September 23rd, 2025
***Fishing Report***
Walleye - Another week of nice stable weather has the fall walleye bite rolling right along. Lots of anglers were reporting that they were finding active walleyes in 12-15ft of water, right on the drop offs of sunken islands. Again 4-6” minnows, tipped on a 1/4oz jig or fished on a lindy rig was the ticket to success. Strong trolling bite also continues for many anglers. Here anglers are fishing deep flats from 15-20ft of water with perch colored crankbaits. Anglers trolling continue to catch good numbers of walleyes, but they often tend to be on the smaller side. Hot colors last week were perch, firetiger and gold.
Smallmouth - Smallmouth bite has been holding steady this last week with big numbers reported but lacked the big size. Many anglers are catching large numbers of smallies out on the sunken islands, in 6-20ft of water. Not all humps are created equal, so the anglers who put in the time to find the best ones can really experience some fantastic fishing when they find the right hump. Slow rolling spinnerbaits, deep diving crankbaits, Ned rigs and drop shotting soft plastic minnows are all catching good numbers of smallies.
Pike - Pike anglers have been enjoying great trophy pike fishing this last week with several groups catching multiple pike over 40 inches. Large sucker minnows, fished under a bobber, back in shallow bays has been the ticket, but finding large suckers has been harder to find than catching trophy pike. If you can’t find any suckers, large swimbaits, large crankbaits, large spoons and even some big topwater baits have been producing big pike for anglers. Anglers have been having good luck fishing river mouths, mouths of shallow bays and weedlines.
Panfish - Stable weather has the panfish working weedlines and weedbeds again. Key this time of the year is to find the green weeds. Brown weeds are no good. Last hour of light continues to be the best time to target crappies as they move into the weedbeds to feed. Beetle spins, jig/twisters or crappie minnows fished under a bobber have been very effective. Sunfish are again being found inside green weedbeds. Small red worms fished under a bobber have been very effective for catching big bluegills.
Stream Trout - Stream trout anglers enjoyed some good fishing this last week. Anglers looking to do a little grouse hunting and fishing walked into some lesser fishing stream trout lakes this last week and found hungry, lightly fished trout. Night crawlers fished under a bobber about 5-10ft down, which proved to be the best way to catch some really nice stream trout. Anglers fishing from a boat trolled cowbells tipped with small crankbaits, over deep water for limits of stream trout.
Lake trout - Lake trout anglers have been finding active lakers this last week. Lakers continue to congregate around sunken islands as they prepare to spawn next month. Depth of the humps anglers were finding lakers ranging from ones that topped out from 20-40ft of water. Large tubes, bucktails or jigging spoons have been very effective for anglers.
Trophy Smallmouth are common in the fall, for the Ely area.