We pulled private houses since Thursday and we have quite a few out. We have had very few problems with them. There were a couple where they took on some water and we had to move them, but no more than usual. We were selective where we put houses and stayed away from areas with a lot of snow so we avoided slush.
We have most of our rentals out and will get the rest out this week. Fishing picked up this weekend and there were quite a few really nice walleyes caught. Some perch are being caught in deeper water and we hope to open Perch Parkway this week. Surprisingly some small eelpout were also caught. It has been a while since I have heard of any numbers of eelpout being caught. I think the warmer temps helped the fishing and now that the weather is leveling off for a while, it should continue to improve.
We continue to see a large number of small perch which are this year's hatch. The numbers are really big and it is a great sign for the future of the lake. It will slow the bite for this year, but it is exactly what we need to improve the fishing in Mille Lacs.
We restricted drive-ons and wheel houses this weekend to make sure that all of our private houses had room. We have now opened the resort to portables and wheel houses without restrictions, except for staying on the roads and not drilling holes in the roads. If you are accessing the lake with a wheel house and you are taking the daily rate, rather than the season package, we require that you leave a driver's license to ensure that the house comes off when you leave. We have done this for many years.
We are open and going well. Our roads have been open for quite a while and have frozen down and we are starting to catch some nice fish. If you have a house here, come up and get it out and if you are looking for a rental, call and reserve it soon. The rentals are filling up quickly.
