Looking for tips on fishing for Lakers on lakes in the Clearwater, Alder, Crystal lakes area the second week of June. Taking my family up there and I've only caught a few of them and all in the fall.

Is it best to troll or jig that time of year? Depth? Lures? Locations on lake if willing.

Thanks, Mike

Best to troll in my opinion Rapala tail dancers little Cleo spoons and one of my favorite trolling lures for Lakers an Erie dearie with a gulp minnow as the trailer or live bait .

I fished on Crystal Lake last year with my wife. I found that a heavy blade bait (Sonar, Cicada) stayed down deep on even a fast drift down the lake. I'd recommend bringing some of those in metallic colors.

I will be on Clearwater the 2nd week of June targeting lakers with my son. Lakers are ALL about water temp, seeking out water in the high 40s, low 50s. I'm guessing that temp range will be somewhere between 25-50 feet down at this time, but there are a couple ways you can determine actual water temp at specific depths:

- spend $10 on a Vexilar Deptherm or similar device.

- If you have a fish finder with a transducer that has a temp sensor and a LONG cord, you can mark it with white tape every 5 feet or so, paddle out into maybe 60 fow, feed the ducer into the water by hand until you get to the desired temp range on your fish finder screen.

Trolling -- as mentioned, you can troll deep diving crank baits in white/blue/purple schemes. There are several that can dive to 25-30 feet just by letting out 120-150 feet of line. Thinner diameter braided line dives deeper. I'll be bring #9 and #11 Deep Tail Dancers, 800 series Reef Runners, and Bandits.

Something new I'll be trying this year, thanks to a post on this board, is drifting/trolling a 1 or 2oz Northland Bionic Bucktail jig. This is a BIG hair jig with a treble stinger that I've read great things about. At 2oz it'll get deep in a hurry.

I spend most of my fishing time trolling for lakers in Quetico. I find it relaxing to just tool around at 1-2 mph with a line out in deep water. Use your locator to find humps and deep water drop-offs. Fish deep with up to 4 ounces of keel sinker 3-4 feet ahead of a flutter spoon on a swivel. Make sure you are trolling above any fish you mark. They will come up many feet in search of prey... but if you are under the fish, they will never see your bait.

Fish calm mornings and look for any bait fish activity on the top of the water. Troll there. Watch for loons diving in the middle of the lake. Troll there. When the wind comes up, troll on the calm side of the lake where (in theory) cool water is coming up nearer the surface.

In the early season, or cold water June... Lakers can be anywhere and deep water trolling may be your last choice.

Good Luck!

Agree - troll the tail dancer deep (clown or the shiny perch) for lakers

Thanks guys. Very helpful info as always

+1 on the Taildancers.

djwillco: "+1 on the Taildancers."

This forum loves Taildancers… I'll have to get one.

Being an engineer, I will have to set up comparison trials.

My personal experience has been much better With countdowns over taildancers especially early on when the lakers are shallower. The tail dancers are a bit more aggressive also run a little deeper. I like the more subtle wobble and depth presentation of the countdowns. Perch, blue silver, black silver.

TwistedCisco: " My personal experience has been much better With countdowns over taildancers especially early on when the lakers are shallower. The tail dancers are a bit more aggressive also run a little deeper. I like the more subtle wobble and depth presentation of the countdowns. Perch, blue silver, black silver. "

could not agree more for early spring , especially for walleyes IMO , i also changed out the factory trebles for gamakatsu's .
but maybe if targeting bigger lakers , i do love my spoons.

Similar to Bobber#3, I like to slow troll except with crank baits. Anything that has flash. I don’t use extra weights, Lakers will feed up, and are often much shallower than people think.

There are a lot of good techniques but trolling is a good way to cover ground and start to figure out where to fish.

T

timatkn: "

Similar to Bobber#3, I like to slow troll except with crank baits. Anything that has flash. I don’t use extra weights, Lakers will feed up, and are often much shallower than people think.

There are a lot of good techniques but trolling is a good way to cover ground and start to figure out where to fish.

T"

Nice Puddicomb paddle! You don't see them often anymore.

Does anybody jig with ice fishing jigs (white tubes, bucktails) when lakers are shallow? I was thinking about trolling a big flashy jig on Kekekabic this May.

TheGreatIndoors: "Does anybody jig with ice fishing jigs (white tubes, bucktails) when lakers are shallow? I was thinking about trolling a big flashy jig on Kekekabic this May."

I have casted 3/8oz jig with 6" white tube. Some success on IMA this way in 2010 (early june) .

