Welcome to the Arrowhead Angler!

September 4, 2009

I am resolute in my resistance to Facebook, but the Arrowhead Angler has become a blogger. I'll be posting my adventure reports here and my many fans can read them at their leisure. This blog may be a couple years late since I don't get out quite as much as I used to, but I'll give it a try.

Every trip report will include a "Nature Moment" that highlights a unique wildlife encounter or other natural moment that stood out on the trip.


After work today I am heading to the Gunflint Trail. The dog and I will sleep in the back of the truck tonight and then paddle to the lake in the morning. We are hoping to meet up with Mac, as he left yesterday and will be camped somewhere on the lake. We'll stay until Monday and try to get some lake trout and hopefully a big walleye. The lake we will be at doesn't have fast fishing, but there are some nice ones.



Here is a summary of my adventures so far this summer...



Believe it or not, I didn't make a trip on the fishing opener in May. Never thought I'd say that, but other things were going on.



A friend and I went to up the Gunflint Trail on Memorial Day weekend. We had good weather and the Lake Trout were biting. My friend, a rookie with lake trout, caught several decent fish, I caught a few. I did catch a number of decent smallmouth bass as well, but we never saw a walleye. Nature Moment: While fishing in the Alpine River, we heard a weird "whooshing" sound. We looked up to see a falcon or some type of hawk diving so quickly towards the water it made a jet-like sound when the air rushed past its wings. It dipped behind a hill, so we couldn't see what it was chasing. A few minutes later it did it again.



The annual Goerdt clan trip was in mid-June this year to accommodate the addition of Ben, a high school senior. This year we split the trip in two halves, one in the Quetico (Canada) at Carp Lake and one in the BWCA at Knife Lake. We had a great campsite on Carp Lake, but the fishing was slow. Nice lake, with lots of bays, islands, and reefs, but just never connected with the walleyes or lake trout. The smallies were abundant and hitting on the surface. The shortest route from Carp to Knife includes a moderate portage that doesn't see a lot of use. It wasn't bad except for two really nasty slopes on the east end. We spent four days on Knife and hit the lake hard, but the fishing was fairly slow again. One evening some of the guys got a number of nice walleyes, and the bass were going crazy on topwaters, but the lakers were few and far between. The fishing on Knife hasn't been as fast the last couple years as it was when I first started going there. Still, the weather was nice (bugs were bad), and the characters on this trip keep things entertaining. And we ate like kings. Ben did get his first lake trout and saw a bull moose. We also had a northern pike that kept trying to eat our walleyes as we reeled them in one evening. Nature Moment: We were anchored near a rock one evening with a walleye on our stringer. Soon a very large snapping turtle was hovering near the boat eyeing the stringer. This is not an uncommon occurrence. What was uncommon was the tenacity in which the turtle attempted to pilfer the walleye. It tried sneaking around the rock and coming in from the back, it attempted to climb over the rock in a rush attack, it would not quit. Taps on the head and whacks on the back did not deter the creature. It hissed and snapped and clawed at the paddle. It was not fazed. We finally gave up and went fish elsewhere, Scrappy the Persistent Turtle was the victor.



In late July, the dog, a buddy, and I went to Brule Lake, on the southern edge of the BWCA, for a weekend. The cool summer we had this year created some odd fishing conditions on Brule Lake. We fished in the usual summer spots (10-25 feet deep) for mid to late summer walleyes, but didn't catch anything. We finally found a few nice fish in five feet of water. Overall fishing was slow again (or am I losing my touch?). The mosquitoes were bad in the evening. Weather was cool and windy. Nature Moment: The first night in camp, we got all set up and we hanging out near the lake, but the dog was nervous and agitated...he kept growling at the woods. He would wander in a little ways, and then would back out, growling. We couldn't hear anything big moving about, so we dismissed as a pine martin or something small. The next time the dog went in the woods, however, he came flying back out and we did hear something sizable moving towards us. A quick look down the trail revealed a bull moose. The moose was unfazed by our presence and continued to hang out and eat. In fact he hung out all night and into the next morning. We named our pet moose Horatio.



That has been it for my adventures this summer. I'll be going this weekend and will have the annual last fling at lake trout at the end of September and the stream trout trip in October. After that I will be waiting for ice. I am excited for winter already. I made some phone calls this week and learned two guys could get dropped off by dog sled on Knife Lake for five days of winter camping and the musher would charge only $200 per guy. Trust me, I am more than aware that hiring a mushing professional for such an endeavour is the way to go, and $200 seems reasonable. I am saving my pennies now.