No Slush on Crow Lake 1-13-09

You're right. The ice conditions were pretty darn good. We were up there last weekend and can attest to that. Also, here's an article that wrote on our trip there.

Crow Lake Trout

It was like old home week, when the five of us gathered together for a taste of Ontario lake trout fishing. My son, Kris, and I have done the Canadian lake trout thing a time or two but for our three other comrades, it was a first time event and we were just as excited as they were.

One of them, a neighbor and good friend, Blake Liend, Keewatin, has fished all over the Midwest and has fought many a lake trout but it was all done during the open water period. Needless-to-say he was really looking forward to giving it a try through the ice, as it’s a whole new game.

Kyle McCollor, Coon Rapids, had never caught a laker before, summer or winter, so naturally, he was pumped. An avid outdoorsman, McCollor is the owner, along with his wife, Jaque, of the popular Oh Deer! mineral mix so a good many of his hours are spent in the woods or promoting his products in the stores or at sport shows. Kyle used to live across the alley from me in Nashwauk and grew up with my son.

Our fifth and final partner was my second cousin, Jason Clusiau of Hibbing. Jason too, is an avid hunter and fisherman and can tell a story almost as good as his late father, Dan. Dan and I grew up together and he was one of my best friends. It was a good bunch and that is what you need when you are spending a three-day weekend together.

Friday morning….checking the weather channel at 3:30 am revealed local temps at a minus 9 below zero. “Not bad, we can weather that” I thought to myself. The two hour trip to the border went smoothly, except for the fact that my windows kept frosting up. Not a good sign. I thought there was something wrong with my heater until we pulled into the nation’s ice box and found the temperature to be a frigid minus 34 below!

“Well, I’ve fished in worse” were my thoughts, as we made our way through customs and stopped at a local bait shop to buy angling licenses. That’s when the O.P.P. (Ontario Provincial Police) stopped in.

“You guys from Minnesota?” he asked. We all agreed. Yes, we were indeed Minnesotans. With that known, he went on to lecture us on the dangers of going ice fishing in this type of weather. I think he was just frustrated because of spending an entire night looking for some other poor saps that were stuck in the slush and unable to make it back to camp. The O.P.P. buried their machines while searching and it turned into quite an ordeal. They even had a helicopter called out. After the scolding, he finished up by saying “you better know how to make a fire or you’re dead.”

With that said, we happily made our way to the running trucks and Muskie Bay Resort on Kakagi Lake, aka Crow Lake. Crow boasts of a fantastic lake trout population and receives a good deal of publicity because of it.

Excitement was high, as we pulled into the driveway of Muskie Bay Resort. Anxious to get out on the lake, we ran into a little snag when two of our snowmobiles wouldn’t start. It was that cold. To remedy this, we made little tents over the open hoods and ran our Mr. Heaters on the engine block to loosen them up a little. It worked like a charm.

Heading out across the lake, I was relieved to find traveling conditions a whole lot better than our earlier conversation led me to believe. The gentleman at the bait shop said most lakes had two feet of snow, with a foot of slush beneath it. Now, that’s enough to make anyone a little nervous but those thoughts were quickly dashed, as I comfortably traveled a well-worn snowmobile trail out to the fishing grounds. Granted, there was some slush but it was very manageable. I think we only had a machine stuck three or four times in three days.

Our first spot offered up only a few fish and although it was slow fishing, we stayed there until the sun reached the trees. We gave it a good shot, knowing the next day would be much better, as it was warming up and we were already at the resort so an early start to a full day of fishing looked to be very promising.

Bright and early the next morning, we headed out with confidence and the fish were there to greet us. Everyone took part in catching a few but it was Kyle, the rookie, who put on a regular trout fishing clinic. He could do no wrong and the beauty of it was the fact that he was using a heavy duty panfish rod, basically, spooled with four pound test line. It was incredible, even though he did break off a couple of times. I still wonder how he managed to set the hook with such a light outfit. Hey, whatever works.

We jumped around a couple of times, finding a few more new spots. The day ended with us fishing these new areas and doing pretty good. That would be where we would start out on the third and final day.

Back at the lodge, we put our ice-laden equipment in a special room that is used just for this purpose. A rack, filled with thawing ice augers was located next to the fish cleaning table. How nice it is to pick up your equipment in the morning, totally ice free and ready for another productive day on the ice. Muskie Bay is one of the few resorts on Crow Lake that caters to ice fishermen. It’s no wonder the In-Fisherman group makes routine stops there.

Our last day found us jumping from spot to spot. It was a somewhat fickle bite but fish were caught. You just had to work at it. If nothing was happening on “Crow 1”, it was time to move to “Crow 2”, or “Kyle’s”, or “Kris’” and so on. Moving around was key but staying with the old reliable bait was just as important.

Although some fish were taken with Jigging Rapalas and Northland Tackle’s “Lip Stick Jigs“, the best bait was, predictably, a basic white tube jig. This trip found the fish preferring the smaller three inch versions over the four inch models, meaning the fish weren‘t their normally aggressive selves.

.

There’s a lot of winter left my friend. Get out there and give it a try.

For more information on fishing Crow Lake, contact Paul and Christine Trinkner by phone at 1-800-363-3379 or e-mail muskiebay@hotmail.com.

Also, here's a 1 minute remix I put together of our trip. Not professional, by any means, but you'll get the drift.
http://picasaweb.google.com/gclusiau...oU9I#slideshow