Whitefish Bay help

[fishhard]

I am going to Souix Narrows May 11-15 and would like to catch a few Lake Trout. What are my best options for depth and lures etc? Can I assume that the fish should be up high in the water so I can troll with out downriggers?

Thanks for any help.

[Eastwind]

fishhard,

There are probably a lot of people on this forum that can better answer your question than me but here is what I would do. I've trolled for Lakers up near Whitefish (Rowan Lake and Crow Lake)for the five years prior to this year between early May and mid May. Shortly after ice out the Lakers can be caught right up near shore while trolling crank baits. At Rowan we've gotten them off of steep shorelines, points and in short narrows. At Crow and in Whitefish the locals and tourists (Us) often boat to an island, beach the boat and bottom fish with live bait. I trolled between islands on Crow when I was there, two Walleye openers ago, and had reasonable luck. I am fishing Sabaskong Bay in LOW the 23rd thru the 26th and plan on going over the portage to try my luck trolling for some Lakers. I've made boat payments too many years to shore fish. Good luck.

[tearin' lips]

I have had my best luck during this time of the year trolling in 40 feet or less (depending on the day and weather). I have never fished whitefish, but on Crow, Esox, Manitou, Dogfly, and Vista a good majority of my fish early on in the year are less that 20 feet deep. As Eastwind mentioned alot of locals use the technique of laying a dead cisco on the bottom and waiting for a trout to take it. I normally troll or cast jigs.

If I am trolling I am doing one of a few things.

a.) Trolling various rapalas and reefrunners that mimic ciscos. I ususally try to keep my bait a few feet off of bottom. Finding a good trolling chart will help you put the bait right where the fish are.

b.) Sometimes I will drop a rigger ball down if I am fishing in 30 feet or deeper so I can troll spoons such as sutton spoons or laker takers are the right depth.

And jigging is basically self explanitory. Usually a white tube, but sometimes I will take the white jig and tip it with a cisco or a large shiner. Some guys also use a lindy rig type set up with a cisco and troll that around at slow speeds.

There should be some gentlemen here that have Whitefish Bay experience to help you out a little more.

Take Care and Good Luck Fishing!

[benelli_dude2002]

Hi there! As mentioned in the other posts the lakers will most likely be shallow. In the past years we have even caught them casting spoons like Lil Cleo or something similiar. Casting towards shore with crankbait too if the water was deeper worked good also. Someone correct me if I am wrong but you cant use ciscos til the walleye opener which I was told is May 19th. But yeah we normally target 40 ft or less. If there was 2-3 guys we would have a guy pulling a deep diving crankbait and the others not as deep so we had a little more depth covered. The biggest laker I ever seen in my life is when I was casting a crankbait and followed it into about 10-15 ft from the boat. And that was on Whitefish. Never bother too much with jigging after iceout not til later in the year when the fish move deep. I hope to get up and make a day trip to either Whitefish or Dogpaw lake. We did good on Dogpaw lake pulling deep running Taildancers. This year I am going to try some spoons. A few of us might go camping on Dogpaw on Memorial weekend that way we can the option to fish 3 different lakes. Been buying a few cranks here and there, a few trolling spoons and even got a rod for pulling cranks so I am all set. I go back to work wed nite and dont get back til sunday so I wont be fishing this weekend. I told a buddy of mine that Dogpaw lake was open and he all fired up for this weekend. Hope this helps. Good luck and be safe! B-dude

[Lotwfisher]

I have had success with all the methods stated above. Be sure to check the regulations before heading up there. There is a Whitefish Bay ruling on using single barbless hooks and no live bait. I dont know for sure the dates off hand but I know they are in the Ontario MNR fishing summary. You will need to look in the Exceptions to general rules area for northwestern ontario under Lake of the Woods - Whitefish Bay.

[fishanytime]

I think it is barbless until the 19th of May in Whitefish Bay, you can fish troll in Long Bay before the 19th and use barded hooks I believe.