thatbasschigger187

I'm still on that grind guys. No quitting until the lakes freeze up. I was out on Minnetonka this past weekend. And it was tough. But I did find them. Water temps were in the 40's so I wasn't really confident. The wind wasn't bad but it wasn't great either. I struggled for the first few hours I was out there. Didn't get a single bite. Not even a pike. I was throwing a swim jig, jig and an assortment of cranks. Barely any "healthy" grass left. You were lucky to even find some let alone fish on them. So I abandoned the grass and stuck to harder cover. I tried docks first. Was getting bit good but all stretchers. They were super particular too. Your bait had to come from the far side under the docks. And dragged slowly out. Your skipping game had to be on point. After a 45 min flurry, that bite died down and I went to a few of my rock piles I have marked. All my deeper stuff was a no go. Idled around for awhile and I saw a rock pile I marked 2 years ago that I have never fish cause it's relatively shallow. I'd say 4 to 6 ft'ish. They were stacked on there. I have no idea why because that spot just seems dead to me for most of the year. Caught a nice bunch of chunky ones. I caught my first 2 off a jig. Then they stopped on that. Threw a drop shot caught a few more. Then they stopped on that too. I went to a technique I don't use much but when I do I usually catch them. A lipless crank! Trust me I hate this technique. But for some odd reason it works for me when my go-to stuff dies. I lost like 6 lipless on that rockpile. They wanted it fast and loud and on the bottom. I know you're thinking to yourself, why not just use a lipped crank? Trust me I tried that after I lost my 2nd LV500. As well as a football jig and other bottom contact baits. The lipless was the ticket in that moment. I had fun for the next 2 hours then boom bite died out and I went home. Just goes to show that lipless do work in the north country. Setups Lipless - Shimano SLX 150XG Powell Diesel 705CB 15# Trilene Mono LV500 in TD Gill / Pearl Shad

Yeah I got a huge discount on these so I bought at least 5 to 10 of each size/length. That day was all about the smaller baitfish but the current was running hard hence why I went with the 3/8 oz in the 2.4 inch size and not the the 3.0 inch in 3/8,1/2,3/4 oz. I use the bigger ones in other situations. I like that they offer them in 3 different lengths and 7 different weights. I don't use these as straight retrieve lures. I have better options for that. These are specific for jig situations with a baitfish bite. MN tourney guys are too good to be relative to a technique as opposed to being specific and my mind is always thinking "tournament" "tournament" "tournament" even when I'm fun fishing LMAO!

It's a super versatile bait. It won me some money this year too when the deep crank just wasn't getting bit anymore but they wanted that baitfish.

Man was the weather amazing yesterday! Cold but sunny. Not as windy as I thought it would be. I was out on the Mississippi. My buddy and I knocked them out. Nothing too big though, biggest running around 3. Pretty dangerous though not gonna lie. Water is super high and it's fast. The ultrex was at max to keep up. And there's tons and tons of brush in the water right now. So be careful if you guys plan to go out there. But we caught alot in the the 6 hours we had to fish. Easily over 50+ fish. Water temp was cold, low 50's and water was pretty muddy. Not the ideal conditions for smallies but the time of the year plus the sun finally being out definitely helped. My buddy and I started with cranking. We were throwing squarebills. I was chucking a KVD 1.5 and he was throwing a Luckcraft LC 1.5. We caught a few but the fish seemed to be missing the lure. All our bites were outside the mouth. I switched to a Storm Arashi 03 with rattles and they got on it. Everything in the mouth. We did this for about 2 hours and it got a bit warmer. The crank bite died down. The fish seemed to get tucked in more to the brush and trees on flooded shoreline. We also noticed alot of baitfish swimming around in the calmer, clearer water. No idea on what type it was but there were small pods of them everywhere. We decided to start flipping to fish the brush more effectively. My buddy went with a tried and true jig but I wanted to try something different. I went with the Megabass Dark Sleeper. And boy was it FIRE!!!!!! We ended up flipping the rest of the day with some occasional drop shot mixed in. Majority of the fish were caught in typical fashion. Find a form of current break with brush mixed in with rocks. The darksleeper was awesome. Not too weedless though. I lost 4 of em compared of the one lost jig of my buddy's. All in all fun day of fishing. Again if you guys go out there be careful! Setups Squarebill - Shimano Curado 70XG Dobyns Champion 703 MH 12# Tatsu FL KVD 1.5 in Chartreuse Shad / Arashi 03 in Wakasagi Flipping - Shimano Excence DC Dobyns Champion 734 H 25# AbrazX FL Megabass Dark Sleeper 3/8oz 2.4 inch in Hanahaze Dropshot - Shimano Stradic 3000 Dobyns Champion 701 L 8# InvizX FL Berkley Gulp Alive Minnow 3 inch

