Greetings!

I hope to paddle from Mudro to Crooked Lake for the 2023 fishing opener this Saturday.

During the 2022 opener weekend, the Horse River flooded the portages with high water and became impassable. Similar issues blocked the portage from Horse Lake into Fourtown as an alternative route.

I don't suppose anyone knows how high the water is flowing around those two portages this year? Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

You could always go directly to Fourtown from Mudro

Call an outfitter in the Ely area.

This may be the best you can get from a data standpoint, from the dam outside of Ely.

https://waterdata.usgs.gov/monitoring-location/05127500/#parameterCode=00065&period=P365D

Hard to say how it is really playing out at specific locations, but hopefully not at the levels seen last year and occurring sooner than it did last year. But that area has some of the lowest elevation lakes that take on a lot of the flow coming in from the other lakes.

Here's the latest from Piragis (for anyone also looking for some G2):

Sun, May 7, 11:42?AM

Hi Tiger,

The water is high right now, but not at the levels it was last year. The last of the ice should be going out on Mudro today, but I am not sure if Horse Lake is open yet (if it isn’t, it should be soon). The real answer is that I don’t really know yet because we haven’t been able to get in there. My instinct says the water will be quite a bit lower than last year’s record, but it’s still high water, and you’ll need to use caution.

You might just have to go with the flow… see what I did there… haha!

Adam Macht
Piragis Outfitting
www.piragis.com
218-365-6745

We were thru there last year but not till the second week of June and the water was still crazy high. There were still quite a few campsites under water all the way up to Crooked Lake. It was kind of crazy to watch the water levels go down by the day.

Thanks - that's interesting. I changed the time span to look back several years, and its +2 feet over the historical high this time of year. Thanks for sharing.

I went thru last week of may last year,high water but passable,I paddled down horse river to LBF,then out to Saturday bay.

Water levels will be elevated but not crazy high. Trip down the Horse should be relatively easy- you'll be able to paddle down the riffles that often require a pull over or some wading. Might be some trouble paddling up the Horse on your return depending on strength and skill level.