We are going into Duncan on 5/17 and set up camp for a few days. I understand it has Lake Trout and smallies and I have never fished for Lake Trout. Any guidance on how I go about catching a few LT? I know they are often very deep but will they be shallower this time of year? Anything depth or structure wise I should look for? Lures and techniques?

And finally...if we should happen to catch a few, what is the best way to prepare them for a (hopefully) delicious dinner?

Thanks for any insight, I am out of my element here.

In mid-May they likely will be shallow. Crankbaits and spoons would be great choices.

Many great ways to prepare lakers. I like to wrap in foil with butter, salt, sliced lemon and onion and whatever seasoning sounds good.

Thanks OS...filet as normal? Leave skin on or take off?

The 3-1/4”, hammered silver, Dr. Spoon is the first choice when it comes to spring trolling for lake trout. In the 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.

I like to pan fry my trout in margarine, cut some onions in inch squares and place them into the pan with the fillets. Cover it all with lemon pepper. Cook for about 4 minutes and flip them over and sprinkle more lemon pepper. After a few minutes flip it back over to fry the spices into the fillets for a minute or two and then serve with a side of stove top stuffing. We take the skin off of the fillets.

They can be almost anywhere as far as structure goes. But they will be predominately shallow. I usually troll a DDHJ 10 about 100-120' feet back. Sometimes I troll a HJ12 if they are really shallow. When I see deeper schooled fish on sonar I may go vertical with a blade bait(very fun).

The easiest way to catch lake trout in the spring is to spend as much time trolling as possible. If you are able to find a productive reef, it is a blast to "park" on top and vertical jig (hair jigs, paddle tails, swimbaits, gold/silver spoons etc.), but if there is any wind whatsoever, it is nearly impossible to hold your position and fish-that's why I prefer trolling. Also, when you think about how much volume of water there is in deep trout lakes, it is a numbers game and you need to cover as much water as possible to find where the fish are hunting for their next meal (made slightly easier in the spring when SOME of the fish are up shallow). Without sonar, it is almost impossible to find the mid-lake reefs that can be the most productive (scout on google maps before you go). If you hook into a fish, figure 8 back around with the boat and hit that spot again to see if more fish are in the area-if so, you may have found your reef (and you will often get hit when circling back around). Fish love misdirection and changing speeds - never troll in a straight line all the way across the lake-spend time turning and changing directions, just never aggressive enough to tangle your lines.

When I head out, we usually troll as much as we can from sunup to sundown, expecting the morning hours to be the most productive (sunup to ~10am). There are days you may spend 10+ hours in the boat just to put 2 fish in the boat, other days you may boat 15 if the conditions are right and you find a honey hole.

My favorite lures for lake trout (all open water season) are the Rapala Deep Down Husky Jerk, Dr. Spoon (chrome, blue, silver, hammered, etc.), Rapala 30' tail dancer (UV Pink Firetiger, Chrome blue, chrome black), Lil Cleo 1/2oz (same colors as Dr. Spoon). If it is later in the year and water temps are higher, I will just add a 1-4oz weight 4-6' above the leader to get my lure down deeper. Our last trip in 2019 at the end of September I was fishing with 200-250' of line out AND 3oz of weight to get my spoon down to that 45-55' hotspot. Try not to overthink it, keep changing up baits, start trolling shallow (6-12') and move deeper until you start to get into the fish.

Pro tip: if there is minimal wind and the stern paddler can handle the canoe alone, have the bow paddler "pump" their rod occasionally when trolling (musky fisherman will know what I'm talking about). A lot of times, trout will follow a bait for a long time before deciding whether or not to bite. If a trout is following your bait and it has the same exact action, never deviating, they are likely going to recognize that bait is artificial and not strike. If they see it acting erratically, their evolutionary instinct is more likely to kick in and encourage a bite. Many times I have been trolling along and thought I felt a light tap on the end of my line (trout nipping at the tail or back of spoon), I immediately pump the rod or simply grab the line and pull out a few feet of slack and release immediately. More often than not, this has immediately encouraged a strike and resulted in a fish that probably would have moved on otherwise. In other words, not all trolling is created equal. Increase your chances of catching fish by allowing the bow paddler to troll "actively." On almost all of my trout trips, the bow paddler has been more productive than the stern by changing up the action of the bait. This method works especially well if you are trolling spoons. You can also imitate this action by casting your spoon as far as you can and ripping (2-4' at a time) back to the boat. I've had the most success attempting to "jig" like this 2-8' off the bottom. When you get on a spot where trout are hitting a vertical jigging presentation, it will be the most fun you've ever had.

See below for my most recent open water tackle assortment for lake trout (minus terminal tackle).
Good luck!

My fishing tips are in your other post. As far as preparing one, we've always gutted by pulling gill flap under the lower jaw. It all comes out in one pull...gills, guts, etc. Then we cut the head off but that's optional. Pan sear with skin on but scored vertically and seasoned with whatever you like. Flip and cook both sides and when done skin peels away and meat pulls easily off bones.

