Elk Lake

[slayer212]

Heading out to Elk lake by itasca. Never fished it before just wondering what to expect for Muskies. Mid 40's or are there 50 inchers in there..im guesing its a clear lake since most are that way. dont need spots just looking for info and what to expect

[john skarie]

Was up at Elk a couple of weeks ago. There was a very intense filamentous algae bloom going on and all of the shallow weeds, and I mean around the whole lake, were dying or dead.

You could find deeper weeds in some spots, mainly coontail and grass, but we could not find any healthy cabbage.

If you go you'll need to open water troll or fish very deep edges or open water, unless things have changed tremendously.

We didn't see a fish come from anything shallower than 20 ft.

JS

[slayer212]

what size fish are in there? Leech lake Strain? hmmm well we will give her a shot on monday and let you know

[cbrooks]

It might be a small lake but the fish aren't. Plenty of forage for them to get big. Biggest problem with Elk is parking... if there's three or four trailers at the ramp the lake is too crowded for my liking.

I believe the DNR uses the eggs of the muskie's in this lake for stocking other lakes. Its a 100% catch and release lake because of that with a pike slot of 26-40 inches I do believe. Trolling is good for this lake and for casting I back up to 30 sometimes 35 feet of water and work my way in until I get a pattern put together. Use lures that can get down for for depth to start off. They seem to be deeper in this lake and in the open water more than the lakes I'm use to. I only fished this lake in the daytime. Good luck

[Jessie_H]

Did you have any luck? I was there mid July, caught a 30" muskie and had a monster follow up (possibly over 50").

This is my personal best also my first year muskie fishing.

[slayer212]

congrats on the fish.. saw 6. 1 huge one prlly high 40 maybe 50. also caught a 38 in northern. good times though prolly heading back in the near future

[RK]

Jessie - congrats on the first fish! As that picture pretty clearly shows, I think the fish in Elk are some of the prettiest fish in the state. For some reason, they're really beautiful.

Elk is a neat little body of water. It is a brood stock lake, and it's also the subject of a long running study on muskie populations by the DNR. Every fish in the lake (or nearly every) is implanted with a PIT tag, which can be read with a wand, so each fish has a unique ID and history. Elk is also C&R only, because it was getting hammered by some locals who were keeping any fish that was over 48" (the previous minimum size). I don't fish Elk much any more, just because of the distance for me, but it's still one of my favorite muskie lakes. Some friends of mine and I talk about the "Elk Lake Follow" where fish come straight up at 100 MPH toward your bait then go right back down just as fast. Dunno why they do it there so much, but they do...

Just be extra careful handling the fish in there - with the study going on, it's important...

Cheers,

Rob Kimm

[10,000 Casts]

RK, have they thought about putting some in Itasca so it has a fishable population?

[mn_bowhunter]

I don't know of any plan to put muskies into Itasca and I'm pretty well connected. I also never heard of any locals pounding elk and taking every legal fish out - at least not park rapids local. I did hear a rumor about a guy netting fish in the spring and taking them out. I assume someone saw DNR fisheries personnel collecting eggs and made up their own story. I haven't been out there since June, but lost a 40"+ pike next to the boat after a couple runs.

[john skarie]

Elk has been C&R since the early 2000's.

I was there on an opening weekend with Perry Smith, former MI INT. Pres. and Rollie Olson, former N Metro MI pres.,

when we were stopped by a DNR employee doing a creel survey.

He informed us that 2 fish were kept on sat., we were there on sun.

After some digging around, we found that DNR crews had seen a steady decline in fish over 48" in Elk lake. It was suspected and for the most part proven that some local guides and fishermen had been keeping a lot of fish.

I was Pres. of the FM MI chapter at tht time, and we headed up a petition supported by all the MN MI chapters and Perry Smith to make Elk C&R only.

The DNR agreed, and now it is the only C&R muskie lake in MN.

It also has had a return of some very large fish. I know of a fat 53" er released there last year.

JS

[Scoot]

It was suspected and for the most part proven that some local guides and fishermen had been keeping a lot of fish.

