Have you thought of hiring a guide? Somebody that fishes the lake.

Location area hard to provide as the fish get removed so fast. Many people will keep the largest sunfish, rather than leave the 9 plus inch gills in the lake to sustain the lake. Keeping 7 to 8 1/2 inch fish. When biggest gills are removed this allows smaller fish to spawn before they are truly mature. I have seen lakes go from having a 8 inch average sunfish to having a 5 1/2 inch average. Sunfish grow only 1 inch per year or less.
Your best bet would be to find a depth, and just fish that depth going around the whole lake. I have done fishing guide trips on Clearwater and caught nice sunfish on waxies and crawlers. Start at 9 ft of water.

I operate a fishing guide service, but Central Minnesota leaves a large area. What is the closest city are you looking to fish? Many lakes have good pike fishing, but need to narrow down the area. This would help define the closest lake to a good pike fishing trip.

I guide on Minnetonka; If you are thinking of catching Walleyes? Plan on fishing either very early in the morning or staying out until 10 pm. If you have a boat you can go any place and try for whichever species you want to target. If you a shore bound fisherman, hit the channels.
Look me up @ Jiggin Jims' Fishing Guide Service, I also do Taxidermy, have done several fish caught from Lake Minnetonka.
Good luck Jim

Bullheads in cold water can be a tasty change. I know some people will target them with crawlers, 7 to 11 inch BH's are your best eaters. Skin and roll in flour, season to your taste, fry in deep grease.

Low light, fish less than 14ft. use a bobber and jig/minnow or leech. Strained water for a brighter light period, fish will be spooky. A trolling motor w/ anchor lock is ok, but If you can ease an anchor down do it. Quiet is key. I guide on several area lakes, so far it has been a bit slow. but should start to pick up.

Welcome to the Stage Gravedigger, This can be found on the Minnesota DNR site. I found 35 streams in the north country. If you search, you can find a stream near you. Or you can travel to the North shore, lots of rivers to fish there.

Welcome Dennismn, Feb, 11 is a Holes for Heros contest, on Medicine lake, in Plymouth, MN. Most of the walleyes are caught in 25 to 35 ft of water. Many of these eyes would be 20 to 24 inches. Be aware, there is a new rule for Medicine on sunfish and Crappie, 5 of each species. Trying to grow larger panfish. Everyone is keeping the real big fish which stunts the growth of the fish. Several of these walleyes could be in the weed beds also. As they are a stocked fish, which most times makes them weed walleyes.

If you are looking to go out on Clearwater lake near Annandale, Mn. A UTV went through the ice, between the bays. This year BJ's bait is not operating during the winter, and no longer is doing lake access. With the current that goes thru the lake.

Welcome Bergstrom, With our last cold weather, more guys are starting to drive on area lakes. Although it is still best to walk out and test ice thickness. Jiffy has a little auger called the scout which is great for testing. It drills a 2 1/2 inch diameter hole plus it has a tape measurement on it. The nice things is I can get my fl-8 transducer down the hole to check water depth. Although pouring water on the ice saves from drilling if you don't have a scout. sometimes the locator can show ice thickness.
This has been a really odd year for ice, The heavy snow that we got in December caused for slush in top of the ice and did not freeze. I would say Big lake will produce crappies and Walleyes in 18 to 28ft of water. You can check for deep weeds using a Rapala jigging minnow. I use them to glide into the weeds, pull up small bunch of the weeds.

Old trick to find water depth without drilling a hole. I use a liter bottle of water mixed with 2 tablespoons of salt. using a good steel shovel to scoop of snow to bare ice. Pour water solution on ice, place transducer in the water. the transducer will show you depth a the lake and even the ice thickness if you practice this enough. We did this years ago before getting power augers. it slow saved us a lot of fuel with using gas augers.
We could also see fish under the ice while doing our scouting. Even map out a point on the top of the ice by scratching depth in ice with a awl. I showed this to some young guys 4 years ago after they setup their wheelhouse on top of a shallow (4feet deep) rock bar. They thought it was 15 ft. along the edge of the bar.

Foreplay lake, oops wrong lake. Sounds like going to lake broken hearted. no fish here. LOL, You misspelled the name it's Forbay. I checked the DNR Lakefinder page, got no survey, says fish Species are burbot, Rock bass, Smallmouth Bass, Yellow perch. with a depth of 26 ft, for 35 acres?
I would just go to Thompson Reservoir, That has Walleye in good numbers, from 2002. Or there are several guys each out on the harbor ice. The last ship of the season went out Sunday night, Jan 15, the 2022-2023 shipping season is over.

Maybe even a step better, as you can zoom into depths you want rather than a 6 ft bottom on half a diameter you could do a full diameter at what ever you wish. Plus a split screen, flasher and sonar as you use during the summer months. Not sure as to the depth you fish, But I try not wishing deeper than 27 feet. If a fish is caught deeper than that it's a dead fish, not matter as the fish go thru depth changes that they can not handle.
Hope this helps.

I would use the bird, unless you are running a 28 or a 30 vex? But I use my bird from summer fishing to have better electronics on the ice. I have recorded several lakes, replotted the bottom of several lakes. Which now I have the true bottom, even the Lakemaster chip don't have, all for my guide service. I do have two Lowrance units that are only used for ice fishing when clients don't have locators. I which will be for sale as I purchased the Mega-live system. for in the wheelhouse. Plus I have a Aqua- view when water conditions allow.

Billy, That's a tough break. We have lakes on Minnesota that are now 5 bluegill limits. I have handed out state regs to people, I operate a fishing guide service. I had a customer try keeping a Smallmouth bass that was One inch under size. He measured it and said it was legal, as I looked a bit later released it wasn't. I ended the the guide trip as the guy got upset as I released the fish.
Having regs in boat and in the truck when I go saves lots of money and chance of making mistakes.

Tight lines for this year, good luck