whoa! It's been awhile since I've posted on here. But how's the fishing everyone? Now's the time to be fishing especially since there's no crowd. Tonka has been fantastic, same as all the metro lakes. The top water bite died within a week... crazy MN weather. But the fish are still super aggressive right now. Finally my Ganterels and GanCrafts got to play! The wiggle wart (pre rapala warts*)has been doing work too. Honestly I swear they'll eat anything right now, other than a top water. So get out there and smash em! Tuesday on Tonka Fishing was amazing! The fish were super aggressive today. Inside grass lines and shallow tops of points were key. Weather was fantastic. Water temps were in the 50's. I started out in Maxwell Bay. I caught a few there flipping the healthiest grass I could find. Nothing big. Went out to Crystal and fished all the super obvious spots. Nothing. Fished Arcola. Fish were filtering through there. All dinks though. I figured they were in there moving/feeding pattern. Started moving towards all the major points on main lake and stayed there the rest of the day. Fish were stacked the tops of points. I started off with a cranks and I never really got off that. Why fish something slow when fast works just as well right? The key though was the grass. Had to be healthy enough to rip grass without pulling the whole thing out. The same applied for the inside weedline. Grass had to be good. I pretty much caught at least 6 to 7 fish per spot. Ended up taking out my dobyns/calcutta set up to throw my swimbaits/glidebaits around. They were smashing it! But alot of misses. Those baits are just to big for the majority of MN bass. Last stop I made was in Black. More of the same, but fish were significantly smaller. Honestly was a fantastic day of fishing. 50+ fish in roughly 4 to 5ish hours. Nothing big but it was fun. Setups Squarebill - Shimano Curado 70XG Dobyns Champion 703 MH 12# Tatsu FL Wart - Shimano Curado 70XG Dobyns Champion 703 MH 10# Tatsu FL Swim/Glide - Shimano Calcutta 300D Dobyns Fury 8' 20# Berkley BigGame Mono

Yeah you gotta be there early. I always get there by first light. One of the most annoying things is getting line caught in your outboard by those people shore fishing. They literally wait for the last second to reel up.

You have to dedicate yourself to Tonka if you want to catch 4's and 5's there. I fish multiple tournaments on there every year and do rather well. Tonka is a spot oriented lake. You literally have to have 50 to 100 spots on the lake to be consistent. The great thing about Tonka though is that you can fish whatever style you want to and still catch a good bag. So stick to your strengths. As for the recreational boaters and etc. Yeah they're annoying. And it can get frustrating at times like having having powerboats cut in front of you while fishing a deep point or having jetskiers spook a shallow area you're flipping. But don't look at the negatives cause you'll hate Tonka if that's what you focus on. Instead think "well those power boats generate alot of current on dog days", or the "jetskiers eliminate that area during these times." Don't over look the fishing pressure either and use that as an approach to how to cover an area. Some bays are more popular than others depending on the time of year. I could talk about Tonka all day. It is my favorite lake in Minnesota. I fish it almost every weekend, besides the occasional drive north the big ol' smallie fish factory. But I'll tell you this, once you feel like you can start catching good bags on Tonka, learning every other lake in MN will feel like a walk in the park.

@sully420 shhhhh about the carolina rig.... jkjk. Carolina rig is lowkey hawg-slaying technique. Most people shy from it cause it's slooooooow but man it gets chomped on. I usually run zoom brush hog or a lake fork ring fry. Another one for you guys to try is a big hair jig while the some fish are still deep. 1/2 to 3/4 oz hair jig. The technique is super easy. Just make a long cast, reel and kill. I usually target really deep points with this. I'll sit in about 30ft and cast into 20ish or lower. Caught some nice ones on Diamond reef doing this. I'll add half a senko to the back of the hairjig if i want it to fall slower/more horizontally and I'll add some Megastrike on the 1/2 senko for some stank. I use this tech when the DD and the swimbait stop working.

