Four late late season days on the lake

Somehow I could not face the long, dark winter without a little more fishing, so I pestered Herbie until he let me come up again to camp out with the deer hunters and fish the first few days of November. It was quite an experience. The boat was an ice palace every morning despite relatively mild temperatures for this time of year. There was nobody else out there and everything felt very wild, like the lake is waiting for winter to close in. It was obvious that I didn't want to fall overboard, for sure. But there was a real scene happening in the water. There were ciscoes on the finder from the top of the water column to the bottom on many of the reefs, and there were huge arcs lying around them. The fish were gorged and had tremendous girths, but they weren't very interested in artificial baits. Of the thirty or so follows I had in four days, not a one even hinted that it was going to hit the bait. They came in like ghosts and just disappeared as soon as I went into the turn. I felt like I was intruding on a natural wonder, a privileged observer of the fish going about one of the most important and little seen cycles of their year. I loved it and felt that my understanding of the lake increased a great deal. Obviously, with fishing like that, the live bait Travis had over the side on the days he came out with me was the key item and we caught a very beautiful, clean, heavy fish, and a 46" pike that was built like a cinder block. Thanks for indulging me, Herbie and Travis. What a treat!
Bill Hedden

I know what you mean Bill. I've been up there "very late" in the year too, and the way you described it as "very wild, like the Lake is waiting for Winter to close in" is the PERFECT description. It is kind of cool. If one can brave the cold, it's something that everyone who loves the lake (as much we do) should experience, even if only once.

I didn't see the whole cisco thing that you did. That's pretty cool. What did you learn when you say your understanding to the lake increased?

Also, we need pics of that TANK of a pike. Very nice! Congrats. Replicas of those big pike fit in nicely with a few 50"+ replicas of Muskies. :) I'm just sayin'!

Cool post.

-Dan

Dan,
When I said that my understanding of the lake increased I guess I had several kinds of things in mind. First was simply getting the direct experience of being out on the lake alone when there was not another boat anywhere around and not likely to be one for a long while. That's quite a feeling and a rare treat. Next was witnessing the muskies really putting on the feedbag eating the spawning ciscoes. I knew about it, of course, but it is something to experience it. Travis and I were on Musky Point late on my last day and the graph was filled with fish around the outside of the reef. We watched a big fish come up from the bottom to check out the sucker and then I raised a 50" class fish on a dawg which we watched go down to settle above the sucker, putting the terrified bait in a sandwich. While that was going on, I raised another, even bigger fish. There were muskies moving everywhere around that spawning aggregation, but they were all so gorged that none would eat even the extremely lively sucker. It was thrilling and frustrating and expanded my knowledge of how the fish use the area outside of the structure we normally fish. And, last in my learning experience, it was interesting to see which reefs the ciscoes use and where they set up on the structure. You get a new appreciation for why the back side of Strawberry is so good when you see the massive bait show off the reef there: it is the special spot for that whole big area of Vermilion Bay (and they weren't using the walleye hump further out there). And on Strawberry, they set up much further out than we fish and also further north, halfway between the pins and where the big finger of weeds juts out in summer. Herbie said they were using the flat, sandy bottom out there. New territory to check out when the fishing is tough. The first island reef was loaded with bait and muskies and there was a smaller aggregation off the submerged reef beyond the bald rock at Sunset. Go through Canoe Narrows and the ciscoes in that section of the lake are using the McKenzie Wall. Similarly, the Wall in the Back Channel near the Portage Narrows. The fish were in some of the summer spots, but not in others, and they tended to use the spots differently than we normally fish them. I am certainly going to invest time fishing the largest outlines of the structures, which is something I have observed Mike doing over the years. Who knows, these might all be meaningless observations at any other time of year, but it was fun making them.
I am sorry to say that I don't have a photo of the giant pike. I was sheltering from a big wind on a day of fishing alone and I pulled up in the Back Channel much further north than where I normally fish, where the wall bends fairly near the S-curves. I put a sucker over the side while I ate and that's when one of the big arcs on the graph came to life and suddenly the clicker went off on my reel. I brought the fish to the surface and she had just one hook in the corner of the mouth where I could get at it easily, but that other treble was hanging in the air and I knew what a mess she would make if I netted her, so I held the line and did a quick measurement and then just plucked the hook free. It was great to see such a special fish explode and disappear unharmed. When I talked about the pike with Scott Jaeger that evening (the guides are all working guiding hunters at this time of year) he said that friends of his caught a 52" pike several years ago and that made me wonder what are the biggest specimens of the various species caught in Eagle Lake? We know John Coleman's muskie was the big one; but what is the biggest pike, walleye, bass and laker? I'd love to hear any information people have.
Bill

Hello Bill...

I have enjoyed your thoughts on late fall fishing on Eagle. I have made 4 fishing trips to Eagle over the past 2 years and truly enjoy the quality of this fishery and of course all aspects of fishing out of AML.

I just got back from my deer hunt last week at AML. I shot my deer early (and trust me I heard about it) and had an opportunity to fish with Travis for two days. What a blast as we experienced all of the great observations you refered to. It was actually kinda spooky as we to were the only boat on the lake. I have never caught a 50"fish but I can say I had 2 opportunities at a 50++ fish during those two days once on a follow on a double dog and once on a sucker that we lip hooked, got to the surface head shake and bye bye.

Over the two days I caught 3 muskies 40, 43 and 44 (fatty). Oddly enough Travis caught 2 very nice lake trout both on depth raiders.

I am looking forward to next year and a big thank you to everyone at AML for a truly great season!