Rainy River Sturgeon Report – 4/9 – 4/10

What began with a long drive to our state’s international border with Canada, ended with sore backs, burning arms, and jaw-aching grins. Favorable weather conditions had me heading north to fish the mighty sturgeon with a good friend, Jon Marshall of Nature Vision/Marcum Technologies. Our goal was not just to find fish, but to adjust our locations and approach to target the larger fish in the system. This task was made much simpler with the knowledge of the third angler in our party, guide and long-time sturgeon guru, Jonny Petrowske of Outdoors with JonnyP.

Thursday, April 9th – Our first location yielded slow action and a medium-sized fish or two, but Jonny felt we could do better up-river, so we pulled anchor and gritted our teeth in the 22 degree weather until we arrived in our second spot of the day. A good hole in 20FOW provided the ample depth and head-of-the-hole structure we were looking for to soak a few gobs of worms. We were promptly rewarded with a few fish in the 40” range, with a few lulls and “sucker-runs” mixed-in. The action was slow enough to appreciate the peaks, and fast enough to endure the valleys, until Jonny P hooked into a school-bus! A long-fight and excellent net-work yielded the big-fish of the trip, a 62” pig. That fish opened up the proverbial flood-gates, and we were off to the races. Numerous high 40” fish, and several 50’s soon followed, including a 52”, 54” and 55” tanker.

While the bite came and went, what remained constant was our continual attentiveness to details. Our terminal tackle was checked after each fish, especially the hook and hook-point, as well as the braided line that was in the deep rocks with those sturgeon. Lines and rod-tips were constantly monitored for fish that didn’t engage the baitcast clicker, and no set was left untouched for longer than 10-20 minutes. The basic rig we used was a 3 oz. flat slip-sinker and bead combination with a 12” braid leader separated by a heavy ball-bearing swivel. Circle hooks in the appropriate sizes were used, so each “hookset” was simply a firm loading of the rod.

Friday, April 10th – Warmer weather made the pre-sunrise boat ride much more comfortable, and a slow-start like the previous morning gave us some time to enjoy the surroundings. Before long the big fish started moving again, and we were swiftly greeted with more fish in the 40” range. Just when we were contemplating a re-position, the hardest fighting fish of the entire trip shattered the calm morning with CLICKER!!! It was my turn in the rotation, and all early signs pointed to a large fish. Deep digs and long down-current and up-current runs told us what we needed to know; serious fish on. At one point the fish made such a strong upstream run towards the boat, I had all I could do to keep-up, only to lose all that progress in a major-drag burner in about the same amount of time. Some dandy net-work yielded a 60” long X 26” girth torpedo that wore me out in a serious way.

The walleye bite was slow for most anglers. Though the weather was turning, the water temps held steady in the 35-36 degree range. Friday was better for the anglers we observed than Thursday, but there were fish to be had for the few that worked the periphery of the crowds and took note of where fish were coming from. Our two-hour late afternoon foray into the eyes yielded a couple of fish, but after our 1:30AM arrival time and 4:00AM wakeup call, we had little energy left.

For those of you interested in an impressive fighting fish that takes little in terms of fancy gear and new-fangled tactics, I suggest you make your way north. Get swivels, sinkers, and circle hooks that you can pile crawlers onto, and find some good holes to work. Use your electronics to study your anchor set many times before committing that pick to bottom, and don’t be afraid to change casting locations, anchor rope length, and hole locations until you dial in the right combination. Do these fish justice and fight them with appropriate gear, and CPR to fight another day. Special thanks goes to Jonny Petrowske and Jon Marshall, I couldn’t have picked two better guys to fish with, and Jonny’s skills and experience in particular were paramount to our success in catching more and bigger fish! www.outdoorswithjonnyp.com.

Good fishin’!

Joel