Are any of you guys excited for the fall season?!?!?! Far less pleasure boaters, less pressure from the tournament anglers and the fish will be schooled up and ready to eat. I finally get to go attack the smallies in Mille Lacs and go look for some 6lb+ plus momma's. No more 5+ hours of scanning... just go out, put the trolling motor down and fish. I'll get to use my topwaters now (they get no play during tournament season) and my big swimbaits. Tournament season is finally over for me. A few pickups here and there if I want to but now I can finally just go fish around.

That 6.8 is a TOAD!!!!!

Tonka is my favorite MN lake. You can literally fish any style you want there. You can flip a jig in dirty water. You can drop shot 30 ft rock piles. You can punch/frog thick mats. You can deep crank weedlines. The traffic is terrible but man... the fishing is spectacular! For Denny's if you're not pulling in 3.5lbs per fish or higher you have no chance of getting in the money. That lake you have to have spots on spots. My units are literally like Lite-Brites with how many spots I have marked. Tournament days are all about run and gun and checking out spots. You end up running the whole lake to find your kickers. 34lbs (8fish) of bass though is amazing! It is my favorite lake to take someone new to fishing cause I can take em to some honey holes with a drop shot and have them pull 2's all day. There's so much fish in that lake you can fish any bay and you'll catch em. Depends on the lake and if there's zebras. Zebra lakes the fish should still be deep cause the water temps are still hitting the 80's and there should be grass everywhere. Dirtier lakes should be having some slight turn over now and shallower grass should be key for those lakes. I've been personally smashing them on deep rock piles on Tonka with grass all around them. Using heavy punch jigs first, like the RTX jig, to pull out the hungry ones and then a drop shot with a Robo to finish off the school. 50+ bass days and it's not that hard. Fishing is really easy and predictable right now.

Beastin'

Tonka on Saturday was on fire!!! We smashed 'em. Grass is incredibly thick though. We were flipping/pitching into 20+ ft of water. But man they are incredibly active. We caught alot of bass. We had 18.4lbs (5 fish) bag. Not the best you can get on Tonka but not bad at all. Lots of bass boats though. Must be on there for the Blackfish tournament next week. $10k ain't no joke. Sunday though was the first time I failed this year though. I went to Buffalo, a lake I haven't fished much of, thinking I would be able to replicate their monster bags of smallies they've been bringing in. I only caught 4 fish going for 8 lbs. 3 dinks and one going for 3lbs+. But all the fish I caught were random. I really need to do some homework on that lake. I marked a bunch of rockpiles and nothing. I found the little grass they had and nothing.

BEAST!!! I'm glad it worked out for you. I love these underused techniques. It really does give the fish a different look. And I strongly feel they'll react to it first time they see it. Thanks for proving the tech accurate. I'm sure people thought I was BS'ing lol!

@sully420Yeah gotta stay away from that nasty stuff. I always spend the first hour or two scanning and looking at the map before I even make my first if I don't fish that lake much. I guess it's my tournament mentality. Find the juice before you squeeze it. I got out last night too from 5 to 8:30ish. I spent an 30 min scanning the whole lake (it's a small lake) picked out a few nice drop offs where I marked some bait fish with healthy coontail on it and got to work. Caught a nice bag again. 16-18lbs of bass (5 fish). I honestly didn't expect it cause I was using a bunch baits/lures/colors I have never used or have no confidence in. Brush hogs, spoons, chatterbaits, etc. The fish were biting like crazy. I think they were just in feeding mode. @sully420 I'm definitely on the same boat as you in terms of trying new techniques. I think most anglers just get used to using the same techniques over and over again because it works in Minnesota. But when you go to a different body of water in a different state things change drastically. Flipping Tonka is way different that flipping the Cali Delta I tell ya. I know I get stubborn when I can't get that jig pattern to work, cause that's my favorite lure/technique. But I've learned to kinda just fish the moment and let the fish tell you what they want instead of trying to force your will onto them. We are all not KVD! LOL!!!