to get up earlier in the morning northern pike are often very very active at first daylight. That's a summer pattern in a spring pattern in the fall. It's they can be active just about any time and they will bite a little later into the evening, but they generally don't bite much after the sun goes down and less the lake is very very clear. What I would suggest you do is to try varying your lure presentation. I would get some spinnerbaits. And try to locate areas the weeds are dying off now in The Lakes. That's one of the indicators of fall fishing and late summer fishing is that because of the less light that's available the we'd start to die off. So an area we call Flat which is simply a big shallow water area and it doesn't have to be near sure. It can be a big flat Island out in the middle of a lake or a point or a bar. That's very very that maybe tops out at 10 feet and has weeds on it can be pretty hard to fish during the middle of the summer because there's so many weeds on it. The weeds are dying off now and the Northerners are coming in from the deep water. The big Northern is a different animal than a small Northern and we don't know why I've never read any studies on this but we know through just common sense and years of fishing. These are two very different animals small Northerns can be in warmer water than big Northerns can be after Northern gets to be a five six seven ponds. They become a deep-water fish in Minnesota. They go out deeper because it need to be in colder water and it's tough to catch bigger Northern. The summer it doesn't happen often unless you get farther up into Canada where the waters are cooler. So what I would do would be now that the Northerners have started to come in shallow, and they have and they will continue to do that. They're in Shallow now in Mille Lacs. What they do in Mille Lacs is they just troll the entrances and swing into those Bay's those big bays in that area and let out, you know enough line use heavy pain test. I would say, you know, you'd want to use maybe 12 15 pound test maybe a monofilament line that doesn't stretch as much as some of the others are our specialty lines. You can get the don't stretch a lot so you can get a good hook set. And you don't know where the Northerns are going to be. So just troll zigzag patterns on these weedy Flats with a spinnerbait and just roll back and forth and all over and then if you don't do anything that way then move to the edge of the drop off and start casting a jig and minnow, but I think you'd do better with spinner baits and Jigs and Minnows and you would be trolling Daredevils and lazy Ikes I mean not to say those aren't good Lords, but this is a time of year when I think you might vary your presentation a little bit. Okay, let's take another one here as we get down near the end of the are go ahead you're on with China (00:43:28) happy babies. I don't have any questions that relate to actually how you fish. But I belong to a family of fishermen the women do not - for some reason or other but we were always tell that you don't get my skis and you don't bring them in that you release them and whenever we spoken to the man about this. Oh, no, this is a fish that we just do not catch to bring home and we do not kill so I would like to have your comments on that and I'll hang up (00:43:57) well. (00:43:59) Catch and release fishing is something that is catching on more and more in Minnesota and and has been popular in particularly in the southern states with regards to Bass Fishing. We do have limited fish flakes only produce. So many fish the DNR cannot make a lake produce more fish than the light can actually produce Anglers men and women that fish are more intelligent with regard to fishing because a lot more has been written about it. There's a lot more scientific information on fish available. So we've got a limited supply of fish and I think it's important that we release fish the musky in particular has has generally been considered a trophy fish that is a fish that there aren't many muskies in many lakes that have muskies muskies require a lot bigger Turf than does a northern pike. So a lake to likes the same size will not produce necessarily the same amount of muskies our northern pike. So people have been releasing muskies for years so that they can catch big muskies and and men and women that fish muskies will have Standards like I'm not going to mount a fish until it's 30 pounds. I mean 30-pound muskies a trophy must be anymore. And I know people that have fished for years to catch 130-pound Muskie. They've released maybe 30 40 50 muskies and if they get that one fish they may mount it, you know, but I think this indicates a level of awareness and sportsmanship that I that I affirm because I think we should be releasing a lot of fish. I release 90% of my fish it angers my wife sometimes when she'd like me to fill the freezer a little but I release most of my fish and I think if we're going to have good fishing for our children and in the future we're going to have to do that water quality is something that we need to be concerned about to and is that decreases? We've got we've got less fish available. So I you know, I firm The Catch and Release ethic and think it's a good one. Okay, let's slip in one more color quickly here. Go ahead, please you're on with jet. Yes your question. No. No, she's gone. Well, we talked an awful lot about the fishing opener. We make a big deal about that as I mentioned before when is the fishing Ender the closer closer? So to speak is there one. Well, there are four some species the pan fish bluegills crappies perch fish of that nature or open all year. You can catch them all year as long as it's safe to be out the closer for northern pike walleyes muskies and bass is February 15th for Inland Waters. So there's really only about three months out of the year when you can fish those that's right. That's right. Very 15th is the close of ice fishing season, and it's a good date because after that point the ice really does get unsafe and the mother nature doesn't go by our fishing calendar. So it may or may not be safe this year by February 15th, but it also gives the fish that move in to spawn the big Northerns the walleyes a chance to have a little respite from from the Angling. Sure into to get ready to do their spawning. So that's a good thing in some states. There's no closed season on like in some of the southern states for bass. There's no closed season. We got just about a minute and a half or so left yet. What about ice fishing winter fishing you do that? And how what do you think of that experience it? I love it. In fact, it's strange. I look I look forward to the ice fishing season more than I do the regular season. I can't tell you why Bob. It's a very very different ball game. I ran a nice Shack out of Minnetonka so I can keep warm. I do some Open Water open ice fishing that is fishing on the ice when when it's warmer when I can get out and drill holes, but it's you're fishing a very very much smaller. You can't move around quickly. And if you do move you have to drill a hole every time you move. I think it's just a special thrill that that comes in ice fishing for me seeing that bobber just sort of disappear slowly down the hole and not knowing how big the northerner walleyes going to be is a real excitement to me, but it's very different kind of fishing your you need to be Where the fish are the fish are less active they may be feeding 3 to 4 times less than they do in the summer. They may only be feeding once a day or once every two days. So you really have to choose your fishing locations carefully. The best time to start thinking about ice fishing is in the fall get out after the turnover locate the fish after the turnover particularly your walleyes find them stay with them until the lake gets colder and colder and if you can find a school walleyes in October and November, they're probably going to be there the early part of the ice fishing season. So if you've never fished a lake before it's rather silly to go out and Prospect in the middle of the winter because you just you know, you're up against the odds you want to know where the fish are before you get there and you can do that by prospecting in the fall, which is another good reason to get out during the fall and do some fishing. All right Chet. Well, maybe we stimulated some people to get out do that. Maybe you won't be quite so lonesome month after the fall. Thanks a lot. Thank you. Bob Chet Myers fishing enthusiasts who has co-authored with a number. Other fellows a book called bass and in fisherman Handbook of strategies. Midday is made possible by Ecolab Incorporated and it's Chemlawn subsidiary next week during the 11 o'clock hour. And midday. We'll have University of Minnesota extension nutritionist. Joanne slavin in to answer your questions about healthful eating do stay with us more good listening ahead. The time is 12 o'clock. This is Bob Potter.