We just finished being up there for a week, here’s the report. Keep in mind this is our first time fishing this lake. Fished The Sunday before Memorial Day and conditions were tough, highs were around 48 with light rain, we fished Black Bay and caught about 8 pike, 1 smallmouth and an 17.5″ walleye just casting and trolling rapalas and spinnerbaits. The reports had been excellent for LOTW so we trailed over there on Memorial Day and caught our limit of walleye and sauger by noon with 1 fish in the slot ,23″. Tuesday we again fished LOTW and had the same result, no slot fish this time largest fish was 18″. Wednesday brought bluebird skies and sunny conditions, the surface water in the lake was reading 55 and the back bays near 60. We fished the American side casting on the north side of islands on the shoreline. Caught 10 nice pike and a 23″ walleye. Also 2 smallmouth bass. Caught another 21″ walleye jigging on top of a hump in 30′ of water. Thursday went back to LOTW and again destroyed the sauger and walleye (over 40 fish caught) many small ones. 1 Real nice 26″ fish. Friday fished Rainy Lake again the American side. 6 smallmouth, largest 17″ fishing stickbaits on windward rocks, caught 6 pike. Fishing was slow. Was windy in the morning and as the wind stirred up the water the main lake water temp was 50 degrees, so still abit cold from what I gather. Talked to some folks who did much better on the Canadian side (30 fish) on Friday. But the consensus was slow fishing probably due to water temperature. Saw people Fishing with bobbers off the dock but no one was catching anything. The walleye bite was definitely off this past week. Talked with some folks who had been coming to Rainy for years and said it was off and that’s it usually a lot better. Hope this report helps.

Thank you, tomr I look forward to the report! Skeeter I stocked up on jigs and sinking and suspending stick baits, every time I go to Walmart I grab those cotton brand crankbaits (there like 2.50 apiece) so I’m ready to burn some tackle if nessecary. When we’ve fished Lake of the Woods in July we seem to catch more big walleye in very shallow water like 3-4′ of water trolling spinnerbaits for pike, I feel like the shallows should be MORE productive in late May than in July due to the water temperature. Looking forward to the cooler weather up there (coming from Florida).