I took my kayak out on the Mississippi River on Sunday for about 4 hours.  Covered about 3 miles.  The water temp was 68 degrees.  The river is fairly low.  I end up catching a few smallmouth in the 14 to 16 inch range and a couple of pike.  I did catch two 17 and 18 inches.  Most were caught on swimbaits.

1 hour ago, gim said:

At least someone is catching fish with consistency. It sure isn’t me. Nice job @Standard

You just gotta drive 2.5 hours outside the cities!

 

In all reality, the spot I was fishing Friday and Saturday I know pretty well, and it's almost always guaranteed to be decent.  This just happened to be some of the better days.

3 hours ago, gim said:

At least someone is catching fish with consistency. It sure isn’t me. Nice job @Standard

 

gim….  We in same club for once.  I sucked so bad on Sunday I got depressed.  Wind made boat control a challenge I failed.  Struggled with my new Curado, got a minor backlash that turned into solid snag and buried the line in the spool, but I caught a fair amount of coontail…. Yup, I sucked.. 😩

Some pics from the weekend - wind was strong and really limited where I could get to and stay (without getting bounced all over the place) - caught 16 fish across the two days - they ranged from 12 inches to just shy of 18 inches plus an inadvertent Perch catch (picture attached) 

Looks like the weather is finally going to break next week. I am seeing highs that are 65-70 and lows in the 40’s. Which would actually be average for this time of year.

 

Maybe that will help because the bite has been atrocious almost the entire month of September.

3 minutes ago, gim said:

bite has been atrocious almost the entire month of September.

Maybe that's the reason my ankle has kept me away from the shore since mid-August...it knew I wouldn't have any luck.
 

Maybe I'll get out again before the ice arrives. 

On 10/1/2025 at 8:13 PM, gim said:

Looks like the weather is finally going to break next week. I am seeing highs that are 65-70 and lows in the 40’s. Which would actually be average for this time of year.

 

Maybe that will help because the bite has been atrocious almost the entire month of September.

 

The high temps keep getting bumped up for next weekend in the long term forecast.  Hopefully that holds up, I'm planning on heading up to Fergus again.  

Completely blanked today on bass not one fish tried it all. 73 degree temp. Just can't get anything lately. Wind tomorrow wont help 20MPH south wind ouch.

That falls in line with how my fishing has been for weeks now. Generating bites has been tough. Like pulling teeth tough.

 

I haven’t been completely skunked but several outings have only produced a handful of fish.

 

I think there are better days ahead when the weather and water cools down.

On 10/3/2025 at 10:36 PM, Mrpike said:

Completely blanked today on bass not one fish tried it all. 73 degree temp. Just can't get anything lately. Wind tomorrow wont help 20MPH south wind ouch.

@Mrpike - it certainly was windy yesterday (Saturday) - I had to keep tucked in hard to the shoreline/tree line, otherwise I was being pushed all over the place with the strong wind gusts (they said gusts were about 30 mph and it certainly felt like it) - I caught one good fish (17 inch Smallie, I will look to post a pic later), a handful of decent fish (15/16 inch LMB/SMB), and a handful of smaller sized fish (12 to 14 inches LMB) -- I rode my bike to the lake this morning to check it out and the winds were very strong - waves/white caps all around - they are calling for 25 mph wind with up to 40 mph gusts -- so I will not go out today

@gim - I have the mouth at the bump board -- and when I look at the picture on the computer it is in the correct orientation, yet when I post the pics on here they come out upside down or vertical instead of horizontal - not sure why ? - any tips/suggestions are welcome - Thank you !

 

@WaskaCrank12 try flipping the orientation so that it's upside down, maybe it will auto flip. I sometimes experience this problem.  Flip it upside down, then flip it back if you have to.  That's solved the problem for me too.

 

We can tell how big those fish are pretty easily even if it's upside down.  Much better fish than I've been catching, that's for sure.

