Minocqua Area Fishing Report

Moving nicely into June, water temps rising, fish where they should be (for the most part) and despite being a little windy at times, great time to be on the water.

Smallmouth Bass: Very Good – Catch and Release only, but lots of very nice “Brownies” being caught shallow. Ned jigs with Finesse TDR’s, Crawz and Ticklerz slamming fish. Top water with Pop-R’s, Chug Bugs, Torpedo and the new Lunker Hunt Spider providing explosive action. Shy fish can always be tempted with a mud minnow or big leech.

Bluegill: Very Good - No signs of bedding on most lakes but fish are shallow and active. Small leeches stay on the hook the best, but worms and thunderbugs are hard to beat. Tiny tubes and Mini Mites under small floats and using flys or poppers in the evenings very effective on warm days.

Largemouth Bass: Very Good-Good – Setting up shallow, warming for egg production. 4” Wacky worms, 3” swim baits and smaller, lighter jig/creature combos best. Tubes also working very well in 3-6’.

Musky: Good – Top water action good with noisy, tail spinning baits best. (Tally Wackers, Whopper Ploppers, Top Raiders). Glide baits, especially those with tails (Phantom soft tail, Smity Jerk) also effective. Medium buck tails and spinner baits also working well.

Walleye: Good – Leeches working very well, concentrate along outside weed edges of 12-16’ using 1/16 oz – 1/8 oz jig or slip-floats. On smaller, shallower lakes, popping or ripping jigs with a large fathead in 5-8’ cabbage. Flowage fish found deeper in 16-18’ mud taking crawlers.

Crappie: Good – Anglers searching for Crappies have found most in 8-12’ cabbage on small jigs, though some being found in large schools near shallow rocks.

Yellow Perch: Good – Thunderbugs, where still available, best choice over 6-8’ weeds. Small-Medium leeches also good choice. On Flowages, thread a thunderbug on a #8 or #6 Aberdeen hook 12” below a 3/0 split shot to work around drowned root systems.

Northern Pike: Good – Chasing well again, spinner baits and chatter baits. Soaking a large chub or sucker along 10-12’ weed edges and inside pockets also good.

a…Tropical Depression? Is heading our way, will halt fishing for a day, temps cooling down for Thursday/Friday will see a slow gradual warm up through weekend into early next week.