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       Lake Trout Lakes near Sturgeon, Lonely-Walter-Jesse chain
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Date/Time: 03/28/2024 06:07AM
Lake Trout Lakes near Sturgeon, Lonely-Walter-Jesse chain

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Previous Messages:
Author Message Text
cburton103 01/30/2023 05:43AM
Argo: "cburton103: "I remembered this thread recently, and I wanted to update the thread based on my experience. The trip started with a few days left in May 2022, and ended a handful of days into June. We had comfortable weather relatively speaking the first 3 days, and then very windy and moderately cold weather the remaining five days. This seemed to affect fishing results. Anything Lonely and north we weren’t able to target as well as we would have liked. That said, we had good lake trout fishing on the following lakes:


Ram (small lake, so be conscientious here)
Antoine


We caught lake trout, but had significantly slower fishing on:
Walter, Pickerel.


We trolled Pickerel from almost Stanton Bay to nearly the portage to Doré with no luck, although this area has many good reports.
Doré.


We didn’t make it to Olifaunt or McDougall, so no report there


Tight lines!
"



Thanks for that. Did you stay on the island site on Antoine? Did you do the 1 km portage when you left? Any reports on these?


Interesting you had no luck with lakers on Pickerel.
Walter is not supposed to be a great trout lake. Caught lots of bass and pike there in July 2021. Did you get the nice site on the north end of the island? I really enjoyed that site. "



We ended up just day tripping to Ram and Antoine from a two night base camp on Sturgeon. We entered Ram by paddling up the creek from northern Stuegeon to Ram and doing the short 5 rod bushwhack/portage between them. Water levels were very high last year, but I suspect this could be done even in reasonable water levels. When we exited the Ram/Antoine area, we portaged back from southern Ram east into Sturgeon towards our campsite, so no report on the long portage to the Sturgeon Narrows area.


We didn’t check out the island site on Antoine. But we did catch two lakers casting from the exposed rocky island just northwest of there. I was using a bigger Mepps and my buddy was using a slightly weighted pearl colored Zulu fluke. The other trout were caught trolling.


We liked Walter, with the exception of being very exposed to the wind on the main island. We stayed on the grassy campsite on the east end of the island. The site on the northern end looked cozy, but we didn’t see a good tent pad. My buddy caught one very healthy laker - probably 26-27” with nice girth. That was the only one our group caught though, despite what amounted to probably several hours of trolling. We had our two best smallies come from Walter on the trip, one of which was my all time personal best 22.5” fish. I measured it quickly so I could release it, so it’s possible this measurement is off by 0.25-0.5”. But clearly a different class of fish from my previous 20.75” smallie. We picked up a few walleye there, but not many. Our group’s best walleye of the trip at 25.5” came on my next cast immediately after the PB smallie. We were fishing at a small inlet stream on the northern shore that was probably flowing stronger than normal.
Argo 01/29/2023 07:45PM
cburton103: "I remembered this thread recently, and I wanted to update the thread based on my experience. The trip started with a few days left in May 2022, and ended a handful of days into June. We had comfortable weather relatively speaking the first 3 days, and then very windy and moderately cold weather the remaining five days. This seemed to affect fishing results. Anything Lonely and north we weren’t able to target as well as we would have liked. That said, we had good lake trout fishing on the following lakes:



Ram (small lake, so be conscientious here)
Antoine



We caught lake trout, but had significantly slower fishing on:
Walter, Pickerel.



We trolled Pickerel from almost Stanton Bay to nearly the portage to Doré with no luck, although this area has many good reports.
Doré.



We didn’t make it to Olifaunt or McDougall, so no report there.



Tight lines!
"



Thanks for that. Did you stay on the island site on Antoine? Did you do the 1 km portage when you left? Any reports on these?


