To all my fly fishing friends out there I could use your help! MN native here currently living in CO. Ive been slowly getting into fly fishing from a new job and have really been enjoying it. I wanted to try it out this year on my annual trip to the good ole nort country and was hoping you guys could give me some advice/tips. So I'll be up in the BW at the end of may for my trip, we will be camping on West Pike and fishing there and surrounding lakes for pretty much everything, smallies, pike, walleye, maybe even trout, we've come across some small waters in the past that are stocked. I plan on bringing a 5 & 7 wt rod, with some floating lines, a clear intermediate, and probably a moderate sinker. I've heard that many have had great success with smallies on poppers? Any other suggestions on flys or techniques? Also any suggestions for leader use, as Im assuming the pike can be real hard on them? Any tips or recommendations of any kind would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

A buddy of mine from Aspen fly fished up in Quetico and the below is what worked best for him.

A sub surface fly such as this should work well for smallmouth and pike......




Frog surface poppers should do well too.

Welcome aboard. We have a dedicated fly fishing forum at the bottom of the main page you might want to join. People have great ideas about what to use and techniques, enjoy.

ajlewis49: "To all my fly fishing friends out there I could use your help! MN native here currently living in CO. Ive been slowly getting into fly fishing from a new job and have really been enjoying it. I wanted to try it out this year on my annual trip to the good ole nort country and was hoping you guys could give me some advice/tips. So I'll be up in the BW at the end of may for my trip, we will be camping on West Pike and fishing there and surrounding lakes for pretty much everything, smallies, pike, walleye, maybe even trout, we've come across some small waters in the past that are stocked. I plan on bringing a 5 & 7 wt rod, with some floating lines, a clear intermediate, and probably a moderate sinker. I've heard that many have had great success with smallies on poppers? Any other suggestions on flys or techniques? Also any suggestions for leader use, as Im assuming the pike can be real hard on them? Any tips or recommendations of any kind would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!"

My club fly-fished this lake last summer and did well with streamers on bass and pike. I think a few guys landed a couple of walleye as well on nymphs. I'll see if I can dig up some photos and post here. Do look for the fly fishing forum as well for more advice.

I have had good luck with deceivers in black or chartreuse. Your 7 weight will be the weapon of choice, in my opinion.

A big bead head wooley bugger makes a good crawfish imitation for SMB. Hop them along rocky shorelines. I like the buggers with rubber legs in autumn splendor color, and they are fairly easy to find. Most "crawfish" flies look better out of the water than in the water. Late May will depend on the stage of spawn / post-spawn, but we have done well in the past with crawfish imitations.
I also like streamers.
Use a fly fishing steel leader in pike areas or bring plenty of flies.