What Happens When Fish Haven’t Seen a Lure for Two Summers?
The Canadian Border, which includes traveling across the border via water, is open. Many who visit Minnesota’s NW Angle like to boat into the adjacent Ontario waters of Lake of the Woods, a long ways away from the nearest Canadian towns, in the middle of nowhere and loaded with some of the best fishing in North America. With this being said, what happens when these fish on the Canadian side, basically haven’t seen a lure for two years? I bet you can imagine!
The stories are coming in daily of how good the fishing is. Between the fish not seeing lures, not being caught, and in the case of walleyes, not being harvested, fishing has been incredible.
Walleyes. As an example, one report we received was from the day the border opened. “A couple of older guys were like kids in a candy store. They were actually giddy with excitement as walleye fishing was so good. They went out just for a couple of hours and came back with a couple of limits and stories. They were literally like kids with excitement,” explains Paul Colson, owner of Jake’s NW Angle Resort.
There are 14,552 islands in Lake of the Woods, with the majority of them on the Ontario side of the lake. Between islands, sunken islands, saddles, bars, humps, shoreline points, neckdown areas, weed beds, bays…. do I need to go on? This area is an absolute treat to see, let alone fish.
Muskies. The reports from muskie anglers were equally as impressive. In some cases, seeing 30 – 40 fish in a day! Lots of nice fish caught and released. Fishing for muskies only gets better as we get into the fall months and it should remain very good.
Pike. They don’t always get much respect or attention, but if you want to have a fun day, do a “milk run” throughout the dozens of bays located throughout the NW Angle and adjacent Ontario areas of Lake of the Woods. First off, quite certain you will catch a mixed bag of fish.
Second, pike will keep you busy and on your toes. They are a fun fish for kids and novice anglers as they are very prevalent, grow big and are usually very cooperative to bit under just about any conditions.
Smallmouth Bass. Again, a fish that really gets overshadowed by walleyes and muskies, but the lake with all of its structure, is a haven for big numbers of smallies. Most will work shorelines. The area is Canadian Shield, meaning there is rocks everywhere making this incredible smallmouth habitat.
Crappies. Fall is a great time to fish crappies around the islands in this part of the lake. They school up this time of the year and once you find them, they are fun and they are usually big.
The Minnesota side of the NW Angle was the only option to fish for Americans up to the NW Angle since March of 2020. Forced to fish the Minnesota side of the lake, visitors and guides alike were happily surprised at the incredible fishing on the U.S. side of the Angle. With that being said, it doesn’t offer as much water or variety of the adjacent Ontario portion of the lake and fishing has been excellent.
Now that the border is open, driving up to the Angle is once again a great option. For those who fish, boating from Minnesota waters into Ontario waters is also again an option. Let me ask you a question… If I said to you were going to take one of the best freshwater fishing areas in the world loaded with fish and close it down for two years and we just opened in on Monday, how do you think fishing would be?