Interesting you had no luck with lakers on Pickerel.
Walter is not supposed to be a great trout lake. Caught lots of bass and pike there in July 2021. Did you get the nice site on the north end of the island? I really enjoyed that site.
cburton103 01/29/2023 05:28PM
I remembered this thread recently, and I wanted to update the thread based on my experience. The trip started with a few days left in May 2022, and ended a handful of days into June. We had comfortable weather relatively speaking the first 3 days, and then very windy and moderately cold weather the remaining five days. This seemed to affect fishing results. Anything Lonely and north we weren’t able to target as well as we would have liked. That said, we had good lake trout fishing on the following lakes:


Ram (small lake, so be conscientious here)
Antoine


We caught lake trout, but had significantly slower fishing on:
Walter, Pickerel.


We trolled Pickerel from almost Stanton Bay to nearly the portage to Doré with no luck, although this area has many good reports.
Doré.


We didn’t make it to Olifaunt or McDougall, so no report there.


Tight lines!
HighnDry 05/16/2022 07:40AM
PineKnot: "I know the following lakes in the area you're looking at have lakers....the ones with an * are particularly good for some larger fish....



Pickerel *
Olifaunt
Dore
Ram
Antoine *
McDougall *
Walter
Batchewaung "




That's a good list. If you felt up for trekking a bit more to the west, Cirrus is a good LT lake as well....
cburton103 05/15/2022 04:59PM
jberns: "Cburton, when is your trip? I'm probably headed to Antoine for part of my June trip. Given this year's weather, I'm guessing the mud on that last portage will be terrible. Hopefully the one from Sturgeon to Ram can be skipped. I've taken those portages from Sturgeon to Ram to Antoine 2 other trips and mud was above ankle-deep for the entire portage."


My trip is May 27-June 3 on the water. 8 days this year, which is great. I’m hopeful to go for even longer trips when the kids are older and come along. My wife is a saint for even letting me go while she’s 7 months pregnant with #3!


I’ve heard of the mud on those portages. I’m sure we’ll have some pretty epic mud this year with the late spring, high water, and the rains they’ve had and are projected to continue to have. It will be interesting to see the moving water areas through the Poet’s chain as well.
cburton103 05/15/2022 04:58PM
Springer2: " McDougall trout, early June, 2007, probably mid-depth Rapalas.





"



I love how good the average size of Quetico lake trout is. Such iconic fish. Extra special to catch them in a place like Quetico.
Springer2 05/15/2022 03:57PM
McDougall trout, early June, 2007, probably mid-depth Rapalas.




jberns 05/15/2022 03:43PM
Cburton, when is your trip? I'm probably headed to Antoine for part of my June trip. Given this year's weather, I'm guessing the mud on that last portage will be terrible. Hopefully the one from Sturgeon to Ram can be skipped. I've taken those portages from Sturgeon to Ram to Antoine 2 other trips and mud was above ankle-deep for the entire portage.
HighnDry 05/15/2022 12:05PM
Antoine is worth the layover day. Take the site on the island due south of the portage from Ram. Comfortable, good base of operations.
cburton103 05/11/2022 12:31PM
You guys exceeded my expectations! Thanks very much to each of you!


Planning on for sure including Antoine in our route now. Possibly even a layover day. We'll probably be able to hit McDougall and Walter with solid effort as well, and troll through Pickerel, Dore and Ram on the way in and probably on the way out through Batch Bay.


I'll try to remember to post a lake trout fishing report here after the trip to help pay this advice forward.
Argo 05/11/2022 08:41AM
PineKnot: "I know the following lakes in the area you're looking at have lakers....the ones with an * are particularly good for some larger fish....



Pickerel *
Olifaunt
Dore
Ram
Antoine *
McDougall *
Walter
Batchewaung "



Just checked my old map - my outfitter marked the southern shore of Olifaunt as well as the long bay in the south as LT zones.
PineKnot 05/10/2022 10:01PM
I know the following lakes in the area you're looking at have lakers....the ones with an * are particularly good for some larger fish....


Pickerel *
Olifaunt
Dore
Ram
Antoine *
McDougall *
Walter
Batchewaung
Argo 05/10/2022 05:44PM
Of course! Olifaunt has trout.