Little Cleo's are the best. Granted that I haven't done that much laker fishing, but when I did that's all they would bite on. Even other spoons were worthless. It was quite the eye opening experience when we had to throw out everything we thought we knew about fishing and just started trolling in the middle of the 80-100ft deep lake. We were thinking that there was no way would catch anything in the middle of the lake but it was on the shoreline and drop offs that we had gotten burned.

If you have never fished for trout before then you need to relearn how to fish. You still want to find the structure, but that structure is 40 feet deep and deeper. You need to have a map with depths, be able to read the land really well, or have a depth finder. Then we trolled so slow that we thought we were doing it wrong. Fast can work too at certain times, but you probably need a down-rigger for that. It was a real test for my buddy's patience until we landed the first fish. He thought I was crazy telling him not to paddle, letting out that much line and a long ways from any structure that he could see. We did catch them though and we gained a new appreciation for trout fishing in the BWCA. For one, it is easy to smoke a cheap cigar and sip on your drink of choice while paddling leisurely in open water.

A1t2o: "Little Cleo's are the best. Granted that I haven't done that much laker fishing, but when I did that's all they would bite on. Even other spoons were worthless. It was quite the eye opening experience when we had to throw out everything we thought we knew about fishing and just started trolling in the middle of the 80-100ft deep lake. We were thinking that there was no way would catch anything in the middle of the lake but it was on the shoreline and drop offs that we had gotten burned.


If you have never fished for trout before then you need to relearn how to fish. You still want to find the structure, but that structure is 40 feet deep and deeper. You need to have a map with depths, be able to read the land really well, or have a depth finder. Then we trolled so slow that we thought we were doing it wrong. Fast can work too at certain times, but you probably need a down-rigger for that. It was a real test for my buddy's patience until we landed the first fish. He thought I was crazy telling him not to paddle, letting out that much line and a long ways from any structure that he could see. We did catch them though and we gained a new appreciation for trout fishing in the BWCA. For one, it is easy to smoke a cheap cigar and sip on your drink of choice while paddling leisurely in open water. "

You have many excellent points in this post! Anyone looking to catch a lake trout needs to pay attention to this. Attn: minnmike!

Oh I'm paying attention. Thanks everyone.

The 3-1/4”, hammered silver, Dr. Spoon is the first choice when it comes to spring trolling for lake trout. In the early spring, target areas in the 8 to 10 foot range, just outside the areas you would be looking for smallmouth. Look for gently slopping, rocky, rubble type areas. You don’t want to be in an area that appears to be a straight drop off from the shore. If you view the shore line, you can make a good determination of what the structure should hold beneath the surface.

I am still looking for that elusive trophy “laker”. Some people in the Ely area have told me if you want to catch an enormous lake trout you need to fish early in the season, just after ice out, and troll the shallow areas with a 4-1/2” nickel plated Dardevle Spoon. The nickel color imitates a cisco or whitefish which are the primary forage for these fish.

These two spoons can be cast or trolled during the early spring phase. When the water begins to warm, these trout will move to deep water on reefs located next to adjacent deeper water. The summer time phase is when you will need to troll deeper. This can be accomplished by adding weight to your line with a three-way swivel. Tie off about three feet of leader line to the middle loop of the swivel and tie on your spoon. On the bottom loop tie on about a foot and half of line with a one ounce weight at the far end of this line. Tie the remaining loop to the line on your reel. Let out plenty of line, at least 120 feet while trolling the depths of the lake. With the three-way swivel set up, if you do happen to snag up, there is a good chance you will just lose your weight and will be able to retrieve your lure. These spoons can also be jigged vertically over deep reefs as well.

Another good trout lure to use in warm water is the one ounce hair or plastic jig. White or black colors seem to work best while vertical jigging over a deep reef. I prefer to use white. You will need to lift the rod a little higher when jigging at extreme depths. Since you will be fishing so deep you probably won’t feel the hit itself as most of the strikes come during the drop. You will just feel a heavier weight on the line, when you do, set the hook as hard as you can.

How big for an "elusive trophy laker"... inches.

Great post QueticoMike. I don't know much about laker fishing during the summer. I would like to try it though.

bobbernumber3: "

timatkn: "


Similar to Bobber#3, I like to slow troll except with crank baits. Anything that has flash. I don’t use extra weights, Lakers will feed up, and are often much shallower than people think.


There are a lot of good techniques but trolling is a good way to cover ground and start to figure out where to fish.


T"

Nice Puddicomb paddle! You don't see them often anymore."

Mine is is still in really good shape, nicest paddle I ever used although my wife disagrees her original Whiskey Jack hand made (before Danny expanded) works better for her.