Yes, this has been talked about a lot, both at MI meetings and on lots of muskie sites online. It's fairly common knowledge who the people were who were taking the fish...

[certified jumbo]

interesting.....so what were they doing with these muskies they were keeping. eating them, mounting them, transplanting them or were they musky haters and just wanted them out of the lake. just curious??

[RK]

10k - No plans that I know of to start putting them in Itasca, and I doubt there will ever be one.

As far as fish being kept out of there... Elk has historically produced fish over 50" ever since the first generation of stocked fish hit maturity. Since it's a main brood stock lake it's netted with large gear frequently, and as a study lake it's probably one of the more intensely surveyed muskie lakes in the state. So when the DNR's main muskie biologist starts noticing that fish are all of a sudden topping out at 48" and then disappearing, it's a pretty good indication there's significant (relative to the population size) harvest happening. Keep in mind, Elk is a tiny lake, and the actual number of adult muskies in it is shockingly small. So even a few 48"+ fish kept is a big chunk out of the adult population.

I did hear from some pretty credible sources (locals who fish the lake and guide in the area) that there was a local guide who was bringing clients to Elk and keeping fish. I don't know the guide's name, and wouldn't mention it if I did. Hardcore muskie guys might not like keeping fish, but have to keep in mind it WAS legal at the time. But as important as Elk is as a research subject, getting the C&R only rule change was a pretty significant deal.

Cheers,

RK

[certified jumbo]

Good information RK, thanks for sharing.

CJ

[Nick Kuhn]

Probably won't be any plans to ever stock Itasca. Elk is stocked pretty heavily, and undoubtedly fish have moved into Itasca. Where I fish mostly (Polk county, Wisconsin) more than half the muskie lakes consist only of migratory fish (as primarily Bone and to a lesser extent Deer were stocked with way more fish than the lakes could handle), and some of those waters are pretty decent fishing. The difference there though is these are often large lakes with paths to smaller ones (with the exception of Wapogasset which is now stocked anyway). Here Elk is a small lake feeding a much larger one. The population in Itasca will be unfishably low unless natural reproduction develops there (which is certainly possible).

[cbrooks]

How long has Elk lake been catch and release only lake?

[Fishin_Jacks7]

Nick you were talking about deer lake having too many muskies in WI. My grandmother lives on the lake so I did look at some surveys the WI DNR did on deer and they said the lakes muskies top out at around 44" I understand they are 2 different strains of muskies. Do you think having too many muskies in Elk can stunt the growth? They don't even stock Deer anymore which is a downer but the MN dnr is putting muskies in elk year after year you have to wonder what they do to manage this population besides just taking eggs.

[john skarie]

Elk does not have to many muskies.

The lake is not stocked every year.

The last estimate I heard was between 240-280 muskies in that lake. It's a small lake but 80% of it is over 25 feet deep. Max depth around 90 feet.

The fish in that lake are very well built, and "stunting" has never been an issue.

Elk also has very large Walleyes and Largemouth Bass. Really a very good fishery in many respects.

JS

[Nick Kuhn]

Elk has considerably fewer muskies than that. According to the Minnesota DNR about 0.35 adult fish per acre. For comparison: under the old management plans Deer had about 0.9 adult muskies and Bone 1.2 adult muskies per acre, considerably higher than Elk (which has seen it's stocking reduced). Under the new stocking protocol for WI, Deer and Bone have both dropped to ~0.5 fish per acre (which is still a higher density than any lake in MN other than Shoepac), and the size has definitely improved on those lakes. The very reason Wapogasset is now stocked is because they expect fewer migrants out of Deer. I suspect Blake and Big Round will have a significant decline in populations as the Bone population evens out. Still, even at a lower stocking some fish do move out.

[john skarie]

Nick you're talking about mature muskies.

I was refering to the estimante Jerry Younk gave me about the total population.

JS

[mn_bowhunter]

Elk has been stocked with fingerlings annually since 2001 according to lakefinder. Around 275 per year until 2008 when 135 were put in annually. The forage base is great for getting big fish. I wasn't aware of the harvest by some on the lake - learn something new every day. I'm glad it's C&R now as the number of 48" or larger fish has got to be low.