Hotspotoutdoors

I am up here at Crane Lake, thinking about making a day or two trip down there this next tues-wed. How is the Lake Trout population? Am I going to need downriggers to get down to these fish? I was planning on pulling some cowbells with either spoons or suckers if I could find some. Thanks for the help!

WW, the surface temps are in the 70s, so you're going to have to get down 20 feet or so to get into the best temp range for lakers (50-55). Although we've got a cooling trend the next several days, with highs in the 50s-60s, so that'll cool those surface temps a bit.

I haven't been out for a coupla weeks now, except for a quick jaunt as a passenger in a buddy's boat for a few hours (one fish on and lost at boatside), but the other reports I've heard in the last week have been good.

Last Friday,Burntside temps at about 25 FOW were 51-52 degrees, about 58 degrees at 16 FOW in one spot, 61 degrees at the same depth at another.

Does anyone have any advice for summer lakers on Burntside?

I'll be up for the 4th and was going to fish a few days. I'd love to hook a trout, but don't know the lake well enough yet or a whole lot about lake trout fishing. My grandfather passed away before I ever thought to ask him where and how. All I know is to slowly troll Sutton Silver Spoons in 50-55 degree water. Accoring to "Sr FishingMN Family" and Steve Foss, that would be 25-30 feet of water right now.

Specifically, where, how deep, and what lures/technique? I'd love any advice anyone could give and I'll report back here with how I do after the weekend.
Thanks!

MG, welcome to HSO/FM. Great to have you here.

Your Sutton spoons will work very well on Burntside, as will any salmon/trout flutter spoon.

You haven't told us what gear you have. So, what gear do you have?

If you have downriggers, just troll 30-40 feet down over shoreline and island points/breaklines in 40 to 75 FOW. If you don't have downriggers but have divers like dipsy or jet divers, same deal.

If you don't have any trolling aids, put three ounces of weight on your line above a ball-bearing swivel and then put a six foot leader between the swivel and the spoon. Trolling about 2.5 mph, which is generally a good speed for most flutter spoons, you'll be down 20-25 feet. Jointed Rapalas and Husky jerk-baits work well, too, though I've done best on spoons. If you're using the weight option, be sure to let out a good 100 feet of line or more so fish spooked by the boat will feel OK coming back behind after the boat passes and smacking the lure.

Another option is the big-lipped deep Rapalas, some of which will troll down to 30 feet deep so you wouldn't need any extra weight/downrigger/diver at all.

There are so many spoon/minnowbait patterns that the possibilities are dizzying. But just let me say that when the guys I was guiding caught 11 lakers over a two-day period recently, they came on half a dozen different spoon patterns, with none outproducing the others.

Hi Steve,
Thanks so much for the warm welcome and the advice. As you probably could tell, I just joined the site. I stumbling across it last night while researching lakers online.

To answer your question, I don't have any trolling aids. I just have my walleye/northern pike gear and a few casting poles. As for tackle, we've fished lakers a few times on fly-ins when I was a kid so I don't remember much about the tackle. I do remember that we used jigs tipped with sucker meat primarily on those trips, to some success. I also fished lakers once on Burntside with my dad when I was a kid, and again, don't really remember it too well. I do know we trolled the sutton spoons with the three-way rig.

It's interesting you mention deepdiving cranks. I just picked up a bunch for walleyes and I'm thinkin those would work. But, like you, everyone seems to say that spoons work best.

So, you still think the fish will only be in 45-75 feet of water (at least the active ones) this late in the summer? I was always told that by mid-summer they go really deep, like to the bottum of the 100 foot holes. Also, what pound test line to you use? Most sites have said that the heavier line people used to use is not a good idea. Most of them are saying to stick with 6-8lb test. Is that true?

Thanks again!
Jeremy

Jeremy, I catch fish over 40-75 FOW at all open seasons on Burntside. There's a shallow winter pattern as well, and the fish do also frequent the shallows to some degree in spring, before the shallows warm.

But when the summers are warm up here, Burntside stratifies, and the thermocline (with water too warm for lakers' preference above and colder water below) generally runs around 25 feet deep. Some summers there's little or no stratification because the summers are too cold. I think we were pretty close to stratifying last week, since surface temps were in the 70s, but this last five days of cold weather has reversed that, I'd reckon. And with the strong winds agitating the water, I think the surface temps will still be fairly cool.

Anyway, when you're up here, if you can get to 20-30 feet deep trolling you'll be able to find active lakers, if they are active.

There are lakers in very deep water at all times of the year, but it's an old wives tail that they can only be found way down deep on the bottom in 100+ feet of water in summer. It may be true on other waters, but we're talking Burntside, where it's not true at all.

That being said, vertical jigging with your pike rod and 1-2 oz bucktails in deep water is a good option, too, and there are a handful of guys on Bside who basically only jig in summer. Others jig around dawn when the winds are down and it's easy to stay vertical and then troll after the winds come up in the morning. Unless you know the lake and know specific spots, it's not likely vertical jigging will be very productive, since you can't cover near the water looking for active fish that you can trolling.

Anyway, if you fish the way I said and in the locations I said, you'll be putting your lures over the top of lake trout. And even if you're over 75 FOW there's not necessarily any need to get your lures way down deep. There are lakers on any given day close to bottom, and some of those lakers don't feel active enough to come up to your lure. But on any given day some of those deep lakers will do it, and it's nothing for a laker to come up 50 feet to smack a lure. Plus, if it's an active day, there'll be fish suspended well off bottom, often as high up as 20-25 feet from the surface over 50-100 FOW, and your lure will hit them right on the head.

