Leech Lake Ice Out!

Well, it looks as though the ice should be out at Leech lake by Monday, April 5th for possibly the earliest ice out date in recorded history. You can view the ice out progress on Modis , a satellite site that displays the days current views of our part of the country, and is perfect for tracking ice conditions. An interesting feature of this site is you can look at almost any date back about 3 years or so. Just 2 years ago the opener was on May 10th, 2008, the ice did not officially go out until that Sunday the 11th. There were a number of resorts that were iced in and could not launch boats. Here is a picture of the bay on the north side of Pine Point that was very iced in on Saturday morning. It was very interesting to fish at the edge of the ice and catching fish. What was more unusual was the fact that the fishing was quite incredible. In years past it seemed like the cold water only brought out the smaller males. 2008 was just the opposite. With water temperatures in the low 40's warming to the mid 40"s by Monday, the big hawgs had the feedbag on. Shattering the Big Fish record, Matt Taylor nailed this beautiful 27.5 incher, the largest to be put on the trophy to that date. Many large fish over 25 inches were caught and released and marked the definite comeback for walleye fishing on Leech. With ice out so early this year, it could be interesting to figure out where the big fish will be. The past 2 years have been relatively cold and we have had no problems finding big fish. Of course this flies in the face of the traditional thoughts that the big females go rest for a few weeks after spawn before they begin feeding. This year you can expect the walleyes to spawn possibly by the end of this week into next week. This would put opener at least 4 weeks after the spawn. All indications should point to a great opener however it would be hard to argue the last 2 years success with water temperatures at around 45. Maybe we will really be in for the mother lode this year!!

The 2010 opener will be the latest it can possibly be. There are 2 things about this year's opener that I am sure many of the Team Walleye members are looking forward too. First of all opener will be on the 3rd Sunday in May, which means Mother's Day will not occur on the same weekend. This will make the wives much more happier for sure! The second potential is that we may experience short sleeve weather, something that has eluded us for many years. The trees will be well on their way to full leaf out, certainly an different environment for sure. Either way, it is shaping up to be a great opener.

Written by Team Walleye correspondent, Dave Anderson