Biggest Rainy Lake Pike

[LongAgoLeo]

I can't speak to Rainy in any meaningful way, since my decades of dispersed camping/fishing have been on Kabe.  Not sure if this needs to shift to the Kabe thread, but I'll hide behind the newbie moniker and just respond.  For years we used jungle hammocks and slept wherever we stopped.  Then did years fishing from an old 22' deck boat with a camper enclosure; allowing us to pretty much stay anywhere.  Now we're super nimble in a dinky little Tracker with a hydraulic jackplate to negotiate some pretty skinny water.  We get some looks, since we're don't draft much more than a powered surfboard.  (But hey, we did a couple years in a duck-boat with a mud motor and other years with inflatable 9' Zodiac yacht tenders.)  Some of the guys decided to breakaway from my brother and me when we started encountering sub 20-degree temps in October.  They got a cabin at Sandy Point and loved it and have been doing this in October now for years.  We crash their parties occasionally, but my bro and I still opt to camp.  With the reservation system in place now and the inability to disperse camp in the NPS, we're probably just going to do the tarp, ka-bar and loin cloth thing and check out some of the 4-million acres in Superior National Forest.  We'll still do some obligatory trips to Kabe to hang with our fishing peers, but the mandated campsites has diminished the appeal to us a bit.  Nothing but positives about the folks at Sandy Point!

[LongAgoLeo]

Just got a chance to watch your second video, beanman.  You guys look like you had a great time.  Nice boats and gear, too.  Loved the clips from Kettle Falls.  Noted the extended cooler platform on the Lund.  That toss a pretty good rooster underway?  See you bumped into some nice smallies.  We've had years (on Kabe) where we couldn't find them and other years where we couldn't keep them off the line and all 19" or bigger.

[Xplorer]

I've never done the houseboat thing but have spent over 350 nights camping on Namakan mainly, Rainy and to a lesser extent Kab (east side only).  I've also fished Redgut and Seine bays on the Ontario side of Rainy.

Some of the biggest pike that we've seen have been on the reefs chasing the walleyes in August.  They will hit a 12" walleye that you've hooked and is struggling like nothing else!  Biggest one I've seen was in Seine bay, it hit the same walleye 3 times and would hold onto it all the way to the boat just out of net range.  This was a mid 40's fish.  We were able to net a 15.5# pike that wouldnt let go of a small walleye in Redgut bay one year.

Mid September fishing for eye's will depend alot on how the water temp is holding, and where the turnover process is on the lakes (Nam/Kab).  If bigger walleyes are what your looking for I dont know that Kab or Namakan will provide that compared to Rainy, tho there is a very healthy population of 21-24" eye's in Namakan right now.  Our best big fish outings have been in early/mid August on the east end of Rainy reefs, fishing rigs and spinners.

And yes, no trip is complete without a stop at the "tiltin' hilton".  I almost hate to admit but we've been going up 4-5 times a summer since '97 and have met so many nice folks up there. Rick even lets our lab Ammo up in the veranda when its hot, LOL. 

   

[beanman]

15 hours ago, LongAgoLeo said:

Just got a chance to watch your second video, beanman.  You guys look like you had a great time.  Nice boats and gear, too.  Loved the clips from Kettle Falls.  Noted the extended cooler platform on the Lund.  That toss a pretty good rooster underway?  See you bumped into some nice smallies.  We've had years (on Kabe) where we couldn't find them and other years where we couldn't keep them off the line and all 19" or bigger.

No roostertail from the cooler.  That was a pretty nice space saver for those guys.  We spent less than 3 hours on the smallies.  Most of our time was spent catching a bunch of 10-12" Walleye.

[LongAgoLeo]

Xplorer - At first blush I was totally envious of your camping day-count.  But then did the math and realized I'm virtually in the same club!  Another testament to how great the venue up there has been for so many years.  Have also experienced hits by big pike on hooked fish.  Interestingly, never up on Kab/Nam, but a number of times on the Mississippi River and Mille Lacs.  Never netted or hooked-up one of these opportunists, though.

 

beanman - Yup, thought that cooler location was clever (assuming it was stable underway).  My old deck boat had a built-in step on each side for accessing from the beach.  These proved fabulous for staging coolers, which we'd never done previously due to their space consumption.  (Of course we were working with an 8' beam, too.)

Sounds like the walleye class you bumped into were about the same as the current 13" class so pervasive in Mille Lacs this year.  Bodes well for the future, I guess.

 

 

[MWesley]

Heading up to Rainy for the first time on a houseboat trip Memorial Day Weekend.  Looking for big pike, and was wondering what spots would work best?  I noticed a lot of the bays further east (Marion, Hitchcock, Saginaw) have creeks flowing into them and seem to have vegetation... Good spots to try out?

[beanman]

My understanding is that big bays in 1-4 feet of water with floating raps or jerk baits fished slow is one way to go.  I haven't figured out May too well though so take my advice with a grain of salt.