Lake of the Woods - Morson Fishing Report

[Shorelunch]

Howdy. I fished out of Taylor Bay Sat and Sun. Sat morning went to the Gooseneck/Harbor Island area. Caught all of the walleyes we wanted. We only stayed for an hour, and caught 20 fish (not kidding - even for a fisherman). Lots of eater fish and caught a 22 and 25 incher. Trolled spinners and minnows in 62 degree water in 5-7 feet.

Fished closer to Taylor Bay area in the afternoon and scratched out a few fish. Water temp was 52.

Sunday headed back to Gooseneck/Harbor Island area and fished for about two hours and again caught many more fish. Biggest was a 27" and a few more 22's along with a bunch of eaters. Water temp dropped to 60 and they were in 7-8 feet.

Heading up to the cabin in Hanson Bay this weekend. So far, the weather looks decent for the weekend.

[Eastwind]

Just returned from three days of fishing out of Morson. Numbers of fish were down, size of fish was up. Found fish tight to shorelines. Had no luck in cuts between islands or rock bars that jut out from islands or shore. Most were caught in 8' to 12'.

[Shorelunch]

Fished out of Morson over Memorial weekend. Night and day difference from last weekend. We worked pretty hard to find fish along rip-rap/sand shorelines and rocky points. Mostly caught fish in 10 feet trolling spinners with minnows. Also worked humps off shoreline, but nobody home. Water temps were 58-60.

[dnoz]

Same results for our group seemed like we would catch a couple in each spot and then would have to move on to the next. Caught most of them on rocky shorelines and points. We also tried a few reefs and picked up a few. I didn't expect to catch any on reefs this time of year but we did. I am not sure if it is because of the cool spring or what. No big fish but most of the ones we caught were between 14-17".

[marknamy]

Saturday I too struggled to find them. Sunday I moved from rubble shoreline to sunken points and reefs close to spawning grounds. 14-16 feet of water seemed to produce quite well. Six 14-18" fish in just over an hour and realeased a 23". Not hot and heavy but made for a wonderful first fish fry of the year. Back in a couple of weeks to give it another try. Hoping my luck holds because finding fish the past weekend was far from skill.

[Asandir]

nice reports, get to take kids up for the weekend. Hope things are looking up.

[irish2]

Probably the best walleye fishing we have had on opening weekend through Memorial Day. Never fished more than 3 hours any day. One day we lost count after 40 plus fish. Smallest 14", largest 25". Fished sandy bays and shorelines. Dragged bottom bouncers and minnows. Hammered Copper and Brass blades. Opening weekend found a lot of fish shallow (6-8'), later caught them between 12 and 18 FOW.Actually had trouble gettin g the good eaters. Too many fish over 18". Heading back in 2 weeks.

Richard

[Scoot]

Shorelunch, I have a favor to ask of you-- please clean out your PMs or shoot me an e-mail at scootsfishing at yahoo. I'd like to run a question or two by you, but can't because your PMs are maxed out. I'd greatly appreciate it!

Thanks,

[Shorelunch]

Heading up Friday afternoon for the weekend. Any reports on walleye and/or smallies?

[marknamy]

Found good numbers and nice size walleye's on the edges of structure. Caught fish on points and reefs. Seemed as though they went deep, just off the edge of the structure on Sunday.

Good luck this weekend.

[Shorelunch]

Had a very fun weekend. We fished traditional mid-June structure, points and rip rap shorelines and some humps off the shore. Caught a lot of 12-17" trolling spinners with minnows, leeches and/or twister tails, anywhere from 6-12 feet. Biggest fish of the weekend was only 18", but made up for quality with quantity, which was perfect with my two boys and their Grandma fishing. We fished around the Sunset Channel, Myles Bay and north of Rabbit Island. Caught fish at every spot. I know a lot of folks got walleyes out on the reefs, too.

Also fished for smallies, but struggled to find anything but a couple small northerns.

Back up over July 4 for more walleyes, attempt smallies again - and now this year, my 10 yr old really wants to muskie fish, so we're going to throw that into the mix.

If anyone wants to share a few muskie and/or smallie spots, please do (of course we C&R)!

[cbrooks]

Shore do you ever go to the NW angle side? I got some spots I could PM but it might be way out of your range.

[Shorelunch]

Shore do you ever go to the NW angle side? I got some spots I could PM but it might be way out of your range.

No, not really. It would be quite a haul. I'm getting in touch with a few semi-guides and resort/marina folks to get pointed in the right direction. Any input from FM'ers would be great though

Thanks for the offer, CBrooks. I'll have to get you up to the Morson area when I get to know it better for muskies.

[cbrooks]

That sounds great shore.

Just an idea. Post that question in the muskie forum. Last year I asked for advice on the NW angle/LOW in the muskie forum. I got a few responses in there via email. Wish I could be more help never fished out of Morson. Good luck

[Scoot]

John, the good news is that that area is a very good one. You can go any direciton and don't need to go far. Like I said yesterday on the phone- get Richard Pearson's Muskies on the Shield and read it. Pay particular attention to the mesotropic water section and the full season on LOW section. With that info, look at the map of the area and start picking apart the spots.

