Every once in awhile Mother Nature decides to throw a bone in our direction and bless us with some beautiful winter weather. The fishing conditions for the BWCA trout opener last weekend were perfect. The mild temperatures and thick overcast were a nice combination for a comfortable day on the ice.
Light snow cover made hiking across the lake a breeze as well—heck even the holes were easy to auger with only five inches of ice. What more could an ice angler ask for? Oh yeah, the icing on the cake was that the trout were actually biting. I would not have called it a slam, but it was a pretty good day.
We hiked into Daniels Lake from the Clearwater Road on Saturday to catch some lake trout. The trail had been packed down by snowmobiles which made the hiking pretty easy, so I was told. I took the equipment in by snowmobile while my buddies hiked. It is a win/win situation since I do not have to hike as much and they do not have to carry the equipment as far. It is legal to snowmobile up to the Boundary Waters line on the Border Route Trail which is a majority of the trail leading to Daniels Lake from the east.
After getting a late start and finding a group of anglers already established on my favorite point we picked out a promising piece of shoreline and started drilling some holes. After an hour of no bites we noticed the group of anglers packing up so we made the move to their spot. The point started producing some action immediately and the bite was pretty good for a few hours. We only landed seven lake trout that day, but we had quite a few squandered opportunities. Everyone was a little rusty on the first day of the season so we lost a couple fish but it was still a lot of fun.
The rest of the weekend I spent chasing walleyes with little success. My quest began on a small mid-trail lake that only produced a couple of little northern pike and one small walleye. The next day I tried to catch walleyes on Tucker Lake without a bite. There are some nice ‘eyes on Tucker but so far they have eluded me. My buddy Bobbo and I punched some holes on the east end of the lake and soaked a couple of minnows before the Vikings’ game on Sunday but we never had a bite.
The snowmobile trails are currently being groomed and I have been seeing some riders around but there is not a lot of snow to move around. I have yet to do any trail riding since I cannot afford to repair my sled after each ride.
The word on the Trail is that the Nordic skiing has been pretty good. Skiers would also like to see some more snow but what we have already is enough to ski on. It sounds like there could be some snowfall on the way, but we all know that meteorologists— much like fishing guides—are usually wrong.
Cory Christianson has worked as a fishing guide on the Gunflint Trail since 2000. If you have any fishing or wildlife reports or stories to share, send an email to: christiansoncory@hotmail.com or call 218-388-0315. You can also visit Cory’s website at Gunflintfishingguide.com.
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