T

bobbernumber3: "How big for an "elusive trophy laker"... inches.
"

Based on my analysis of DNR survey data, the biggest one in the last 10 years was pulled out of Mountain, a whopping 40 incher, in 2011. The next largest there was 20 inches, though. The other two lakes are LLC and Trout with the occasional 37 incher. I would say anything over 30 is trophy size for the BWCA, but 35+ is just massive and definitely elusive.

bobbernumber3: "How big for an "elusive trophy laker"... inches.
"

I'd say 40 inhces or 20 pounds. Some lakers grow wider not longer. I think people have posted pics of 20 pounders that were under 40 inches. My experience is bigger lakes produce more bigger fish. For example fishing smaller Raven Lake never got anything over 7 pounds--doubt anything exists bigger than that. On some of the big Q lakes I've gotten into schools of fish 34-36 inches (probably 10-15 pounds) one after another with some into 40 inches sprinkled in. Never personally seen one bigger than 40 although there are plenty of articles of people in the BWJ with fish that big and bigger. I don't really fish for them much anymore though because I bring my grade school kids and that big cold water scares me with them along---even with the life jackets on I worry about hypothermia for them--they don't have the insulation I do :)

T

the dreaded double post...

timatkn: "

bobbernumber3: "How big for an "elusive trophy laker"... inches.
"

I'd say 40 inhces or 20 pounds. Some lakers grow wider not longer. I think people have posted pics of 20 pounders that were under 40 inches. My experience is bigger lakes produce more bigger fish. For example fishing smaller Raven Lake never got anything over 7 pounds--doubt anything exists bigger than that. On some of the big Q lakes I've gotten into schools of fish 34-36 inches (probably 10-15 pounds) one after another with some into 40 inches sprinkled in. Never personally seen one bigger than 40 although there are plenty of articles of people in the BWJ with fish that big and bigger. I don't really fish for them much anymore though because I bring my grade school kids and that big cold water scares me with them along---even with the life jackets on I worry about hypothermia for them--they don't have the insulation I do :)

T"

20 years ago on Clearwater (1999), the DNR snagged a 42 and a 45(!!!) incher from Clearwater. I would be surprised if a lot of people were managing 40+. Not that the DNR is the authority on fish size as it's luck of the draw, but I still think 40+ is extremely rare. Even 35 seems pretty rare. From what I can tell, fish sizes have been dwindling over the years, ever so slightly. Hard to know why, though. Could be overfishing, could be environmental, could be some cycle (old ones dying off before others get huge), not sure. Still, I'd be thrilled to catch anything over 30 inches, and 35+ would blow my mind. I wouldn't need to catch a single fish for the rest of the trip to be satisfied after a catch like that. 40+ and I'd need my eyes checked and a new pair of undies.

There is a poster Plittle who has caught a few lunkers in the BWCAW I think back to back years around 40 inches.

I disagree on size going down. With catch and release I feel the laker size has gone up, but I fish the Q.

I am not bragging but go to the Q. It has been rare for me not to catch a 30 incher on a trip and I am no expert, I just troll large flashy cranks. Pick out a larger lake Pickeral, Brent, McIntrye, Burt, Suz, Minn/ McAree(can’t remember which one), North Bay, Sarah, Ted, Darky, Argo etc...

T

We troll with a size 000 Luhr Jensen Pink Lady trailing a 6' mono leader with a spoon.

The Pink Lady is an amazing example of design and engineering! It's a diver that will trip when a fish strikes which will help plane the lure and fish to the surface as you reel in (i.e. you're not fighting the diving action). If a fish hits and misses and trips the lady, giving a little slack and a quick pull usually resets it without needing to haul it all the way back to the boat.

When we deploy the Pink Lady, we enable the reverse on the reel and allow the lady to pull line out as we troll. We count the number of times the handle on the reel spins around as a crude method to determine how deep we're fishing. We typically fish 25-40 cranks, but it's a matter of trial and error.

Sutton hammered silver spoons are go-to's for us, but white or blue spoons work well also.

The lady creates quite a bit of drag. It's possible to wedge your rod between your legs as you paddle, but I use this rod holder with this mount.

In one of the attached photos, you can see my paddling partner (aka my father-in-law) with a trout and the pink lady hanging from his rod tip.