And yes, I'm talking about exactly where you described. This is the video. You can scroll through and find the part where they navigate to Ram with some uncertainty. The dad wasn't 100% sure they could do it. But they did.
cburton103 05/10/2022 05:26PM
Gaidin53: "Here is the map Stu Osthoff marked up for me. This is based on my July trip though. Has some other pertinent facts added though on portage information.



Ryan
"



Wow, thanks for that map, Ryan! Pure gold.
Gaidin53 05/10/2022 04:58PM
Here is the map Stu Osthoff marked up for me. This is based on my July trip though. Has some other pertinent facts added though on portage information.


Ryan


cburton103 05/10/2022 01:26PM
Argo,


Thanks for sharing that story. Glad to hear you were both ok! Moving water, light canoes and wind is a tough trifecta to deal with!


In terms of skipping the portage into Ram, are you talking about paddling the creek into Ram after the small first bay of Sturgeon? So I would finish the Deux Rivieres, then turn right (west) to that creek that exits the Northeast part of Ram?


If that looks doable, that may seal the deal for visiting Antoine. One member of my crew was lamenting adding another 100 rod portage, so this will help make the trip a bit smoother and easier. Plus, I haven't caught a decent lake trout in three years now. Went to the bwca the last two years and only managed one teeny maybe 13-14 inch lake trout in Fraser Lake in 2021, and none in 2020.
Argo 05/10/2022 06:48AM
Since you're going to Antoine, I'm going to suggest you that you likely could paddle in from Ram Lake and avoid the half km portage from Sturgeon. I watched a video where a dad and son did this in the summer of 2018(?) so it should be doable in this year's high water.


We capsized on Russell after checking out the falls in July 2020. We just had most of our fishing gear and some day items in the canoe so we were light and riding high on the water. It was a beautiful, calm, sunny day but you could see storms to the north all morning that refused to intrude on us. As way climbed into our canoe the wind really picked up and was blowing in our faces. We rode the outflow of the falls into the lake but just as the flow subsided and killed our momentum a fierce wind blew the bow to the left. My son, being all of 100 lbs at the time, was in the bow and between the wind and the eddy carrying us back to the falls we could not get the canoe turned around. At that point we should have just paddled to shore. Instead, as we fixated on righting our direction west the eddy carried us broadside back into the outflow and that was it. It all sort of happened in slow motion. At that point we just held onto the canoe, keeping it upright to contain our daypacks and one small tackle box. We got swept around the much large eddy to the north and just pulled up on shore. Believe it or not it was flat calm again. In retrospect, we could have easily made the south shore when were were initially blown sideways. Also, I think if we were kneeling instead of sitting there's a chance we would have stayed upright.


Apart from our two good fishing rods and one of two tackle boxes (containing laker jigs), we managed to salvage most of the important things. Our day packs floated, my gps and inReach were tethered to the thwart. However, when we returned to our gorgeous campsite and took inventory, we realized we were missing my son's flip-flops, my cap, and our map case containing our route, meal plan and permits! Here's the thing...when I bought this case from Aquaquest I deliberately requested the bright orange case. We paddled back and searched the shoreline and found it immediately almost a kilometer away from the falls (this was probably two hours past our capsize event). Everything inside was bone dry! Very unlikely that we would have found it if it was a darker model. Two days later, after an overnight on McDougall we paddled the shoreline once again on our exit out and found my cap. I'm not bald but you just don't want to be hatless out there. No sign of my son's dark, spongey flip-flops.


Our one remaining rod that was left at the site was a $25 pink "Rapala Girl" spinning combo that I bought a day before the trip as a back-up. But here's a wonderful story, a few days later we met up in the middle of Walter Lake with a family of four from Whitby ON just outside of Toronto where I'm from. We told them our story and they gave us one of their rods! Salt of the earth types the are. I gave them two Bungee Dealy Bobs. I eventually returned their rod even though they insisted it was gift when they gave it to us.
cburton103 05/09/2022 10:40PM
Argo: "Where did you read that Jesse has lakers? Someone in an earlier thread made that claim but I'm skeptical. It's a very shallow lake with dark water that is teaming with pike and walleye.


I've heard Walter and Lonely have them but the reports are never great.


