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Posts: 239
Location: Elroy, Wisconsin | I finished fishing on 9/27 for the year. Major storm hit on the 26th and that ended my season up there. Fall fishing closer to home .
For my boat it was way below average this year, with many days of no fish even seen. I fished a total of 6 weeks through the summer and one good week around the 4th and one the second week of Sept. The other weeks were extremely slow with less than one fish per day of any size boated. We did manage 17 over 40" with three 47s the biggest. On most water that would be a good year, so maybe our expectations on LOTW has gotten too high.
Other Observations
More musky guys on Sab Bay than ever before and lots of first timers, many of whom went home disappointed. There were for the first time ever, the usual discourtesies on popular spots.
The water never cleared up and remained dirty all year. Less so further west.
Muskies on shallow bars were almost non-existant. At dark they was somewhat more active.
Almost all fish caught were extremely fat. Shad, shiner explosion???
Casting and trolling first and secondary break lines was at times productive, but never
consistant. Fishing bait balls was not productive.
Moon phase and solanar periods were not factors. As usual weather fronts after periods of stable weather provided the most activity. Surpriseingly cloudy dark days were often non productive.
I have raised a lot more questions than answers. Feedback from others here would sure be welcome. I am sure some of you had a great year. what worked for you?
Have a great fall,
Mudpuppy
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Posts: 84
| I only spent 1 week up in Sioux Narrows in late June. I definitely saw less fish than last year, but I have less years of experience to compare it to. I caught 1 nice thick 46, lost a little guy, and lost 1 other nice one in the upper 40 range. In the spots I'd get 2-3 follows last year, I was seeing basically none. Had to make up some stuff on the fly to find a few fish. This is also a family trip, so I can't be out all day every day, and I keep it to prime times. I probably would've done a bit better if I could put more hours in, but that's the way it goes. |
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Posts: 457
Location: Minneconia | Our week late August early September really paralleled what you are saying, we've never seen so many boats musky fishing in Sab. It was the slowest fishing I've experienced in the years I've been going up there. We fish from Nestor east to about Horseshoe or the Raspberry Islands in the west. On the bright side I caught my biggest LOTW fish ever at 51" this year on the last day, in an area(east of Split Rock narrows)that 47/48" seems to be top end year after year. But again, the pressure was absolutely ridiculous. |
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Posts: 897
| Gas prices, exchange rates, and the internet are the likely culprits for the pressure increase this year. Definitely more boats there during my trips than years past. I went up for 4.25 days over the 4th of July. Major cold front the day before I arrived shut them down for the first evening and first full day. The second full day was pretty slow but they were clearly becoming more active and then they got pretty active after 5 pm. Got one 41, lost a nice one and two others we didn't see, saw close to 20. The third full day we saw over 30 different fish, had over 40 follows, got 6, lost 4, including a 47 and 48. Saw a couple over 50 that day. The fourth day the fish shut right back down for no apparent reason. Saw 7 or 8, caught one low 40's, had one shot at a 46-48ish.
I was back up for 5 days in August, the 11th-15th. That trip we struggled during the day every day, very short windows of activity, weren't seeing a lot of fish, and the bigger fish were pretty much non-existant. It was odd, too, because the weather was seemingly perfect. The sunset bite was unreal that trip, however, and saved the trip. My boat got 15 over 5 days, which isn't horrible, two biggest were 47's, the rest were low-40's, upper 30's.
Speed and size of baits was more of a factor this year than ever before. 8's burned FAST were getting eaten a lot more than anything else. There also seemed to be a solid topwater bite based on what others were telling me, but we never found it. It was a different year, that's for sure, but as long as we stuck with it the numbers ended up ok. |
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Location: Contrarian Island | my 5th full week on lotw and my take on it this year was timing on spots is more crucial than ever.. with added pressure fish probably slide in and out a lot more? we could fish a spot 3 x and see zero fish and the 4th they are all over it... Figure 8 skills this year were more important than ever... use to be fish would come racing in and you could do about any kind of 8 and they would hit it... not the case any more... noticed it the last 2 or 3 yrs that the % of 'suicidal' fish has gone down... from pressure? or just weather related? hard to say... topwater bite this year was way better than the 4 previous years combined... hope that continues!  we got 20 in our boat for 8 days, which is below our expectations... weather more or less sucked for us most days.... we had 3 51+ and 4 or 5 others over 46..so decent size avg... more boats as mentioned...gas prices being lower I'm sure has something to do with that... exploring and finding less pressured areas will only help more in years to come.
