New bag limits for Northern Wi.

Big news in the northern Wisconsin walleye world! The WI DNR has just approved a 3-fish daily bag limit that will apply across the Ceded Territories which encompass most of northern Wisconsin. This will replace (and is generally, more liberal than) the previous system where the daily bag limits were adjusted on a lake-by-lake basis as determined by actual native American spearing harvest numbers.

Also, the WI DNR has approved a 5-year moratorium on walleye harvest from two popular lake chains in northern Wisconsin, the Minocqua and Tomahawk Chains. The goal of this closure is to try to rehabilitate the sagging walleye populations on those bodies of water.

newoodhntr:

Sounds like we will see the bag limits coming soon (in the week) regarding all these lakes that they are now going to keep at three in the Ceded Territory… Also, the pics are from South Trout lake, the exciting part of this is that when this lake is ice free, we are usually ice free in the entire Northwoods.

Mark

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I haven’t called the DNR office yet, but was unclear on something. As I read it, it can be confused for the Ceded Territory as a whole; or each individual lake within the terrirtory.
So, is it still a bag limit of 5, of which you can only have 3 from 1 lake? So if someone fishes lake A and catch their legal 3, can they go to lake B and harvest 2 to complete their daily limit, or is 3 and done? I know there is a lot of lake jumper up there that will hit 2 or 3 lakes in a day.

Randy it still is a 5 bag limit per day state wide,catch 3 fish on lake A and you can go to lake B for 2 more fish. This 3 fish bag limit will take some hype out of the spearing in my opinion and each lake bag limits wont have to be posted giving DNR employees time to work on other projects.

Mark thanks for the photos, Trout is a lake I haven’t been on very often and should fish more. I did do some whitefishing on the ice many years ago. Campgrounds open May 1st and we’ll be back up north. Are you still tending bar Saturday nights?

Newood:

Still bartending and will be on duty this weekend, for those who would like to try Trout Lake, be aware of the spiny water flea invasion/infestation that has recently occurred. Sorry I missed this, in fact just talked with Randy as he will be up here this weekend and early next week. More on the fishing later, not that I have done much as of late… Hoping to get out tomorrow night as I have the Musky League meeting shortly, gotta run… Go Hawks and Rangers!!!

Mark

For an update through this week. I still haven’t fished since last Thursday. Water temps have risen and dropped, keeping fish in shallow, then forcing them back out and hopefully allowing them to come back in during this weekend’s warm up. We had our Musky League rules meeting last night so I was able to pick some brains and found out that there is some pretty active bedding activity from the smallies currently. Before I left we were walleye fishing and catching fish holding the boat anywhere from 32′ all the way into the 10′-15′ contour… We were just starting to pick up spent females coming back in to feed. In normal years the spawn is spread out, while it seemed that this year it happened very fast, so there was a definite lull this spring while they were recuperating.

Musky season starts tomorrow, fish are being picked up already by a variety of fishermen trying to catch other species. Also a number of the hardcore guys were up on the border waters of MI as that musky season opened on the 15th. It sounds like bucktails were the hot bait this past weekend. I may fish musky this weekend, but will also be concentrating on SMB and crappies as well.

Happy Memorial Day weekend, be especially safe and THANK YOU VETS for the land of the free and home of the brave!!!

Mark