I returned last night from a 4 day trip to the Northwest Angle portion of Lake of the Woods. I took a first time muskie angler up to hopefully get him his first fish. He had told me that he wanted to catch some walleyes, too, but after some convincing, more by the muskies than me, I was able to avoid it! 
The fishing was pretty spotty, and the Angle was much more crowded than I am used to. Muskie anglers really flock to LOTWs in July and I usually go in August when I have my favorite spots mostly to myself. Despite all that, we were able to manage a few fish. We put 5 muskies in the boat, but I think we lost SEVEN! 
I couldn’t believe the hook-up problems we had but that’s muskie fishing. We had about 20-25 follows in addition to the 12 or so strikes in the four days which, believe it or not, is below average for me up there. Normally you can expect to see a monster or two and a bunch of fish in the mid 40″ range over several days of fishing … the fish we found were mostly low 40″ range or smaller. One of the things that kind of hurt was the fact that I put a lot of time in on a section of the lake that was completely dead, thinking that it would turn on at any moment … it didn’t. 
It’s really important to be versatile and mobile up there! 
In addition to the muskies, the big pike were on the rampage in the deep cabbage. I think we got 5 of them between 35″ and 40″ one evening … I didn’t pay much attention. 
Enough complaining! Any trip in which you can manage to get multiple muskies in the boat is a success! Plus, I had a great time getting a friend excited about muskies. His first fish hit a weighted 8″ firetiger believer twitched over some boulders. It wasn’t huge at 35″, but any first muskie is a real accomplishment! His second fish was a little more exciting … a nice 41-42″er that crushed a topwater on glass-calm water about 15′ from the boat right at dusk. What a blast! He didn’t stop talking about it for the rest of the trip. A picture of that fish (not a great one as it’s a little overexposed and blurry) is attached. We weren’t able to get any monsters this trip — the other fish I caught ranged from 36-41″.
The baits I normally throw found the fish for us: prop-style topwaters like topraiders and lac suel turrbos, DD twitch baits, rad dog and ace tandem spinnerbaits, weighted suicks, and bucktails all produced strikes. Most of the fish were adjacent to wind-blown rocks or in deep cabbage. The weed growth is really poor up there this year due to low water, but if you can find clean, deep weeds the fish will be there. The thicker weed areas that normally produce fish for me did not have fish in them … the weeds had to be clean (clear of “gunk” and/or stringy “pike weed”). Those patches are few and far between this year.
What was interesting was the fact that wind-blown rocks weren’t producing for us. The fish we found were usually tucked around the corner from the windy stuff. We found the most fish in areas where the wind was funneling water through a couple of islands, near what I’d call a current seam on the river. The fish would be inside the calm edge of the seam, usually a fair distance from it. My pbservation over the years is that fish that aren’t positioned in the prime feeding areas, which would be right in the wind, on the point, or barely tucked around the corner from the wind, are less aggressive. The fish we found in those slack water areas were true to form in that they were short srikers and followers. The weren’t lazy followers, but they definitely needed coaxing. Fish in prime areas will often bite the first thing that comes by them; fish these less-aggressive fish we needed to throw a jerk or twitch bait at them or work them on a figure 8 to get bit.
I did hear from some guys that did well fishing early and late and napping during the mid-day period. That’s a lot of work if you ask me, but it definitely paid off for them. I know guys that fish those hours on a regular basis and it seems to make a significant difference during hot, clam, dry spells and/or when fishing pressure is high. It’s something to consider when you’re facing those conditions.
We stayed at Walsh’s Bay Store Camp, which I’ve been staying at for about 7 years now. It is by far the best muskie camp around, in my opinion. It’s near impossible to get a reservation there for a popular time unless you’re planning well in advance, but here’s their website in any case: http://www.baystorecamp.com
John
