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2020 Lake of the Woods Fishing Reports & Info


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I agree it was too cold to portable fish, however, 4 of us got on snowmobiles (yes, it is true) on Saturday and took the long treck to The Bridges. The ride out was quite interesting early in the morning but we 4-5 hours of constant fish. Couldn't even fish with 2 lines the entire morning, any shiner that went down the hole immediately had a fish on it, 34 FOW. Fatheads did not draw the fish nearly like the shiners did.

Also, caught 2 really nice walleyes almost 15 feet suspended. Fisihng wise, it was an incredible trip.

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22 ft. We were next to the top of a ridge. Typical I guess, deeper water next to shallow. The ridge had a hole/valley in the side of it about 20 feet across.

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The best bite was live Emerald. However, anything with a shiner worked better than fatheads. Just heads, dead whole shiners we were reusing. It didn't matter. We didn't have any frozen with us so I don't know about that.

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Fished with 5 guys out of Ballard's Resort the 18th - 20th near Knight Island. We averaged 100 fish/day. Lots of saugers but it sure was fun. As always, Gary, Nick, Bryan, Justin, Scott, and the rest of the Ballard's crew provided top of the line service.

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Fished in a wheelhouse at the end of Adrian's road 1/22-1/24. Fishing was slow.

Ended up bringing home 22 walleye/sauger and 1 jumbo for the 3 of us. Biggest walleye was 18" but most were 14-16", the sauger we kept were 12-14", but did get a 17". Caught less than 50 fish total for the 3 days.

Hammered the tullibees though, which I am fully aware isn't a crazy accomplishment, but seemed weird to me. Easily caught 25 of them.

The reports around us were slow, similarly to the reports from others at the bars. After reading a few of the other reports it looks like the northern reefs are where its at right now.

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Your report sounds identical to mine. End of Adrians road take right. Lots of tullibees and a limit of fish but slow. Biggest was a 22 inch eye.

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hey jp its been eight days since last report whats up camera go down the hole missing out on the wigwam videos

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I posted in the Riverbend topic as well (a good laugh) but we found some slow fishing in 32' of water with Sportsman Lodge. Only 2 walleyes caught rest were saugers nice size but few and far in between. Kept 10 threw back 3. Walleyes were caught suspended 10 to 20 ft below the ice. Biggest was 17 1/4".

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I went out on the zipple road today, set up in 26 feet of water. few saugers to start the day, about 10:30-12 i caught 11 fish, and 6 keeper fish (4 walleye) each of the eyes i marked 4-5 feet off the bottom, and as soon as i lifted my lure to them they were quite aggressive. Good Fishing!!!

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It was a great weekend on the SW tip of the rock bar on garden island, 27 fow. 5 guys 125 fish, 4 over 23 inches. Lots of nice keeper walleyes and saugers worth the drive out and my sled breakin down out there, Thanks to Eric with his ranger and pulling me back through that deep snow. Chubby darters were the ticket in the morning, moving to anything gold in the afternoon.

Big Red

Over and Out

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Fished Thursday - Saturday with Sportsman's Lodge Sleepers... Good fishing by our standards. 60 fish for 4 guys for the three days but probably 40 of those were really nice sized walleyes. 4 slot fish (biggest was 24") with the remainder being nice keepers between 15 and 19". Had some nice fish fry's on the ice and still came back with a limit of walleyes for each guy and about 10 saugers for the group. Like everyone has been saying - Walleyes were suspended 8-15 feet below the ice for us in 35 fow. Glow Pink and gold stop sign was the hot lure for me. Lots of fun - Great Trip!

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Happy Fishing to all, and to all a good day!

Wigwam Fisherman

This home video is better than most fishing shows seen on the weekends!!! I can certainly envision the day JP has his own show, tremendous personality. Great job JP what ever you are making it probably isn't enough Wigwam needs to give you a raise.

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2 of us did a last minute trip yesterday. We fished rented a house from Bayview Lodge.

We fished in 34' from 8:30 to 4pm and from 9 to 2 was the best bite. Bobber rods were SLOW. We caught most of our fish on small Lindy Darters, sometimes w/ a small piece of minnow and sometimes not. We only used fatheads for minnows.

We iced probably 40-50 fish and kept 6 'eyes in the 15-19" range, 10 saugers that were 13-15", and 13 tulibees for the smoker.

From 2 to 4 when the bite was tough, I broke out my crappie rod, 28" UL w/ some 2 lb no stretch line w/ a 4 lb test mono leader. A small crappie sized demon jig put a couple more in the in the cooler.

The common denominator was if a fish came up to the lure, SLOWLY raise it up until they bit.

Looking forward to coming back up the 1st weekend in March!

Brian

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What are you talking about Calvin n Hobbes...JP is livin' off of his NHL pension...this is just his hobby! Just kiddin JP, you rock, keep up the great work. Appreciate all the info you share!

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Took sleds and portable up to garden area. Fished roughly 26 fow. We were done by noon. most of the walleys around 16-18.5. Caught some really nice saugers to. Used a combination of jigs. Not one really hot. On the way back my sled burnt a cylinder up in front sportsmans lodge. Really nice it decided to go there instead of 26 miles up there. Time to rebuild sled so I can go next days off. Hope weather will warm up. Man was it a cold ride up there. If you go up there look for small brown house off of garden, staren sholds. Happy hunting

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Got back tues night from a 4 day trip on the big pond all and all it was a good trip. Got to the lake Sat. around 11 am head out to S. Arnesen's reef on the north side and set up the shack for the afternoon and evening. I think we picked up 1 walleye and 2 saugers for the afternoon. Sun. morning was better there we got about 6 more fish 2 walleye and 4 saugers. But I thought we could do better. So we packed up and headed to Morris point. Well fishering where we were here was just terrible. No bites for the afternoon and then Mon. morning we had some power issues so not much attention was spent on fishing. I decide to pick up and move again. This time we headed to Zipple I reset the house here in about 25-26 feet of water. Then I headed to Baudette to get some parts for our generator. When I got back the other 2 guys had 6 fish in the bucket in the hour I had been gone. Ended the day with close to 9 fishing I think kept with a few throw backs. Not great Lake of the Woods fishing but after the first 2 days we'd take it. Tues morning we stayed here and had our best day of fishing we finished our limit off we some throw backs between and picked the house up at 12:30pm and pointed it south. Colors were typical when the sun was shinning gold was tough to beat. Glow colors were better when the sun was tucked in.

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Curious about Lake Trout on LOW? Where are they, the Canadian side, the NW Angle or are they within the MN portion of the lake as well? ANy advice would be appreciated!

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We found some fish in the mud to go along with the great reef fishing this weekend.

Happy Fishing to all, and to all a good day!

Wigwam Fisherman

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Curious about Lake Trout on LOW? Where are they, the Canadian side, the NW Angle or are they within the MN portion of the lake as well? ANy advice would be appreciated!

canadian side

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7 of us were up over superbowl weekend. We fished 2 half days and one full day (Sat - Mon). We caught 117 walleye/sauger and 2 jumbo perch (12" and 13"). A few walleye were over the slot and had to go back, largest was 22". We caught several walleye and sauger in the 13" - 15" range and a bunch under that. I am sure the warm weather helped the bite. We had a steady bite throughout the day with a few flurries of more activity. We were out of Bayview and Randee took good care of us. Watched the supperbowl at Wigwam and meet up with JP who also was a great host. Fun times!! More fish on deadsticks then jigging, but both seemed to work. Gold, Pink, Red, Chartruse were the colors of choice.

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