Edited by BNelson 9/30/2016 11:42 AM
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Posts: 1828
| man it's hard to believe that "pressure" on LOTW could bring peoples' results down to or below normal standards for MN/WI lakes. Read tons of reports of less than 10 fish in a week, often less than 5, and pressure is mentioned all the time. Could it be changing that drastically? |
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Location: Contrarian Island | 12 hours per day on the water I expect 3 or more in the boat, on any water, MN, WI, and for sure LOTW...so in 8 days we 'expect' 24 or more...simple math.. but some don't expect that many, some may expect more...it's all relative to ones expectations...
and pressure definitely effects every lake even one as big as lotw
Edited by BNelson 9/30/2016 12:36 PM
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Posts: 63
| What was the water temp and what are your thoughts on turn over muddpuppy |
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Posts: 239
Location: Elroy, Wisconsin | Bout the only way to tell turnover is the dirtiness off water during turnover and the clearing up post turnover. I don't think turnover has occurred on LOTW yet. Water temp last week was 60/62 F.
Mudpuppy |
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Posts: 2280
Location: Chisholm, MN | I was one of those first timers this year. I was unpleasantly surprised at all the other muskie boats as well. Fishing was OK, but definitely not what I expected. |
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Posts: 705
Location: Alex or Alek? | BNelson - 9/30/2016 12:32 PM
12 hours per day on the water I expect 3 or more in the boat, on any water, MN, WI, and for sure LOTW.
I want to fish with you... |
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Posts: 4269
Location: Ashland WI | MOJOcandy101 - 9/30/2016 2:18 PM
BNelson - 9/30/2016 12:32 PM
12 hours per day on the water I expect 3 or more in the boat, on any water, MN, WI, and for sure LOTW.
I want to fish with you...
No doubt. I think I have over 150 hours this year with 5 in the boat. |
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Posts: 457
Location: Minneconia | BNelson - 9/30/2016 11:36 AM
use to be fish would come racing in and you could do about any kind of 8 and they would hit it... not the case any more... noticed it the last 2 or 3 yrs that the % of 'suicidal' fish has gone down... from pressure? or just weather related? hard to say.
Definitely have noticed the above recently. 10-12 years ago it was fairly common to have fish go around the 8 5 or 10 times and then eat, or just smash the first or second outside turn no matter how poor the 8 was...we've even had em eat L turns with two feet of weeds hanging off a bucktail with the blades bound up and not spinning. Now a fair amount go around the first half of the 8 then do what I like to call the "Minnetonka Shimmy" and take off. Sure seems like pressure to me. |
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Posts: 49
Location: Minocqua, WI | My brother and I were up at Split Rock the first week in September and it was really slow. We only caught 8 small ones. The largest was 37. We had another 6-8 follows the entire week. It was our first time on lotw's and we can't wait to go back though. Surprisingly, we did not feel like there were many other Musky guys around. Close to Split Rock were the walleye guys in camp, but once we got a couple miles away, we rarely encountered anyone else. Not knowing the area at all, we were really exploring too. We ended up fishing hard near and north of split rock in Sand Bay and then quite a bit to the west around "little blueberry" and "Kings Island". We fished every rocky point and small bay we came across but just moved few fish.
We are definitely going back, but not sure if we were in good areas and just ran into some tough fishing or if we should fish elsewhere. As for Split Rock Lodge, we loved it! Mike and Linda do a great job running it.
