Rainy Lake 7/24 thru 7/30 report

Fished starting Saturday afternoon on 7/23 thru the following Friday. I have fished Rainy 1 time in early August (last summer) and fish it every year in early October so I have some knowledge of the lake and places to begin.

That said, we had a tough week finding keeper sized walleyes. We spent the majority of our time east of the Brule, but also fished a couple spots west of the Brule going out each morning and coming back in the evening. There were a lot of boats on many reefs on both sides of the Brule. We spent a lot of time jigging and pulling lindy rigs, both ways produced similar results. Sometimes the jig/minnow was the ticket other times they preferred leeches. It seemed like when they wanted leeches, they would also hit crawlers over minnows

The bright side is about 40% of the fish caught were walleyes in the protected slot with most being 20″ to 23″. The down side was the overall quantity of fish was down from past experiences (although a couple spots if we got consistent little ones, we would move on after 30min or so)

Im headed back up for 4 days of fishing in early October. With the fishing pressure going down after Labor Day, maybe the bite will be better by October. Im sure the walleyes are getting sick of dodging jig heads everywhere

Nice report. I had saw all the boats on the reefs West of the Brule but didn’t know how they were doing. Do you stay at one of the resorts?

We stayed at Sha Sha

We were on a houseboat from the 24th-31st in VNP. Fishing was tough the first few days, strong winds then hot and flat. I’ve never seen so many 10-12″ smallies in my life! By Wednesday afternoon we started to figure out the eyes plus the barometer rose a percent. We ended the trip with 38 slot fish with 6 people fishing, 13-18″. They all came on leeches both rigged and slip bobbered. The majority were caught in 24-30′ on windswept rocks.

This was my 4th time up there on a houseboat trip and by far the toughest bite we’ve encountered but it’s also the latest we’ve gone.

We’re going to Rainy late September, it’ll be my first time so I’m pretty excited. Is Black bay any good?

bigstorm curious how/where you fish out there in October? I have never spent much time chasing walleyes that late in the season but I have some time off the last week of Oct and was thinking about a few days on Rainy.

Thanks!

belletaine wrote:

We were on a houseboat from the 24th-31st in VNP. Fishing was tough the first few days, strong winds then hot and flat. I’ve never seen so many 10-12″ smallies in my life! By Wednesday afternoon we started to figure out the eyes plus the barometer rose a percent. We ended the trip with 38 slot fish with 6 people fishing, 13-18″. They all came on leeches both rigged and slip bobbered. The majority were caught in 24-30′ on windswept rocks.

This was my 4th time up there on a houseboat trip and by far the toughest bite we’ve encountered but it’s also the latest we’ve gone.

We’re going to Rainy late September, it’ll be my first time so I’m pretty excited. Is Black bay any good?

6-8′ deep with lots of rocks.

Dutchboy wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>belletaine wrote:</div>
We were on a houseboat from the 24th-31st in VNP. Fishing was tough the first few days, strong winds then hot and flat. I’ve never seen so many 10-12″ smallies in my life! By Wednesday afternoon we started to figure out the eyes plus the barometer rose a percent. We ended the trip with 38 slot fish with 6 people fishing, 13-18″. They all came on leeches both rigged and slip bobbered. The majority were caught in 24-30′ on windswept rocks.

This was my 4th time up there on a houseboat trip and by far the toughest bite we’ve encountered but it’s also the latest we’ve gone.

We’re going to Rainy late September, it’ll be my first time so I’m pretty excited. Is Black bay any good?

6-8′ deep with lots of rocks.

Kinda what I thought. There’s a snowmobile trail from Kab to Black Bay I believe.
Sorry for the hijack! I’ll be studying the rainy threads.

scottaheller wrote:

bigstorm curious how/where you fish out there in October? I have never spent much time chasing <em class=”ido-tag-em”>walleyes that late in the season but I have some time off the last week of Oct and was thinking about a few days on Rainy.

Thanks!

We fish similar areas (reefs/humps) in early October as well, pretty much a jig bite tipped with a minnow or shiner at that time. The bigger challenge in early October can be the weather. Seems like every year we see snow or at least flurries 1 day and the wind can blow for more than a day.

That said, we still have a good time, lot less boat traffic (may not see more than 2 or 3 boats all day from the Brule or east)

1 year we ran into a really tough bite for 2 days, pulled the boat out and trailered it downriver for the remaining 2 days and did well.