LOTW ideas

I’m planning a trip with a buddy for late Feburary and looking for some ideas. We like to fish pretty hard, but are limited with mobility due to no snowmobile or ATV. I do have a 4×4 truck. I’ve been looking at resort packages and sleeper houses, but those options really seem to cut into a lot of time we could spend fishing. I’m open to anything that maxamizes our time on the ice. The plan is to leave the cities around 5pm Friday and head back Monday afternoon. This will be our first time up on LOTW. Thanks

Depends on whether you are fishing the south side or in the islands. Your options using a truck in the islands are very limited, as there is only one road system pretty much taking you from youngs bay to flag, oak and a few other islands. There are a few good spots to fish close off the road but you won’t be able to do it justice. Booking a house through the lodges up there like Sunset, is pretty dang good fishing. They’ll work hard to get you on fish, and you’ll be able to get out of your house and be able to hole hop on some good structure. Even if the there is no snow and you could get around with a truck, it’s still a bit sketchy if you don’t know what you’re doing or where you’re going. There are some areas with pretty strong current and a few pressure ridges that would be impassable with a truck. In the last few years the fishing up in the angle has been much better than the south side in my opinion.

The southside will give you more mobility if you’re looking to not go with a resort. You can buy a road pass from Adrians and use their road system. It’s pretty extensive Fishbone like road layout, and you’ll be able to fish from just outside pine island to miles out. Like I said, for whatever reason the fishing has been pretty poor the last few years.

My vote would be to fish out of a resort house up in the Northwest Angle aka the islands.

For late February you are looking at probably staying on plowed roads as the snow and slush is usually pretty deep and drifted in most areas. Your biggest barrier will be transportation on the ice. My advice would be to wait and see what the conditions are like as well as the best bite. The south shore basin has been pretty slow that time of year the last few years. Most of the resorts on the south shore are running guys way up north on bombers unless something changes this winter. You’re right that your time does get cut a little short when renting houses, but if it means catching a lot more fish than I would say it’s worth it.

I would book a house at Sunset or something.

If you haven’t fished there before, the LOTW bite is normally a daytime bite, so don’t worry about eating up too much of the time while riding in a track van or bomber. Most resorts will take you out quite early and not pick you up until right before dark. You maybe miss like a half hour of productive fishing, if that. My best days out there have seen the bite heavy around 11 AM and 3PM, definitely not your low light periods or anything.

I’d normally recommend Arnesen’s because they run an awesome operation in the winter, but the fishing near the reefs there has been pretty crappy the past couple years. I personally think those reefs have been hit too hard in the winter over the last five years, so I’d venture further north if I were you. In years past if you were the first group out to 12 mile or 16 mile reef in the winter you would just kill the fish(me and a buddy had 85-90 fish days for three days straight between us two a few years ago). Last year we were one of the first groups out to 16 and we caught like 2 fish the entire day, it was absolutely dreadful fishing.

The only thing about fishing the angle is that you’ll add a couple hours of travel on either end of your trip, and have to pass through canada, but the fishing should be much better.

Even in good years, February is the slowest month for fishing the south shore. February is always deep winter, it never falls into the early ice or late ice timeframe, which can be the best fishing up there(especially early ice IMO). If it was me I’d push the trip back until April and call Arnesen’s and see if they’ll take you out tip up fishing for monster pike :).

Thanks for the good ideas!! I have some time to work out all the kinks, but Sunset looks pretty awesome. Sure solidifies my need for a new snowmobile, lol.

With a snowmobile, your possibilities are endless

The other thing I should note is that I spend the majority of my time fishing central and north east MN, also around the northwest suburbs. We get to go on one trip a winter that’s out of these areas. The last few years we gone out to the Waubay SD area. It’s been a lot of fun and have had great success and marginal success. Pending on the day and lake we fish. The great part about fishing out there was our mobility. We were able to drive or walk anywhere we wanted to go and punch endless amounts of holes.

Now we’re just looking for something new. LOTW looked like a good move so that’s where our attention has been, but the lack of mobility kind of makes me feel a little stir crazy already.

I guess what I’m saying is that if anyone has ideas for the next self guided trip where leg power could get the job done. I’m all ears

Having lived and fished on LOTW for a little over 20 years I would have to say late Feb is going to be tough for getting off plowed roads with a truck. It’s a big lake and walking to a location is not realistic. If you’re wanting to not go through a guide/resort and fish out of your truck best to stay on the south side. Depending on conditions you can drive out to most of the reefs or fish the flats. I would recommend not to go up to the angle and go driving off the roads. That is a different world up there with ice and currents. Great fishing but not a place to play around with a truck on ice.

Not sure if he is still around but Fords Guide Service out of Williams used to rent snowmobiles (I think he would rent just the snowmobiles) and offer mobile fishing trips. Something like that might be worth a day and fish off the ice roads the rest of the time.

Leg power and LOTW don’t really go well together, especially that time of year.
The further north you go, the more fish you will catch, generally, but the more time you spend travelling. February is tough in my experience. Play it by ear.

Go to devil’s lake in March.

Late February, Can you say Tulibee!

It doesn’t need to be late Feburary.

I’m open to any and all advice/direction that leads to a great trip.

Hudson8907 wrote:

It doesn’t need to be late Feburary.

I’m open to any and all advice/direction that leads to a great trip.

Then I would try to be a bit flexible and hit early ice or late ice. Again, assuming you’re only transportation being a truck, the south side is still my recommendation. Early ice could be Christmas time for a truck. Late ice could be around mid-March. As you know, weather will dictate. Late ice can be some fantastic pike fishing on tip ups. I like to fish pike early and shallow then move out a bit deeper for some mid day walleyes.

Hudson,
Bill and Ben have good advice.

My $.02, We like to stay at Adrian’s for the simple reason that we like to get out on the lake early and stay out late. We fish it hard also.

Adrian’s does not regulate this, other resorts may/will dictate your hours on and off the lake.

FYI – The experience up there is like no other.

Awesome, thanks!