Lake of the Woods winter fishing pressure stays high as harvest drops

Sep. 1—At first glance, the numbers from last winter's creel survey on Lake of the Woods might suggest ice fishing pressure reached an all-time high, but a new survey design the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources implemented last winter makes the results an "apples-and-oranges" comparison.

Anglers last winter logged just shy of 3.2 million hours of fishing pressure on Lake of the Woods, compared with more than 2.5 million hours during each of the previous three winters.

That's where the new creel survey design comes into play, says Matt Skoog, area fisheries supervisor for the DNR in Baudette, Minnesota.

"We're now accounting for overnight pressure," Skoog said. "There's no good way to get a directly comparable number, but if you remove the overnight pressure, we're right about where we were at, pre-COVID."

Participation in fishing, hunting and other outdoors activities skyrocketed during the pandemic.

Last winter, Skoog says, the DNR implemented what's called an "access-based design" to measure fishing pressure and harvest on Lake of the Woods. As part of that format, creel clerks set up at popular access points and select resorts along the south shore of the big lake and interviewed anglers and fishing groups as they came off the ice.

The winter creel survey began Dec. 9 and wrapped up March 31. The DNR uses a similar design to measure winter fishing pressure and harvest on Upper Red Lake.

Under the previous format, called a "roving creel survey," creel clerks would travel the ice by snowmobile or pickup truck and talk to anglers as their trip was in progress. The new format, Skoog says, enables the DNR to more accurately account for the pressure and harvest from anglers fishing in wheelhouses.

The deluxe ice fishing shelters, which have exploded in popularity in recent years, allow anglers to stay on the ice for days at a time.

"Now we're getting them coming off the ice, so it's a completed trip vs. an incomplete trip," Skoog said. The old design, he says, only accounted for fishing pressure and harvest up to the point of the on-ice interview. That meant the DNR had to estimate fishing pressure and harvest for the rest of the day, Skoog says.

"It's more precise with the new design because you're getting exactly how long they're fishing and what they caught over their entire fishing trip," he said.

While winter fishing pressure is above or near record levels, it's not translating into an increase in harvest of walleyes and saugers, the mainstays for anglers fishing Lake of the Woods through the ice.

Anglers last winter harvested 94,200 pounds of walleyes and 121,094 pounds of saugers, Skoog says, based on creel survey estimates. By comparison, anglers during the winter of 2021-22 kept an estimated 160,000 pounds of walleyes and 260,000 pounds of saugers, both of which were below the six-year average of 352,000 pounds for saugers and 265,000 pounds for walleyes

The numbers for the winter of 2022-23 were about half the harvest tallied during the previous winter.

Skoog says he attributes last winter's poor fishing to a series of weak year-classes for both walleyes and saugers. The 2017 and 2019 year-classes were weak for walleyes, he says, and 2020 was "on the border of average to weak."

For saugers, the 2018 and 2020 year-classes were on the bottom end of average, and 2021 and 2022 were both "really weak," Skoog says. Strong sauger year-classes between 2014 and 2017 are starting to "age out" of the population, he says.

A year-class refers to the abundance of fish recruited to the population from a particular year's hatch.

"Our catch rates are starting to reflect those more recent year-classes," Skoog said. "There's just not as many fish to be caught."

Despite the decline in walleye and sauger abundance, Skoog says he doesn't have any concerns "at the moment" about the Lake of the Woods fishery. The 2021 and 2022 walleye year-classes both look "pretty decent," he says, and if 2021 actually produced a good year-class, they should start showing up in DNR test nets this fall.

Walleyes from the 2022 hatch probably won't show up until next year.

"If you talk to people fishing out on the lake, it seems they're starting to catch those smaller-size eaters — those 13-14 inchers," he said. "They're starting to show up again in a little bit better numbers than they were the last couple of years."

The amount of winter fishing pressure on Lake of the Woods has been a hot topic among anglers and barstool biologists — among others — in recent years, but for now, the DNR is in "wait and see" mode until the fall survey is complete, Skoog says.

The DNR conducts the fall survey over 17 days beginning the Tuesday after Labor Day, setting 64 nets at sites across the Minnesota side of the lake from the south shore to the Northwest Angle and leaving them in the water overnight.

If walleyes from the 2021 year-class don't show up in abundance, "then we have a little bit more concern," Skoog says.

"We'll have a little bit better picture of where we're heading" after the survey, he said.