12 minutes ago, WaskaCrank12 said:

yet when I post the pics on here they come out upside down or vertical instead of horizontal

My raw photos do that too....easy fix if you're running Windows on your computer. Open the pic with Paint, then just re-save it....should post correctly after that. Macs? There a paint program that comes with the OS...try the same thing with that.

Rough weekend. Friday got 3 pike on spinnerbaits. Sunday wind was horrid got 1 bass and 1 pike. Even attempted trolling a crank haven't trolled in years. White caps not fun. Saturday we shore fished got zero. Weather looks good but putting the boat away end of the month. Got a new boat in July and just don't want to put it away.

Another weekend in the Northwest for me.  Got on the road a bit late, so I wasn't on the water until about 1230pm.  Water was a bit colder than I was hoping for, around 57-59* but I had a pretty consistent bit up until around 430, and then they seemed to shut down.  Tomorrow could be interesting, a falling barometer and a windy day in the forecast.  Hopefully the weather change puts them on the feed.

 

Pretty good average size today with a few tanks.  Of course, the batteries on my scale died and I left the bump board I just bought for this trip at home.. oh well.

I took all of next week off like a month ago and fishing has been terrible lately for this guy.

 

I’m chasing largies on Monday, brown bass on Tuesday, and muskies on Wednesday. I am really hoping that cooler weather has dropped water temps and improved the bite.

 

My boat is getting winterized on Oct 27 so the number of days left to fish is dwindling now.

@Standard - nice fish !

I am going to try and get out on the water today (Saturday) - but with winds forecast to be 20mph with big gusts on top of that I am not sure that will happen. Tomorrow (Sunday) is supposed to be even windier and include rain - so that looks doubtful. The DNR has already taken the docks out of two of my local lakes (which makes it very tricky to launch and load --- and with big winds it can be a major struggle).

@gim I will have Thurs/Fri of this coming week off so I am hopeful the weather will be fishing friendly on those days --- I hope the entire week will be good weather for you.

I winterize the boat myself and store it in the yard under cover (not fully enclosed) so I will try and keep the boat ready to fish for as long as possible -- but as mentioned the days of being on the water are now numbered.

Up near Breezy with a couple buddies. 60F water temps. Fishing is slow but we're grinding it out. 

 

 

Wow, Adrift!

Pretty good outing this morning for largies.  By far my best day in over a month.  Went with a friend for about 5 hours and caught 13 largemouth and 3 pike.  Almost all quality fish.  10 of the largies were 17+ inches and the 3 biggest were all 4+ pounds.  My friend Greg tagged into a thick northern pike too - which was about 10 pounds.  A green spinnerbait reeled in as slow as possible as long as the blades kept turning was the lure of choice.  Water temp was 58 degrees.  Tomorrow I target brown bass on the big lake.

 

 

Saturday did a bit better chatter bait and jig and a pig 14 bass 1 30 inch pike all in less than 2 FOW.

62 degree water temp. Days are numbered as well probably put boat away Halloween week. When water temps get to mid 50's bass for me are usually tucked in for winter.

Went to Mille Lacs today to target smallmouth. Kinda slow. Caught 5 bass and 3 pike. It’s rare for me to run into pike out in the abyss on a rock pile, but I musta found a snake pit and one of them bit off a jerk bait. Not cool.

Biggest smallmouth was 19 inches, water temp was 56. I am done chasing brown bass until next spring.

 

 

Nice fish all

18 hours ago, gim said:

I am done chasing brown bass until next spring.

 

 

I almost just threw up in my mouth.

 

Do you put the poles away to pick up a weapon?

 

Done fishing????

Yes, that’s part of it. I start hunting in November. First deer, and then pheasant.

 

My boat has a winterization date of Oct 27 so I might go once or twice more as long as the weather holds up. Usually sometime by late October the water temps also drop below 50 degrees, which is the cut off point for me to target bass.

 

Specifically speaking of Mille Lacs, it’s just a massive lake and the wind has to cooperate for me to fish it.