While you’re sitting down for your first cup of Saturday morning coffee, Lucas Fagan might be on his second, or even third, as he and fishing buddy Jasper Padrnos try to take up where they left off on Lake Vermillion during last year’s inland walleye/northern opener.
Just maybe, they will top last year’s end-of-trip 25-inch walleye, a cherry on the trip and land the elusive 30-incher. They plan on fishing Vermillion, a 39,272-acre lake near the border with Canada with many islands and 341 miles of convoluted lake shore. Even if winds are wild, they can find secluded places in the maze of bays, inlets and behind islands.
It will be their second year up there for the opener, a major cause for celebration of spring, fishing and fun in Minnesota.
The two grew up in Rochester, though Padrnos now lives in the Twin Cities. “We met through soccer, we were both captains of the JM (John Marshall) soccer team,” Fagan said. With school changed dramatically because of the COVID-19 pandemic, they decided on fishing and “ever since we have been getting out just about every weekend.”
Also helping Padrnos was JM sports biology teacher Robert Schmidt, one of his favorites. He took them on field trips, even during COVID, to places like Mill Creek near Chatfield where he caught trout. “It definitely started in high school,” he said.
Together they have fished many places for multiple species. But the fish they love most is the walleye, especially northern Minnesota walleye.
Yes, they can fish the Mississippi River around here year-round for walleye but it’s not the same. Though Vermillion is a seven-hour drive, “it’s so much fun to be on that big, clear lake,” Fagan said. “When you are out and it’s calm and you are out there with your best friend and it’s just the two of you on the water together … you’re out there in nature.” Besides being a gorgeous, clear lake, “Vermillion is that chance for that one big trophy walleye.”
The state fish are a huge challenge and they love it, Padrnos said. “Northern Minnesota walleye are a mystery,” he said. “You can go just about anywhere in Minnesota and you can catch bass, but I think walleye give you more of a puzzle you have to solve … with walleye, it comes down to a lot more technique there are little things you have to get right to have them bite.” It might be just the right amount of line for long-lining. “It’s a little bit harder to have an amazing day.”
Though they are young - Fagan just turned 23, Padrnos is 22 - they speak as real veterans. Part is the passion, Padrnos said, part is social media. While years ago, they would have needed to put in more time, today they can watch YouTube walleye videos and get a great education quickly. “The learning curve, you can keep up with everybody else,” Padrnos said.
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And while talking like fishing fanatics, they don’t miss out on the beauty of it. They talked about the clear northern Minnesota lakes, the wildlife, the solitude that are such a great part of it . The lakes without so many people also help. Unlike the Mississippi, they don’t have to worry about current so they can work slower, use different strategies. They will fish a lake and try to figure it out. “We are big on dialing in a body of water and realizing, yah, we can do it here, let’s go somewhere else,” Fagan said.
The opener makes those lakes more special because they can’t fish them for inland walleye until THE OPENER, a hallowed time in Minnesota.
Padrnos, a paraprofessional in the Hopkins School District, said once ice starts melting down here and ice fishing end, he thinks about getting the boat out, fishing the river, and about northern lakes. “I can’t wait to go up north and chase after golden walleye,” he said.
For Fagan, the head barista and marketing manager for Cafe Aqui in Rochester, it’s the time after his late-April birthday. “That three-week period before opener, the water is open, boat’s ready, rods are ready, let’s get on the water,” he said. When he’s on the water, being a barista, he has to have his cups of coffee.
Last year, the opener was odd because weather was so warm and fish had finished spawning, he said. They could see fish but nothing was biting. It took them a few days, and help from others, to dial in the bite. They found fish slow trolling along a mile-long dropoff. On the final day (they spend four fishing) “boom we caught the 25-incher on one of the last passes,” Padrnos said. “We took that as the cherry on the cake.”
This year, they want that 30-inch cherry.
John Weiss has written and reported about Outdoors topics for the Post Bulletin for more than 45 years. He is the author of the book "Backroads: The Best of the Best by Post-Bulletin Columnist John Weiss.”
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