night time

[rymcneil]

I tried night fishing a few times on minnetonka and had no luck. Is minne a good night lake? What other lakes around the metro would u guys recommend? Is there a certain time of the year better? I'm new to muskies but I think it was a blast fishing for them at night even though I had no luck. If you don't want to tell on here shoot me a email if u wanna thanks guys!!! [email protected]. Ryan

[MuskyBug85]

tonka can be a great night lake, one night in august we had a 3 fish night all those fish coming in about a half hour of moonrise. now i know i will get feed back from guys who say that moon timing has nothing to do with it so take that bit of info how you want, i however am a HUGE believer in windows related to baramoter and lunar/solar movements. I think the trick with night fishing is working spots you have confidence in HARD instead of the run and gun mentality we have during day light hours. I also believe that if you catch a fish stay put and try and find another one in the same area, i think often at night they will cruise in packs more so then during the day. also dont be afraid to burn at night in warm water. I guess the jist of night time is pick apart the areas you believe hold fish, work a piece with a bait if nothing happens try it again with a different bait that works at a different speed. a

[50inchpig]

agreed windows are still huge at night, especially moon related windows. it's just like fishing during the day, they gotta eat sometime.

say you fish a 12 hour night shift, you don't get your first fish until 1am then you pop two more at 5:00am just as the moon goes down and the sun starts coming up. you've had a pretty good night, eh? what if you would have given up at midnight?

IMO the windows can be pretty consistent for days, so can the way the fish are eating, out on the cast vs. figure 8 or whatever, so figure 8 a bunch at night, i try to do at least 5 every cast.

however you break it down, nighttime is the right time in the metro, any time of the year.

[10,000 Casts]

I don't night fish that much and I never fish the metro except on extremely rare occations, but any high pressure lakes can be good at night and the metro lakes are hit really hard during the day. Personally, I wouldn't want to deal with the milfoil at night but I'm sure there are times it could be good. like 50 said, they have to eat sometime and you will get most the spots to yourself.

[Musky Buck]

It's a pressure thing, 20 years ago I could expect to see tons of daytime fish as those spots may not have been worked for days on end, now if I show up to the lake I can expect every spot has been hammered almost daily and multiple times unless there is brutal wind. So rather than be a disgruntled daytime angler I'd rather fish 2 nights vs. 5 days, tired yes, action yes, sunburn no and about the time you wrap things up here comes the masses and many go directly to where we just released some nights several fish, realize you may think oh good, no ones on the spot at first light, then you have no luck, it just may be a boat or several boats pummeled the usual milk run heavily throughout the night or other factors, it's the why you see so many videos shot after dark, daytime boat traffic impact and conditioning. Big females are conditioned to feed after dark, they all are once the heat arrives and the lakes have seen millions of casts, bigger waters give you better chances at what I call fresh fish and it doesn't take much of a fisherman to at least hook up after dark medium slow retrieve a bucktail or vary it and with any technology you can at least be fishing a quality spot, but time on the water is huge, to actually learn the water, what lure, etc. I have 1 lure and I'll never throw another, no need to, 14 fish, 3 nights, up to 54.5" um I really don't think a different lure would've brought me more success. Either way, it only took me 25 years to crack the muskie code and there are still plenty of head scratching days, hard part for rookies some is you can night fish your best spot, nothing, then what right, keep going back, timing is huge, it took our 5th run on the same spot and an hour later we had 5 released from 39"-54.5", rather than hope a secondary spot would work I told my boat partner, we need to persist and the window opened and it happened. Good Luck and be ready for boatside attacks as soon as that lure changes in the water column bang, more like thud, but fish on either way. Now the next guy may have a totally different theory that works for him on likely a different lake, that's fishing and that's why muskies are such a great fish.

[rymcneil]

You guys are the best!! Thanks

Ryan