Clearwater Lake......late Fall.....

A week ago I ventured back into Clearwater Lake to visit the lake trout and whitefish. These two Rapala ice fishing lures were big producers.

They even work on the whitefish..............

Big Bob from Virden, Manitoba caught his very first laker on this trip. Come on Bob, smile!!

The other half of the family managed to tie into one of those deep water pike. What the heck are they doing in 70 feet of water!? Eating trout and whitefish of course.

Estimated 38 inches, 14 pounds, this young lad was pretty happy! The fish took off like a rocket when released. Now check out this video I made with my new Pentax Optio W90 camera.......pretty cool!

Gord & Keith's Somewhat Excellent Goose Adventure...

Keith Mitchell (from the island) and I decided it would be interesting to try goose hunting. Although we technically have the wrong type of decoys, they are set up in a location where we are told "hundreds" of geese have been landing each day. Boy, we can hardly wait!

First off Keith decides to field strip his gun and remove some extraneous parts he has discovered. Now we are ready to shoot! Is that a goose I hear?

Oh oh........what's with this long faced critter?

The decoys seem to be having the wrong affect. It is time to pull up stakes and move onto "plan B".......location number 2.

This is much better. Keith craftily disguises himself as a bail of hay. Keith, are you there....where are you?

Perfect. Hardly a horse in sight! Will the geese show up?

Success! We each bag a bird and Bell is happy to retrieve them. Her expression seems to be saying "It's about time!".

The "Great Grey Hunter" and sidekick striking a pose. The dog is really the only one that knows what to do in this photo.

As the sun sets on Keith and Bell, I reflect on an interesting day, and wonder why my back will no longer straighten up.............stay tuned for "Keith & Gord's sharptail grouse adventure".

Muskie Madness Week, 2010......

Seven muskies were caught during the 2010 Muskie Madness Week here at VBL........unfortunately none were of the caliber pictured above!

Midweek we all took a break from the high winds and took shelter at the Bayview Hotel for the annual shuffleboard tourney........

Dan (Honourary Dick) Kornelyck, and Bob (Chicago Dick) Kaufman, with a combined total shuffleboard experience of 156 years, shake hands before duelling it out.....

Tension runs high when it comes down to a fraction of an inch..........

Seems plaid is back in fashion........or is it?

A smiling Ken Zipzow is crowned the 2010 "champeen", kicking the butts of Gord B. and "Good Dick" Miller. Tracy from the Bayview steadies Ken, in what must have been an emotional moment for the tall Minnesotan...........

Sweeping ahead to the wind up dinner and awards night, Norm takes the prize for the smallest muskie caught.......16 inches of muscle and teeth! Norm walks off proudly with his VBL coffee mug and burlap sack.

Henry and Phil battled it out for the northern division and tied at a solid 38 inches...

Phil was back up again to the deafening applause of an appreciative crowd.....3rd place in the muskie tourney. What's that........another lure for his extensive collection?

Big time trout fisher Marty McVicor scores big with a second place finish and a lovely VBL t-shirt and Dominatrix lure.

The grand prize winner, holding the original hand carved Chuck Weiss muskie trophy, is none other than the "Garlic Ring Man"......also known as Hugh Ferry. A dark horse contender, he surprised even the grizzled old muskie dudes with his perseverance and good luck! Congratulations Hugh.............and to all who participated in the "Madness"!

Joe and Marty's Somewhat Excellent Adventure

Marty and I just returned from VBL and, for the most part, we were humbled by the walleye and pike this trip. For the past four years the late summer walleye bite in the Vermilion Bay area has been outstanding with lots of fish caught, including many large fish. Not so this trip. Although we caught dozens, most walleyes were in the 14-16 inch range. Our biggest went 23" and each of us caught one in the five inch class. I'd never seen a walleye that small before.

We worked the hell out of deep areas (25-55') with bottom-bouncers and crawler spinners that held plenty of fish, but the bite was very tentative. Mostly, our baits were ignored. The pike were even less cooperative. Again, the fish were running on the small size. The sole exception was a fat 34"er that I got on Clearwater Lake. But overall, the pike bite was slow for us. We weren't alone. Most VBL guests were running into the same situation that week.

My conclusion is that Marty and I were doing something wrong. Otherwise we would have caught more and bigger fish. This I need to contemplate.

Lake Trout fishing was good the day we spent on the West Arm of Eagle, running our lures in the deep water of Trout Holes #1 and #2. This is typically a "hit or miss" situation. And it's not unusual to get skunked. But this area holds some big lakers and anything 35 inches or more is a big laker. Several fish in this class have come to net in the last few years. They fight incredibly hard and for a long time. For my money, these are the best fish to catch in Eagle.

