WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
January 4, 2007

My boat is for sale. Check it out here.

Welcome 2007. As the new year comes upon us, the weather remains so nice that its hard to believe that we are in Northern Minnesota. At this pace, we will be fishing in the boat by the end of February. That would be an open water angler dream come true, or at least mine.

So, I hope everyone had a great new year celebration. As for me, again this week I found myself chasing those Walleyes and Perch on Winnie. I just can't seem to break away from the consistently good bite that Winnie is producing. Over the last couple of weeks, it seems that the fish have pulled away from the smaller lake structures and located on more specific corners and points off of those larger structures that spread over a vast majority of Winnie.

This week we found a consistent big or slot fish bite, even during the day, on the deeper 26-28 feet points near steep edges. Most of the larger fish are suspending and we have kept a close eye on the Vexilar and once we see a line show up on the Vexilar we are quickly pulling the baits up to them to soon feel that quick thud in the pole and line. Most of the suspended fish are roaming from 4-8 feet off the bottom. Again the best presentation has come from a frostee jigging spoon in a Perch color combination tipped with a minnow head.

As for the eater Walleyes, we are seeing a bite that continues to be very good at times and this week the best time is that last couple hours of daylight. Look for the last couple of hours to be the primetime feeding area from here until ice out, but don't think on a cloudy day that one won't come across a hungry school of Walleyes during mid-day hours.

How about the Perch? We have seemed to find the best action on the deep rocks. There has been a great action bite for the Perch on the East shore as well. The Perch fishing continues to show what a fish limit reduction will do for the average size and numbers of fish. We have seen many more true jumbos again this year and we are about 2-3 years from having world class jumbo Perch.

Please continue to lean on the safe side of ice fishing. As the ice is slowly gaining thickness, a number of anglers are now driving on Winnie with full sized trucks. I WOULD NOT RECOMMEND DOING THIS! I would recommend ATV or snowmobile traffic again this week.

Good Fishing!

Sean Colter
Member of NMGL
www.seancolter.com