I could fish on LOW with four lures- a heavy (actually the medium weight now, but not the lightest weight) single spin rad dog, an unweighted Suick, a tail spinning prop bait, and a bucktail. If I grabbed a couple colors (light/dark and bright/natural) of the bucktail and rad dog, I honestly wouldn't need anything else. Six lures would take care of me just fine.

A good general approach is to fish weeds early, fish the transition between weeds and rocks a little later, and more rock (reefs and points) after that. It's tough to beat a good wind-blown point or saddle any time of year...

I don't fish muskies very close to where you're looking for info, or I'd give you some spots. I'd be happy to pick apart the map with you some time though, and that'd give you some good areas to give a shot.

Thanks again for the info for this coming week. I can't wait to get up there. Might be pretty tough post-frontal conditions, but that'll be a lot better than doing the trip in the middle of the front, like a couple of my buddies are doing right now.

FYI- I called Mylies, Buena Vista, and Whitefish Bay camp-- not a lot of info regarding the current condition of the portage. The guy at Mylies had the most info. He thought we'd have to work hard to do it, but that we would likely be able to get across with our boats. We'll see...

[Gusser88]

Just returned from fishing the Morson area. Had a fantastic time staying at a friends cabin. We fished 6.23-6.27. The weather was perfect. Minimal rain and wind for all days. Focused on walleyes and caught all we wanted using bottom bouncers and crawler harnesses. Color of spinners and hooks did not seem to matter. Focused mainly on reefs but hit some shorelines. Fish seem to have moved out to the reefs. Fished many different from parts of the lake and did well most everywhere. Biggest walleye was 26" with many 15-17" eaters for fish frys. Attempted to fish Lake Trout in WFB but Turtle Portage was broken. Sitting at work on lunch break wishing we were back up there! Hope to get back up in August.

[Shorelunch]

Just returned from fishing the Morson area. Had a fantastic time staying at a friends cabin. We fished 6.23-6.27. The weather was perfect. Minimal rain and wind for all days. Focused on walleyes and caught all we wanted using bottom bouncers and crawler harnesses. Color of spinners and hooks did not seem to matter. Focused mainly on reefs but hit some shorelines. Fish seem to have moved out to the reefs. Fished many different from parts of the lake and did well most everywhere. Biggest walleye was 26" with many 15-17" eaters for fish frys. Attempted to fish Lake Trout in WFB but Turtle Portage was broken. Sitting at work on lunch break wishing we were back up there! Hope to get back up in August.

Sounds like you had a good time, Gusser. Gotta love Morson. How deep did you catch them? Were they on the flats or breaks or all over?

[Scoot]

Attempted to fish Lake Trout in WFB but Turtle Portage was broken.

When did you try to go across, Gusser? We crossed on Thurs without any issues... It was working perfectly when we left, I swear!

[Shorelunch]

Quote:

When did you try to go across, Gusser? We crossed on Thurs without any issues... It was working perfectly when we left, I swear!

Sure it was, Scoot . . .

Heck, I think even when the portage is in "good working order," most folks would think it's broken by the way it hauls.

[Scoot]

I promise it was!!!

I definitely think you're right- it's a lot of work. It'd really be a lot of work for only a couple guys. The cable binding on the drum was a real problem- without enough bodies to have one guy take care of that, it'd be a heck of a lot of work to get across there.

[Gusser88]

Hey guys, we headed up to turtle portage on Saturday....when we actually got to the turtle portage landing there was a boat docked with a couple guys. They informed us it was broken. We did not land our boat and take a look. Maybe now kicking myself for not looking myself.

[Gusser88]

Shorelunch, they seemed to be on the breaks and concentrated in certain breaks within the reefs. Once we found them we worked the breaks hard and in pretty small pattern. I could almost do a countdown on one reef when were at 15 ft heading down to 30ft. I would tell the boys to get ready to set hook. We did get them on top of the reefs and just off in the flats as well. I would say we fished in 15-35ft most of the time. It was a lot of fun!

[Scoot]

Gusser, I've got a thread going in the LOW forum that shows this, but I'll post this here too-- check out the two pics below. The first one shows what the cable looked like on the drum when we got there. It was all bound up and didn't run right at all. It took some doing to get it off and back on correctly. The second pic shows how the cable should go on- we needed one guy to guide the cable so it'd go on straight. We brought a set of work gloves for him so he didn't chew his hands up on the cable. I wouldn't be surprised if the problem with the portage the guys you talked to were referring to was simply a bound up cable. Obviously I don't know that, but it's a reasonable possibility given what I saw there on Thurs.

[Shorelunch]

Scoot, to answer your post on the LOW forum - we caught a dark - nearly black - sauger in the Sunset Channel a couple weeks ago. Kinda cool looking and I haven't seen them before.

[Gusser88]

Scoot, read your posts on the LOTW site. Sounds like a really cool trip. My buddy was talking about you last week when we were looking at the LOTW maps in his cabin. He was showing us your route and we all mentioned how cool of a trip it would be....kind of like Quetico without a lot of the work!!