Marty wanted one of these bruisers more so than anything else on this trip. His wishes materialized with the monster 38 " laker shown above. This heavy fish was successfully released. Gord estimated it's weight to be about twenty-five pounds and I think that's pretty close. This was one of six we caught that day, which also included three piddlers (caught by me) and a pair of 26"ers caught by Marty. Four years ago, my buddy Andy also caught and released a 38" laker from Trout Hole #2. According to Gord, these are the two largest lakers ever caught on Eagle by VBL guests. I hope to catch one someday as well, but netting both of these brutes was very thrilling, regardless.

The top picture reveals the basic set-up we use for lake trout. It shows my St. Croix Trolling Rod, Dawia Line Counter Reel, three-way swivel, eight oz. lead weight and typical spoons. The reel is spooled with 14# FireLine. The spoon and dropper weight are tied to the swivel with 14# fluorocarbon line. A system like this will catch big lakers, but sometimes we have 225' of line out to get our lures down into 70' of water.

Extended Musky Mania.

Looking forward to extending the madness.... Will need an icebreaker prow for the old Smokercraft.

Big Buck Island

During the "Muskie Madness Week" (report to follow) I ran across this fellow swimming to an island I have now named "Big Buck Island".

Hmm......interesting rack with the dripping velvet........how many points?

Ten at least..........much bigger though than the mount in the lodge..........

He was moving pretty fast, probably didn't appreciate our company!

With plenty of splashing and crashing noises in the bush, he was soon gone. May he live long and prosper!

Gold Digging in the Fall

If you have been told that August represents the "dog days" of summer, you haven't fished Eagle, or you are using the wrong tactic. Nothing beats consistently catching large numbers of large golden walleyes on a warm summer day. You have to plan for the rain and occassional cold day even in August, but more often then not you are fishing in great conditions. While some worry about catching these deeper water fish, I can honestly say that I don't believe we had a single casualty in the two boats this fall other than the smaller "eaters" that we kept. The fish were not as deep as they can get...29' - 32' of water seemed to be the magic number this year. We released our fish quickly and the eagles went hungry. Most of the fish in fact could be observed on the locator heading back to deep water in a hurry.I have no doubt that the Professor, his glove, and Marty "the total package" are repeating this pattern right now in September on Eagle Lake. So go ahead and book your spring trip but consider a second week in the fall to get your pot of gold!

Here is something you don't see every day on Clearwater

Most of you that have experienced fishing on Clearwater in the past probably enjoyed the tranquility of a lake that rarely has many boats. Well....things were a bit different this fall with the high water.

While traveling up the river to Clearwater lake we came upon some huge Andy Myer's lodge boats with props full of weeds and grass. The motors were so big they couldn't reach the prop. We pulled over and gave them a hand and motored up ahead to our favorite spot on Clearwater. We arrived at our spot for jigging and we were the only two boats on the lake.

The water was calm, the sun was out, and it was a nice mixed bag of whitefish and trout. All fish were caught jigging with the "lewie rig" on light tackle. Drop me an e-mail if you want to know more.

Then we experienced something we had not seen before. A stream of boats who all headed within a few yards of where we were fishing. Yes its a big lake, but evidently this is the only place you can actually catch fish. Seriously, it was like the flotilla of boats we see fishing perch in Wisconsin when the bit is on.

The interesting twist this year, is the other boats were fishing with lures tipped with minnows. Without much success I might point out. Even Gord arrived at the scene and was kind enough to point out his "secret spot".

Well there is no such thing as a secret, ever since the "Woods and Water" television show a few years ago. We all know John Gillespi has a difficult time keeping a secret. The good news? The fishing was great in our two boats. The better news? Nobody else was catching much. After catching our limit we decided to mess with the other boats a little bit. We rigged up the trolling rods and proceeded to troll about 30 yards out from the flotilla. We consistently caught double after double in both boats. This attracted some attention. One of the other boats was curious enough that they motored over to Shawn and asked him what he was using. Shawn, always the helpful angler pointed out that anything shiny seemed to work. In fact that was true. We were trolling 4 different spoons, and all were catching fish. E-mail me for details. Fascinating. We discovered that the fish were not concentrated in this 40 yard area. In fact, you could catch trout in all parts of the lake that had depth and fish on the locator.

If you have never tried trolling for trout or jigging for trout and whitefish....give it a try. Its a beautiful lake with great fishing opportunities. And the truth be told, this kind of boat traffic is unusual, and thus the post. In fact, during low water periods, Gord is the only lodge with portage boats on the lake. Can you taste the smoked trout and fish cakes?