Arvid's Fishing Report

Talked to Ralph last night. He’s been guiding for the past week and said that the ice is out to the Gap. He said the water is still cloudy and the bite is tough. Their catch yesterday was four sturgeon and one sucker. Two of the sturgeon were in the 51″ range and that made his guests happy as they had never caught a sturgeon or any fish that big.

One thing about getting eleven inches of snow at this time of the year; it won’t last long. Even with night-time temperatures getting into the low teens; it’s going pretty quick.

The river has been ice free in town for a couple days and is now probably open into Four Mile Bay. There is a lot of current and the water is dirty with ice chunks and other debris coming down the river. There is no bite on the river. It’s going to take several days for the water to clean up, but it should and still provide some time to fish before the season closes. There are those that are still on the lake using ATV’s and snowmobiles to get around. The bite on the ice isn’t much better; slow. Yesterday, I heard two local guys spent a few hours and got one fish between the two of them.

The Bosch boys had a somewhat disappointing season. Because of the late freeze-up, they didn’t get the shanties on the river until mid February so many of the guys didn’t get to fish at all. Fishing was pretty slow after they did get them out. Most of the time they’d get one or two fish a night per shanty and then it might be a slot fish. On the last day of winter test, Tom got a 28″ walleye to claim big fish for the season.

Tom with a beautiful 28″ walleye

Winter has returned as we are getting a few inches of snow today. That won’t help already poor ice conditions. Unconfirmed reports have up to nine vehicles that have gone through the ice since last Saturday. The ice on the river is going fast. The Birchdale landing is open and the Frontier and Vidas landings will probably be open this weekend. One of the resorts has had boats with guests fishing the Birchdale area. Even with a two fish limit they are not getting limits. They are getting some slot fish, but not any great numbers. There is pretty good current and it takes a one ounce jig or more to get down. The water got a little cloudier on Tuesday from what it was on Sunday. In my opinion, there were not fish that came into the river last fall and now it appears that there are not many coming this spring. Why? That’s the millon dollar question.

Diane has been enjoying some time on a “Live Cam” watching a pair of Bald Eagles hatch and now feeding three little ones. I don’t know where it is, but if your interested, the link is mndnr.gov/eaglecam

Bald Eagles – They have fish to eat

On Wednesday, Don & I went to Nester Falls crappie fishing. We coordinated the drive up with Jeff & Pidge. It was a nice day, a little cool in the morning. It was 15 below zero, but it warmed up to about 20 above by mid-day. Turns out that there would be two more vehicles from Baudette; Bert & Roger and Pete & Sandy. I think Baudette had half the fishermen on the ice. The crappies did not cooperate very well. The count may not be completely accurate, but I think the total for the group would be 18 crappies,  35 perch and 3 walleyes. Don caught the nice fish; a 25 inch walleye.

Fishing on Lake of the Woods and Rainy River is really slow. Since Diane & I returned from our month-long stay in Arizona, I’ve heard only one good report and that was one person who was out one day last week and caught two walleyes and six saugers. All other reports have not been good. Fishermen are putting in a lot of time for one or two fish.

If the weather that we are having this winter stays pretty much the same, I think we are going to be in for an early ice out on both the river and the lake. I’ve heard there is only about half the ice we have on a normal winter with some places on the lake not having much more than a foot. It’s interesting.

Don with a nice walleye

There is ice on the lake; 8″ to 9″ off the south shore and it is busy out there. Travel is only by snowmobile or ATV. I had the opportunity to go fishing with Don, his son, Brad, and grand kids today. Brad also had two friends with two youngsters, so there were nine of us. We were off Graceton Beach and fished in about 23′ of water. The bite was good; we got our limit. That’s 72 fish and were just about all saugers. We had two walleyes that were slot fish and one was 26″. Abel, the youngest, caught that fish and it was a dandy. It was nice out there and the weather this weekend is supposed to be very nice. It’ll be some start to the new year.

Abel with his 26″ Walleye

Caleb 

Judah 

Jacob  

‘

Today’s news:

http://www.bemidjipioneer.com/news/region/3903426-updated-nearly-50-people-rescued-after-ice-sheets-break-away-upper-red-lake

This has been a most unusual December. I have fished in a boat on Thanksgiving, but I don’t remember ever doing that in December; I think this was a first. We have very little snow and the only ice is on some of the Bays. There are a lot of businesses that are patiently waiting for cold weather and ice. I think it will be after Christmas before any of the resorts are able to go and maybe not by then.

Sunday was the monthly pancake breakfast at the Senior Center and afterwards I was taking a break when Bill called and asked if I wanted to fish for an hour before dark. He still had his little 14′ boat in the water and has been fishing quite often the past 10 days. Most of the time he would catch two or three and maybe bring home one or none with the others being to big or to little. Yesterday we caught four fish. We were able to keep two; a walleye and a sauger. Two were slot fish in the 25″ – 26″ range; nice fish. It was nice to get out for a short time even if the brain keeps saying that we should be ice fishing.