Apart from Pickerel, which I've heard is good - particularly as you paddle the big open water SSW of Stanton Bay, it seems like you have chosen a route that avoids prime LT lakes such as Jean, Quetico, Cirrus, Kasakakwog and Batchewaung. But Antoine is on your route. It's a bucket list lake for me. Looks terrific and is a good LT producer.


I caught LT on McDougall two decades ago but struck out 2020. We capsized before hitting McDougall and lost 2 of three rods and a tackle box full of laker jigs. So we never really had the right presentation the second time around..


Because my trips are usually late July I need to find deep water. If you're traveling in colder water months you shouldn't need to limit yourself to the deep zones."



I believe I read about Jesse having lake trout on a thread on these boards. Also, Ontario Fish Online has Jesse listed as having lake trout, but the listed fish species often seem to be wrong on there.


I didn't think I would be able to make Antoine fit into my route, but after talking to my crew tonight I actually think we'll shoot to get to Antoine night one instead of staying in Sturgeon somewhere after the Deux. Thanks for the recommendation!


If you don't mind me asking, where did you capsize? I'm intrigued to see what all of the moving water between the outflow of Russell into Sturgeon up through Chatterton, Keats, etc will look like this year with all of the rain and late melt.
Gaidin53 05/09/2022 03:26PM
So apparently McDougall lake has Lake trout. Was just watching a YouTube video from 2018 of a group. Recognized the awesome campsite on McDougall. They went out fishing and showed two really nice Lake trout they brought in for supper. Saw the group catch several more really nice trout on video as well. I looked up fish species for the lake to confirm and Lake Trout are listed for that lake.


Ryan
Gaidin53 05/08/2022 10:56PM
It’s already been said but Antoine would be the lake I know about in that area for Lake trout. The Boundary Waters Journal guy marked Antoine for Lake trout for me since it was near my route, I’ve seen some videos showing some nice Lake trout getting caught on that lake.


I didn’t add those into my gps since they were off my route for this year.


Ryan
Argo 05/08/2022 09:07PM
Where did you read that Jesse has lakers? Someone in an earlier thread made that claim but I'm skeptical. It's a very shallow lake with dark water that is teeming with pike and walleye.


I've heard Walter and Lonely have them but the reports are never great.


Apart from Pickerel, which I've heard is good - particularly as you paddle the big open water SSW of Stanton Bay, it seems like you have chosen a route that avoids prime LT lakes such as Jean, Quetico, Cirrus, Kasakakwog and Batchewaung. But Antoine is on your route. It's a bucket list lake for me. Looks terrific and is a good LT producer.


I caught LT on McDougall two decades ago but struck out 2020. We capsized before hitting McDougall and lost 2 of three rods and a tackle box full of laker jigs. So we never really had the right presentation the second time around..


Because my trips are usually late July I need to find deep water. If you're traveling in colder water months you shouldn't need to limit yourself to the deep zones.
cburton103 05/08/2022 08:08PM
I’ve tried to find all the information I can regarding which lakes on my route have good fishing for lake trout, but it’s been a little sparse for a few of them in particular. I’m entering from Stanton Bay where I’ll be dropped off by my outfitter, then paddling down through Dore and Twin Lakes, and probably camping somewhere in the bay containing Blueberry Island night one. Going to spend a few nights on probably Keats next, then probably Lonely, then Jesse or Maria on the way out.

I’ve read that Pickerel is good for lakers, and that Walter and Jesse have decent laker populations. McDougall off of Keats seems to have decent numbers as well. The reports I’ve read on Sturgeon have been mixed - some claim there are lakers, some claim no. Lonely I’ve read it both ways as well, with no lakers being the more common stance. We may day trip over to Draper as well for smallies, and I’ve read there should be lakers in there too.

It’s hard to want to spend precious Quetico time fishing for a species that may not even be in a lake in reasonable numbers sufficient to warrant targeting them, especially since we’ll have a couple canoe camping/Quetico newbies along. Am I missing anything here regarding any of these lakes and their laker populations? Any nearby lakes worth targeting lakers in? Thanks!