Minocqua Area Fishing Report - 9/6/22

Well, that’s over! Summer, I mean. Following a lighter than usual Labor Day weekend, boat traffic will subside a little as we try to get down to some serious fall fishing. Labor Day (9/5) morning temps in the mid 40’s took some heat off the lakes. Many that saw temps in the upper 70’s are reporting surface readings in the low 70’s to upper 60’s. The rest of the week looks to have lows in the 50’s to highs tipping 80 degrees by Thursday. Still, cooling off and cause for some transitioning to start.

Largemouth Bass: Good-Very Good – Green Bass working weeds still. Lots of good action on Wacky Worms, jig and beaver baits. Top fish of the week a 22” bucket mouth caught on a spinnerbait over the weekend. Shows how active they are. Also, some good top-water action in the evenings following the afternoon warm ups.

Bluegill: Good-Very Good – Still good action for “eaters” (7-8”+) working deeper (8-12”) weed tops. On some smaller lakes with semi-deep (20-30’) basins, look for the better Gills to be suspended. A drop-shot rig with a 1/3 of a crawler or slip-bobbers set 10-20’ down working.

Northern Pike: Good – Action picking up on spinnerbaits and chatterbaits over weed tops. Thick fish in the 26-32” range show signs the Pike like the cooling water and are ready to feed.

Crappie: Good – Anglers finding a good bite working drowned wood using medium fatheads in 12-18’. Coontail edges of 14-20’ holding fish suspended 4-8’ off bottom.

Smallmouth Bass: Good – Gravel/rock humps holding Smallies that look to be feeding on Sculpins. Keep this in mind when working baits among the rocks. Ned Rigs with worms or Ned Craws in light brown, grey of some sort of mottled coloring of each working well. Drop-shotting 3 and 4” Wacky Worms in these colors also effective.

Yellow Perch: Good – While working weeds, try to get your bait down quickly to bypass small Gills hovering above the Perch in 7-10’ cabbage ½ crawler under float or on a drop-shot rig with just 12-14” between weight and hook best.

Walleye: Fair-Good – Walleyes moving into early fall patterns of deeper transition areas. Gravel/rock in 27-33’ on crawlers, chubs or jigging Raps. Also being found holding tight to mud bottoms or similar depth. Crawlers best choice here. Reel your fish up slowly so as not to hurt fish too small/ or big when bring Walleyes or other fish from depths or 30+ feet.

Musky: Good – This next month a good time to be casting shallow weeds and weed edges with top-water baits and high riding bucktails or spinnerbaits. Don’t be afraid to cast a few in shallow (less than 5 feet) as some surprisingly big fish have been coming from inside weed lines.

With water temps starting to fall, we should see some active days ahead. Turn-over is a ways off, most fish seem to react well during this time.