One travel day (i.e. we were paddling through, not fishing intensely) on Batchewaung and Pickerel in the Q I lost track of how many trout I caught. It was more than a dozen and less than two dozen. That was an exceptional day as an individual, but when my paddling partner and I are on a trout lake, that isn't an unusual number for the two of us.

flynn: "

timatkn: "

bobbernumber3: "How big for an "elusive trophy laker"... inches.
"

I'd say 40 inhces or 20 pounds. Some lakers grow wider not longer. I think people have posted pics of 20 pounders that were under 40 inches. My experience is bigger lakes produce more bigger fish. For example fishing smaller Raven Lake never got anything over 7 pounds--doubt anything exists bigger than that. On some of the big Q lakes I've gotten into schools of fish 34-36 inches (probably 10-15 pounds) one after another with some into 40 inches sprinkled in. Never personally seen one bigger than 40 although there are plenty of articles of people in the BWJ with fish that big and bigger. I don't really fish for them much anymore though because I bring my grade school kids and that big cold water scares me with them along---even with the life jackets on I worry about hypothermia for them--they don't have the insulation I do :)


T"

20 years ago on Clearwater (1999), the DNR snagged a 42 and a 45(!!!) incher from Clearwater. I would be surprised if a lot of people were managing 40+. Not that the DNR is the authority on fish size as it's luck of the draw, but I still think 40+ is extremely rare. Even 35 seems pretty rare. From what I can tell, fish sizes have been dwindling over the years, ever so slightly. Hard to know why, though. Could be overfishing, could be environmental, could be some cycle (old ones dying off before others get huge), not sure. Still, I'd be thrilled to catch anything over 30 inches, and 35+ would blow my mind. I wouldn't need to catch a single fish for the rest of the trip to be satisfied after a catch like that. 40+ and I'd need my eyes checked and a new pair of undies."

Clearwater once produced large fish before they got cropped down. Seen a phot of a individual around 1960 catch 3 trout 15-20+ pounds in one day. lake trout grow very slow and is a fish that is very vulnerable to over fishing. Daniel use to have some big fish also.
Yes big fish usually means big waters and maybe a few less lake trout,thus maybe more forage food.

Good luck lake trout fishing:

I think that every lake trout lake in this state should have length restrictions due to the slow growing nature of lake trout . You can still have a meal and release the breeder size fish to repopulate .

Basspro69: "I think that every lake trout lake in this state should have length restrictions due to the slow growing nature of lake trout . You can still have a meal and release the breeder size fish to repopulate ."

I agree,at least start with something.

My group has adopted the following practices. We fish rods with backbone to get trout in and unhooked before they diminish to much. Backing off on multiple treble hooks that take to long to unhook. Flatten barbs of course. Backing off from heavy fishing after June when they are deeper. Keep 3 to 4 pounders for dinner. Landing nets in each canoe. Do not touch trout if possible. Off the hook and into the lake as soon as possible. Only measure trout over 15lbs.

Basspro69: "I think that every lake trout lake in this state should have length restrictions due to the slow growing nature of lake trout . You can still have a meal and release the breeder size fish to repopulate ."

I agree 100%!
Up in Manitoba where I fish the regulations were changed to "•All lake trout over 65 cm must be released." Which translates to 25.5 inches. Their trophy Lake Trout fishing is getting much much better as a result. Any Lake Trout over that length doesn't really taste that great unless its smoked. For me any Laker over 22 inches always gets released as do plenty under. Where Lake Trout live is a very sterile environment which cant grow that many total ounces of fish per acre very fast.

Clearwater has decent numbers of small trout with an outside chance at a monster. Alder has much fewer but bigger average fish (13lb. fish for me last year ) IMO.

Troll a Sutton dimpled flutter silver spoon #6 (2inch) not an 06 in 40 ft. of water on a three way rig with 4 oz of weight 3ft dropper to weights-sinkers and 4 ft to lure. Use 6lb mono or 6 lb diameter fire line. Fish off points or in end of bay cups. Troll slow 1mph to 1.8 mph bring it up moderately to 30 ft. and down to the bottom as you troll. Sunrise to 10:30 am is best and last hour of light is good as well. If you put your time in you will catch them. Taildancers and the rest work well too. Good luck!

Mike, I just booked my trip for Clearwater, the second weekend in June, the 7th. I hope to see you there. There will be 4 of us in two canoes and I hope to have my flying moose decals on my canoe by then, but I might forget since I will probably wait to put them on until after I take the canoe down and flip it right side up. I'll be wearing my BWCA hat. Feel free to flag us down and say hi, we can exchange notes on fishing.

Are people still thinking that the lakers will be in the 20-40ft deep range? It has seemed a little cool lately so I was wondering if the lake temps might be a little cooler that early. The husky jerk and jointed rapala might do rather well if they are that shallow.

A1t2o, we will be paddling a carbon fiber MNII(black) and a kevlar MN3 and will be on the water on the 8th. I will keep my eye out for you. Good luck fishing.

Thanks everyone for all the great advice. Sure to help get fish in the boat.