I spent this past weekend working out the kinks for the upcoming Mille Lacs fall fiesta by doing some nightime cranking on Lac Court Oreilles.
Over 2 nights we covered a lot of water. We fished weeds, we fished rocks, we fished sand. Spent most of our time in 6-10 fow.
The only eyes we picked up were on rocks in 6-8 fow. Not many, but every fish was at or over 20″. We also picked up slimers and SM bass. Nearly all of our fish came on firetiger HJ12s, fished 140-180 feet back, with speeds at 1.8-2.0 mph (GPS).
As a bonus, we set up on a very shallow (2-3 feet deep) rockpile and HAMMERED smallies pitching light jigs and minnows from 11pm-1am on Saturday night/Sunday morning. When combined with the impressive northern lights display that night, it made for a really enjoyable trip.
So, if you’re looking for some night cranking experience, and don;t want to make the trip all the way to Mille Lacs, give LCO or Grindstone a try. You’ll have the fish all to yourselves (we were the ONLY boat on the water both nights) and they are ready to go. 
