Pool 2 Report (2021)

Anyone know if its locked up from the confluence to the dam?

Mike W wrote:

494 ramp was packed Saturday. Empty parking lot when we got there. By the time we had the boat in there was 6 boats behind us. It only got busier from there.

We stayed away from the community holes looking for fish. Found a few but had to work for them. Mostly nice saugers. Sounds like skunked was the report from a lot of boats.

I can second what mike said. Lots of boats out Saturday. Community spots were busy and not much catching going on. Most of the boats cleared out when the clouds and wind rolled in. Water is still real cold and plenty of ice yet. Every fish was worked for.

mahtofire14 wrote:

Anyone know if its locked up from the confluence to the dam?

Channel is pretty much froze north of down town, all the way past Lillydale. Ice looks rough and open patches here and there. As of noon today.

mahtofire14 wrote:

Anyone know if its locked up from the confluence to the dam?

its starting to break from dam to hidden falls but still locked up down by the confluence. i was down by Watergate today on foot, it’ll be a bit.

Have a few hours tomorrow morning before work and was thinking about fishing on the shore by the dam or fort snelling. Maybe I won’t be!

Anyone check out Hidden Falls or Lilydale lately? Getting the boat out somewhere today!

Dave, let us know what you find out! Will be making it out this week/end. Pigseye landing was good last weekend. You can boat up river into the city, I didn’t go any further.

Pigseye landing? Where is that!?

494, where it crosses the river south of the STP airport.

I just got to work this afternoon at the U of M Campus. My unit looks over the river and it is wide open looking out over the 94 bridge just above the dam.

This webcam also has several views from downtown.

Looks ice free in this section!

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Anyone else find the car by the 494 ramp?
If I remember correctly they pulled some out last spring in the same area.

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Upper p2 is a lot more open than 2-3 days ago. I drove shepard road from around watergate down to Highway 61 yesterday. Most of the ice is chunked up between downtown Saint Paul and 35E.

Still some shore ice hanging around of course. The Hidden Falls ramp is snow and ice free but someone would have to bust up the sheet clinging to shore there.

I’ll bet it’s gonna be a zoo down there this weekend.

Any update on Lily Dale ramp?

Water temps on the rise at ford dam. almost 35 degrees.

I drove by Lily Dale in the boat late Friday afternoon, March 5th. It looked like there was just a small ice shelf out in front. Didn’t look like it would take much work to open it up.

Any word on Hidden Falls?

Is Lions Levee in St. Paul Park open yet?

Thanks.

See photo. Lots of rigs in the lot, Haven’t seen any reports if anyone is actually doing anything.

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Lily Dale ramp is open and in good shape.

Drove by the 494 access yesterday. I didn’t see much ice and all that open water looked really good. The lot was pretty much full. There were rigs parked all over the place including out on the road.

SR

boone wrote:

Is Lions Levee in St. Paul Park open yet?

Still froze in noon Sunday.

-J.

Lillydale and Hidden falls are open for sure and so is 494 obviously.

We had pretty good luck this weekend.

Great to hear Cody. What kind of depths were you fishing?

We had our best luck around 30’ or so, but it varied by time of day.

Wasn’t to bad for us today to. Got this fatgal and a half dozen other eyes and saugers in a couple hours. Just jigging plastics about 20′ of water.

Sure seemed a little breezy out today.

Thanks for the ride Mark.

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We got a little lucky too. Maybe 8-10 walleyes total. This one was the biggest of the day at 23”.

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I’ve never seen this clarity and flow on P2. Seems to have moved all the fish deeper and into the main channel. For a bit, I was worried my sonar was not functioning properly. Vast wasteland in most spots

3R – everything seemed to overlap in spots. We did come across some of those spots where those channel cats were loaded up and I couldn’t help but notice that water temps are getting close to 40.

I had been fishing deeper this spring to. Seem like with the low flow the fish had been more out towards the main channel looking for flow. Not that that matters anymore. Its all changing now. From the MN river dumping a bit earlier this week to now water levels going up almost 4′. Kinda like someone just erased the board and time to start over figuring out pool 2.

I’ve got a real brain buster for everyone, might even drum up a little friendly debate… if you had to choose between spot lock or side imaging, which would you prefer or find more useful to have on pool 2.

I’m looking to get one or the other, but I can’t afford both.

If this has already been discussed on a separate thread, just let me know and I’ll go find it.

Mike Otis wrote:

I’ve got a real brain buster for everyone, might even drum up a little friendly debate… if you had to choose between spot lock or side imaging, which would you prefer or find more useful to have on pool 2.

I’m looking to get one or the other, but I can’t afford both.

If this has already been discussed on a separate thread, just let me know and I’ll go find it.

Spot lock and it’s not even close. There are a few flat areas where SI is really nice to have but if you can’t get on top of the fish and are fighting the current all the time it doesn’t matter.