Hometown Hero Makes Magic on Minnesota’s Mille Lacs Lake
Two-year BASS Elite pro wins 2016 Toyota Bassmaster Angler of the Year Championship with a little help from Humminbird®
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Racine, WI (September 21, 2016): Bassmaster Senior Editor Thomas Allen says the turnout at the recent 2016 Toyota Angler of the Year Championship on Minnesota’s Mille Lacs Lake was “probably our best ever at an Elite event, second only to the Classic.”
The enthusiasm was contagious. While droves cheered on their favorite pros, many more (even state officials) closely monitored the numbers and quality of smallmouth bass produced by the sport’s top anglers.
The results? Incredible.
Photo by TJ DeVoe
Following myriad big bass caught during practice, by Day 1 word was out, confirming what many Midwestern bass anglers already know: Mille Lacs Lake smallmouth bass are giants, with high numbers of five-pound-plus fish.
Four-time Bassmaster Classic Champion Kevin VanDam and Bassmaster emcee Dave Mercer extolled Mille Lacs as the world’s finest big smallmouth bass fishery, good press for the struggling region as state officials continue working toward walleye management solutions.
Jaws dropped as anglers started carrying 25-pound bags to the scales. “Had the fish grouped up into fall patterns, we could’ve seen 30-pound mega-bags,” says tournament champion Seth Feider, a Bloomington, Minnesota, native. “There are times when you can go out and catch 50 fish all over five pounds. When Mille Lacs is good, guys will be throwing back five pounders. They definitely live here. This place is full of five, six, seven pound smallies.”
Photo by James Overstreet, courtesy of B.A.S.S.
Still riding the wave of a second-place finish at the Plano Bassmaster Elite event in La Crosse, Wisconsin, the two-year pro made a stellar performance at Mille Lacs, weighing 25-8 on Day 1, 24-11 on Day 2, and 26-2 on Day 3 for a 76-5 total. Feider trumped Humminbird pro Brent Ehrler’s 69-13 by over six pounds.
“I thought I blew my season last month on the Potomac. I really didn’t know if I’d be fishing next year. So I definitely went into La Crosse with a way different attitude. The poor finish at Potomac was a blessing in disguise. Now I’m fishing how I fish locally in little 50 boat tournaments, running around and trying to cut everybody’s head off and win the thing,” says Feider.
He continues: “My first year and half in the Elites were rough. I was definitely lacking confidence. These are the best fishermen in the world and it’s a little intimidating. It started changing for me the last two tournaments. I came in with a ‘nothing to lose’ attitude and started for fish aggressively for big fish instead of a limit. Fish for 50th place and you’re going to finish 80th.”
Lucky for Feider, he finished in 50th place, the cut-off to fish the Mille Lacs AOY. One place lower and this Cinderella story would’ve come to a very abrupt end.
Photo by James Overstreet, courtesy of B.A.S.S.
Finding Fish
Feider’s BassCat is rigged with three Humminbird 1199ci HD SI combos—one at the bow, two in the console. “Side Imaging was the deal. I was looking for giant boulders. Mille Lacs has rock from one end to the other. If you stopped everywhere you saw rocks it’d take you a month to fish the lake. My deal was finding super-big boulders in 15 to 20 feet with fish on them. And sometimes the fish were hidden, so I’d just drop on big rocks. The fish were in transition from summer spots, not quite on the fall stuff yet,” says Feider.
While idling, he’d mark waypoints on big boulders that appeared on his Side Imaging screen, which also appeared on his Humminbird LakeMaster Minnesota map view of 1-foot HD lake contours.
“Then I’d go back with my 2D Sonar to look for fish and drop right on their heads. You had to put it right on the edge of the big boulders with steep sides. Hit the boulder top or two feet off to the side and you wouldn’t get bit. You had to put your bait right where the side of the rock meets the bottom.”
Not only did Feider have to put his bait spot-on-the-spot, the abundance of crawfish in the system made catching fish difficult. Patiently dead-sticking his drop-shot for minutes at a time proved key to catching some of his biggest fish.
“Wasn’t like I dropped down and they ate it right away. They aren’t feeding real aggressively right now. There’s so much food down there … if you dove down you’d see something like 10 crawfish on every rock. They’re not going to run something down to eat it, especially the big ones. They’re big, fat and lazy. Patience was key. It was almost like bed fishing. I kept the bait in their face until they were eating just to get it out of their face.”
He continues: “There was one six-pounder I caught on Day 3 that I saw on my Humminbird… I dropped to him, backed up the boat and was shaking it for what seemed like forever. I was just about to reel up, but I motored up to him again, looked at my graph and could see him still sitting there. So I backed up again and about a minute later he bit. I spent a good five minutes on that fish.”
There’s much to be learned from the nuances to Feider’s drop-shot routine. For example, use of Sufix hi-vis braid, which allows him to monitor where his line is at all times, especially in wind and waves. Attached to the main line is a 16- to 18-foot 6-pound Sufix fluorocarbon leader, to which he ties in a #2 VMC Neko Rig hook about 12 inches up and impales a 4-inch stick worm. The light-weight leader and ½-ounce cylindrical VMC tungsten drop shot weight allows him to get down quickly to the fish he sees on his Humminbird 2D sonar and also prevents snagging.
Minnesota Pride
Reflecting on his win, Feider is honored to keep the AOY Championship trophy in Minnesota. “It was fun to go fish my favorite lake and show the world what it’s capable of doing.”
But he has some concerns for what many are now calling the greatest smallmouth fishery in the country.
“We’ve gotta protect it. I’d like to see it go back to catch and release. I don’t know if that’s possible. They have to get the walleye deal figured out, but keeping and filleting 20- to 25-year-old smallmouths is going to end badly. After these fish are dead and gone we’re going to have a big void.”
Asked about the 2017 season, Feider says he’s going to continue fishing every tournament like he’s got nothing to lose.
Not a bad idea, it’s working out nicely for the young gun.
Photo courtesy of B.A.S.S.