You can fillet or just gut them. Leave the skin on. It will stick to the foil. If you gut them, fill the body cavity with the seasonings. Put the foil package in the coals. How long? Depends on size of fish. Most will need 10-15 minutes per side. Turn over about halfway. You will want good gloves or tools.

Power troll silver Tail Dancers that include some blue--or maybe a red belly.

This is totally fun! Good luck!

Wow, great responses around where and how to fish, lure selection and preparation methods. Much appreciated. What line type/weight would you recommend for LT fishing?

lindylair: "Wow, great responses around where and how to fish, lure selection and preparation methods. Much appreciated. What line type/weight would you recommend for LT fishing?"

I prefer braid for responsive hooksets, especially important when fishing deep water. Tie to a mono or fluoro leader, 2-3ft. To make things easy, just tie the leader to a swivel using your regular knot (I use a Palomar, some use Double Clinch or Uni knots), then tie the braid to the swivel. Then tie the lure to the leader. This way you don't need to tie a line-to-line connection knot which are easier to mess up than a simple Palomar (or similar). The reason I would not suggest straight mono is because it usually has a lot of stretch which results in lower sensitivity and not enough responsiveness for deep water hooksets. Straight fluoro is usually an OK option in small line diameters, but it can be unruly on a spinning reel. I prefer fluoro to mono as it is clearer, and it SINKS, which gets your crankbaits deeper (mono floats). My true recommendation would be braid to fluoro (PowerPro to Sunline FC Leader).

As for line strength, you don't need more than 15-20lb braid (very thin) and 10lb fluoro/mono leader on a medium power rod. If you intend to hunt for BIG fish (30"+), you want to get them to the boat as quickly as possible and release them quickly so they still have some energy, and as such, you should be thinking more like 30lb braid and a 15-20lb leader and a medium heavy or heavy power rod. I also prefer baitcasters for heavy tackle but you can still get away with a boatload of 30lb braid on a 2500 size spinning reel because of how thin it is. You'll get more torque with a casting reel though; a spinning reel's job is really just to take up slack line, whereas casting reels act more like a winch.

ericinely: Pro tip: if there is minimal wind and the stern paddler can handle the canoe alone, have the bow paddler "pump" their rod occasionally when trolling (musky fisherman will know what I'm talking about). A lot of times, trout will follow a bait for a long time before deciding whether or not to bite. If a trout is following your bait and it has the same exact action, never deviating, they are likely going to recognize that bait is artificial and not strike. If they see it acting erratically, their evolutionary instinct is more likely to kick in and encourage a bite. Many times I have been trolling along and thought I felt a light tap on the end of my line (trout nipping at the tail or back of spoon), I immediately pump the rod or simply grab the line and pull out a few feet of slack and release immediately. More often than not, this has immediately encouraged a strike and resulted in a fish that probably would have moved on otherwise."

X2! Our big fish last year was likely following the lure for a while. We came to the end of our trolling run and I popped the motor into neutral. Rods were in holders at the time. I told my kid, ok, let's reel in and double back to start the run over. He started reeling and immediately the rod bent in half. It was like she wasn't at all interested and then the bait just stopped and suspended, followed up by erratic retrieval of a 12 year old and it instantly turned that fish on.

That early in the year you should be able to catch them casting from shore with silver spoons or white, purple or silver crankbaits. Trolling will work too, as would drifting and casting. I wouldn't worry about getting deep as the most active fish should be striking within 30' of the surface. My favorite way to prepare LT is to remove the guts, gills and all the bits of blood (blood line along the spine is very important). Lightly S&P the cavity and then stuff it with lemon wedges, butter and herbs (Fresh Dill is my favorite but any Italian blend works well also) and then set it right on the greased grate over the fire. Flip once. Tin foil makes this fool-proof. Sometimes I will scale them and eat the skin. I always wrap them in foil when I do it that way. The fish is cooked when the skin is falling off and the meat flakes easily off of the bones.

lindylair: "Wow, great responses around where and how to fish, lure selection and preparation methods. Much appreciated. What line type/weight would you recommend for LT fishing?"

I use 10lb Fire line tracer. It is color coded every 5'. Good for trolling and vertical jigging.

20-25lb main line Power Pro Braid with a 15-20lb flouro leader (splurge for the good stuff-I am a huge fan of Seaguar). Yes, you can get by with lighter tackle, but trout are so aggressive I have seen no evidence that heavier flouro leader discourages bites. This also results in less retying after battles (they will often twist themselves up in the line and do have sharp teeth) due to nicks in the line, no need for a heavy steel leader (just use a snap swivel for quick change), and the ability to unsnag your line when it inevitably gets hung up in the rocks trolling.

That time of year, fish for them along shorelines, just cast on the opposite side and let your lure sink a little bit. I’ve caught way more lakers doing that, than by trolling. Spoons, rattle traps, spinners, heavy jigs with twister tails or tubes. Most people swear by trolling, I personally think it’s overrated and boring. That time of year they’re going to be shallow and active, it’s way more exciting to catch them as if you were fishing for bass.