week three

[Randy Peyer]

Fishing in the Three Lakes area has remained excellent in the past week. We experienced a couple of spring cold front in the last 10 days which slowed down the Crappie spawn for a while but with temps in upper 70's last week many nice fish are now being taken in traditional spawning locations. The sizes have been running real nice so far this season with most all Crappies being just about 12 inches. The simpler the better, small bobber, split shot, and a #8 hook with a 12 to 18 inches of line below the float has been the ticket in 2 to 4 feet of water. Walleye are biting pretty well. 12 to 16 inch fish are real common on the Three Lakes Chain. I am still catching some on rocky shorelines but by far this week the best bite has been new weeds in less than 10 feet of water. Picked up a 20 inch smallmouth in a stump field on Thursday on a small beatlespin looking for crappie so they are starting to move to shore but I haven't seen any in the spawning areas yet but they should be soon. Water temps have been fluctuating greatly but were in the 63 degree area on Sunday. Musky opener in five days!! My resort hosted the 11th annual Edward Jones fishing outing May 13th and 14th. 38 fisherman boated 9 accidental muskies, mostly on small crankbaits fishing for walleyes, in the day and a half they fished. Several other larger fish were lost at boatside on light tackle. I haven't fished for bluegill at all yet but have not seen any in the shallows.