The three-way rig is a good one, too, as long as you have enough weight to keep that lure down 20 or more feet. And you can pick up a Dipsy Diver or a (30-foot) Jet Diver for about $15, and your pike rod outghta be stiff enough to handle that, as long as you've got a rod holder in your boat. For either the Dipsy, the Jet Diver or the in-line or three-way weight rigs, if your pike rod is spooled with superbraid in the 30-lb class, it'll be narrow enough to help you get deeper. The fatter the line, the shallower you'll run because of resistance to the water. I use a fluoro or mono leader of about 15 lb behind the Dipsy, Jet Diver or weight, but that's just habit. Lakers are not line shy, and I doubt it'd matter at all if you ran the same superbraid as a leader.

Awesome! Thanks so much for the tips! I'll come back next week and let you know how I did. I'm hoping to someday duplicate what my great grandfather did with that Laker that's on the wall at J.D. Mills Company/Mills Clothing in town. I've been looking at that mount my whole life, dreamin to catch one.

Thanks again for the help and have a wonderful 4th!
Jeremy

Jeremy, does that make you John Mills' son?

Nope, nephew. Sue Brewer, John's oldest sister, is my mom. I'm the oldest Bill Mills grandson. I'll be crashin at John and Marry's place on the lake.

Got it. Best of luck then.

7 hours of trolling B-Side and sunburn on 6/23.

After putting the pieces together I wish I had come back the next day to finish the puzzle.
What I had learned along with a report I heard days after my trip was...

Most fish 55-65' down over deep water or if your daring tight to the contours although one fish was taken at 30' down. Don't know if that one came up to hit or not but most marks if not all were deep. At 75' you'll see a definite change in water density.
Downriggers and dipsys to get your spoons down there.

Burntside temps today: Surface 59-60 degrees, 14-16 FOW 58 degrees, 21 FOW 55-56 degrees, 29-31 FOW 51-52 degrees.
Even temps in small bays were 60-61 degrees on the surface.
Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

The family and I are about to blast up north to the greater Ely area for the holiday weekend. I will be on Burntside at least two times while being there. I will give a post when we return. If you happen to be on the water there and have a marine radio, give Big Country a shout out on 16. I'll have mine on the whole time just in case. BC

Hmmmmm, Mark, I've got six trolling milk runs dialed in on Bside that go over very different depths/structures, and it's a rare full day's fishing those runs don't produce a few fish (best so far this season was an 8-fish day).

I'm busy Saturday afternoon but could hop in your boat Saturday morning or all of Sunday if you're up for it. I reckon it'll be pretty darn busy since it's the 4th weekend.

Big Country and I fished for 6-7 hours today, roughly half a day, finishing up at 3 p.m., and landed one 4-pounder. We saw many, and I mean many, active fish, some flying high and some that we saw come off the bottom and smoke their way up to our lures only to not strike. Some came out of 90+ FOW all the way up to look over the lure on the top downrigger 30 feet down.

We changed up lures often, varying trolling speeds with throttle and s-curves but could not get them to go. We saw no fish over the shallower structure in 45-60 FOW. All were located over 70-100 FOW. We scraped the bottom with downriggers as well as riding them high, also varying how much line we strung out behind the riggers.

Mostly, we just had fun. It was hard leaving the lake at 3 p.m. (prior work commitment on my part). Usually when fish are active all day but not quite pulling the trigger, the supper hour and evening can be really good.

It was a gorgeous day to be on the lake, with temps in the mid 70s, light winds, sunny skies and good company. It was dead calm the first couple hours. Surface temps were from 64-66 everywhere we fished.

Thanks, for the report Steve.

Still a great day to be out. I'll be up in August after the salmon thing on Michigan. get'er dialed in and If you got a saturday free in August I'll make sure it works out so we can fish other than standing on the water staring down a hole.

Sounds good, gutz.

I was out with Big Country again for three hours this afternoon and ran over tons and tons of high-flying fish over deeper water again. Got another 4-lber to go. Neither of them were fin clipped.

BC said the one he cleaned last night had a stomach bloated with bugs, mostly mayflies.

Another short, but fun day fishing beautiful Burntside. It never get's old doin' time on that body of water for me. Thank's again Steve for the camraderie. It sure was amazing to see that many fish charge the lure then not commit. Frustrating to say the least! We saw one laker blast from deep water to a spoon then dive down like a torpedo. I think the ball must have put a real scare in that one. So, the story of the day for the one fish goes like this. After trolling over some deep water humps that had piles of fish on it, we got a little too close to the bottom on one pass. The one rigger started bouncing so I quickly raised the ball (there were fish all around on the hump as I was doing this). Immediately after clearing the hump Steve yells that either the rod is stuck on the bottom or there is a fish on the line. Fish on dude . So, after the catch Steve and I begin to try and figure out what made the light turn green for the fish to bite. Steve comes up with what made perfect sense to me, at the time. He say's that when the ball was banging the rock hump it attracted attention. The laker charges in to investigate. When he finds the spoon on the end of the line he starts to follow. What happened next? Perfect timeing my friends. I was cranking like a mad man to get the rigger off of the rocks, hence the lure took a fast charge upward as if being chased. Makes perfect sense. We solved the puzzle. Problem is I don't care to chance getting hung up on the bottom in whitecaps. So we just stay close to the bottom for the rest of the short day. No more takers. When I get home and clean the fish, the mystery is really solved. Steve, that lake trout had a bone dry belly. No food in it at all. IT WAS JUST HUNGRY!!! I think I may go crazy some day figureing these things out. I guess thats why I keep going. BC

Oh yeah!