Edited by kmeyer 9/30/2016 7:20 PM
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Posts: 51
| Fishing was definitely slower for us this year near the Morson area compared to years pass. Completely agree on amount of musky boats compared to 8-10 years ago, especially in early Septemeber (most surprising to me). In my opinion, fishing the last 5 years just isn't what it was for us 10 years ago. Catch rates down, not seeing nearly as many fish, and like others mentioned, fish are not nearly as likely to hit in the figure eight. It use to seem that anytime I would have a fish follow in the 8 with a double ten, I would elicit a strike 80% of the time. I would say that has dropped to closer to 20%. Maybe next year I'll try a trip up to Eagle or Lac Suel. |
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Posts: 103
| Frustrating year for us as well. Looooong periods of dead sea fishing followed by short windows. Way more pressure than the past. I was fortunate enough to spend about 40 days up there this year so life is still good. |
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Posts: 2238
Location: SE, WI. | Willy/Puppy, I would not worry too much about turnover on the woods. As rough as it gets, and amount of current in the system, the lake just does not stratify like a normal inland lake.
JD
Edited by jdsplasher 10/1/2016 12:05 PM
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Posts: 239
Location: Elroy, Wisconsin | Yep, I never paid to much attention to turnover on LOTW. I still can't figure out why the water was so dirty all year on Sab.
Mudpuppy |
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Posts: 1767
Location: Lake Country, Wisconsin | I thought the pressure in 3 days I spent in Morson, and to the West of there, was really just unbelievable. That was with no musky schools, boot camps, etc either. Was really bad in the center of the lake too. I definitely won't be back In that area. |
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Posts: 153
| Pressure? Thought it was impossible to have fishing pressure on LOTW! It's definitely having an affect. |
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Posts: 306
| Ditto. |
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Posts: 214
| I'll be up first week of November and I will be lucky if I see 1 or 2 other muskie boats out there
Darren |
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Posts: 1767
Location: Lake Country, Wisconsin | musky1969 - 10/5/2016 1:00 PM
I'll be up first week of November and I will be lucky if I see 1 or 2 other muskie boats out there
Darren
Post a report if you remember. I haven't done it myself, but I have heard quite a few people rumbling that the fall trolling production has been disappointing and fallen off in recent years |
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Posts: 214
| Musky Brian - 10/5/2016 1:35 PM
musky1969 - 10/5/2016 1:00 PM
I'll be up first week of November and I will be lucky if I see 1 or 2 other muskie boats out there
Darren
Post a report if you remember. I haven't done it myself, but I have heard quite a few people rumbling that the fall trolling production has been disappointing and fallen off in recent years
Water has been staying warmer later I think is the problem, years past 3rd week of Oct. had water at about 42 degrees last few years thats 1st or 2nd week of November now.
Just my 2 cent's and I have been doing the late fall thing for 14 years. |
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Posts: 216
| Many weeds are gone which may affect the spawning areas as well as the nurseries. This may lead to fewer fish that are shared with many more anglers (significantly increased pressure). Big boats, GPS charts, shared maps with marked spots all contribute to fewer fish seen and fewer caught. The size of the lake used to protect it, but environmental change, fishing pressure and technology have impacted the lake. It is still pretty darn good, but not as good as it was a number of years ago.
Edited by Abu7000 10/8/2016 8:15 AM
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Posts: 540
Location: Leech Lake, Walker MN | More fish caught by walleye fisherman than I have ever heard of pattern change ?
Must adapt ! |
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Posts: 347
Location: eagle river,wis | just closed up our place on LOTW and headed home for the year.Numbers were up but size was down.Warm water and wind all year created a different situation this year.The main lake turned mud brown like Wabagoon and stayed all year.High temps created algae early and because of constant winds stayed suspended up to 10 ft. down.i think the lake will freeze with algae still in the water.Walleye fishermen caught a lot of fish because the muskies were deeper looking for the right temp and clarity.The deeper rock points and reefs produced the most for me and figure eights were critical this year.The wife ended with a 51 and a 48 last day on spinnerbaits slow rolled and triggered on the eights.A learning year for sure.
jeff |
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Posts: 63
| Try the west side on LOTW as fishing pressure is low and water clarity much better.Clearwater Bay,Ptarmigan Bay,Ash Bay,Labyrinth Bay,Shoal Lake.
Also,Whitefish Bay on the east side is a good bet but fishing pressure is higher.
Edited by Lake Of The Woods 10/26/2016 12:29 AM
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