Lake Trout Showdown in the BWCA

This past week I got to go on one of the most enjoyable BWCA trips I can ever remember with my father-in-law Herb Hilinski. The weather was perfect with cool days and crisp nights. Winds were light. The biting bugs that can turn an enjoyable BWCA trip into a nightmare were a complete no-show… and best of all the fish, namely lake trout, were ready for a Showdown!

Allow me to back-fill a little with some history….

I’ve been making an annual trip into the BWCA with my father-in-law for 6 years now and for the first 2 or 3 years we focused primarily on walleye. The walleye fishing was good most trips, occasionally I’d go so far as to call it exceptional. When we grew tired of catching walleye we would portage into smaller nearby lakes to target lake trout and northern.

These day trips were fun and more often than not we would catch our target species but I was always asking Herb about lake trout potential on the larger lake we camped on. The maps we had all listed lake trout as being present. The waters were deep with pockets exceeding 105′ found in several areas around the lake and water clarity could best be described as “gin clear.” Classic lake trout habitat.

What Herb shared was that on occasion lake trout were caught on the lake we camped on but the occurrence was rare. As in rare to the tune of one lake trout every 8 – 10 years or so. Since Herb has been making trips into the BWCA to the same base camp lake for over 25 years with a minimum of 3-4 trips made per year over that quarter decade… he had a lot of valuable perspective to draw from. His opinion was the base camp lake held lakers and he had heard of some big ones being caught in the past by people illegally fishing set lines over 20 years ago but catching them out of a canoe on this particular lake with any consistency was going to be tough.

Early on it became very apparent that while fishing from a canoe was going to be a challenge the biggest hurdle was going to be the lack of reliable and portable electronics…. with emphasis on portable. The lakes we fish are 14 portages and nearly 20 paddle miles into the BWCA so the packs are already heavy enough as it is so anything more than a couple pounds was out of the question. As was a unit that required 12v power.

Solution? Showdown Troller. The whole unit weighs a little over a pound and runs off AA batteries with run times in excess of 20 hours. Since we would be primarily attempting to target the lakers fishing jigs vertically this little unit would be right at home fished over the side of a canoe.

Once we started using the Showdown Troller units off the side of the canoes our success rate on the lake trout went through the roof. One of the biggest hindrances to success with the lake trout when electronics aren’t available is that the lakers in this particular lake rarely feed near the bottom. Most will be suspended 15′ – 35′ above bottom and if you don’t have a way to target them accurately… you simply wouldn’t know there’s fish there to be caught.

Our best baits have been 1 Oz. hair jigs and 4″ tube jigs fished on a 1 oz jig. Any color will work as long as it is white.

Our standard approach now is to drift slowly through the deepest areas of the lake waiting to fish until we mark lakers suspended above the bottom at least 10 – 15 feet. Once fish are marked… the jigs go down and we work the baits like we were fishing these lakers through the ice. Every response to your jigging motion can be monitored and many times the fish respond best to a “cat and mouse” game of keep away. The laker shown in the first photo was first marked in 48′ of water and followed my jig up to 17′ before it blasted the jig and peeled drag headed for bottom! Talk about excitement!

How to Mount a Troller

After some messing around with a couple other mounting methods we’ve come up with one that is BWCA Approved given that is relies on two items that all BWCA campers carry with them… or you should. 1 – Duct Tape. 2 – Zipties.

The cradle bracket that holds the Showdown is first secured to the cross member in the canoe located in front of the angler at the rear. The ziptie goes through the holes in the cradle. Down around the cross member. Tighten. The cradle will not move forward or back.

Next, run a 6″ strip of duct tape along the outside edge of the cradle and secure it to the outside of the canoe. Now the Showdown won’t move side to side. This mounting method will last as long as you want it to last, it weighs less than nothing and costs about the same which is perfect for a trip into the BWCA. When portaging carry the head unit in your day pack and leave the cradle mounted.

What about the Transducer?

I’ve messed with foam floats, suction cup arms that secure the transducer and those methods are waste of weight and money as they simply don’t make the unit perform any better than if you simply toss the ducer over the side next to the head unit and allow it to “self-level” just like you’d do if you were ice fishing. In my experience the unit will self-level at any drift speed you can fish at. If you want to run the unit while cruising from spot to spot the Troller ducer will shoot right through the hull of some canoes, including We-No-Nah Kevlar models. You’ll lose some sensitivity shooting through the hull and you WILL need to turn up your gain but you’ll be able to retain a consistent depth reading which is about all a guy can ask for from such a simple set up.