holiday blogging lovely home
Imagine planning a fly-in fishing vacation for walleyes and northern pike then identifying that not a person, but two of this province’s premiere fishing lodges are situated on that very lake. In addition, indulge in the fantasy that each of these whole-products and services lodges have manufactured a commitment to giving your fishing party with a unforgettable, comforting, issues-free of charge angling family vacation on a very little-acknowledged, best-rated wilderness lake. Yeah, correct. Can’t be, you say. Validate this knowledge at Nagagami Lake.
Big Nagagami Lake first drew my interest numerous years back as we drove north of White River on freeway #631 toward Nagagamisis Provincial Park. Taking into consideration its sheer dimensions, relative isolation and proximity to Hornepayne’s lots of air expert services I believed it may have some prospective for fishing. But, it was not until eventually March ’90 at the Toronto Sportsmen’s Present that two incredibly reputable fishing lodges – Nagagami Lodge and Timberwolf Lodge – were being associated with the lake. Thereupon, like an arrangement of dominoes, every thing systematically fell into put and prior to the demonstrate finished, an August scheduling was mine. And, in order to get a wide see of Liddle’s 2-lodge Nagagami Lake procedure, the vacation would see us break up our time and fishing among the two camps. Dave Sauve, Ontario Fisherman area editor and a frequent fishing sidekick, eagerly agreed to accompany me on this alternatively special angling experience.
NAGAGAMI LAKE
Nagagami Lake, located about 15 air miles northwest of Hornepayne, is a medium-sized, kidney-shaped lake measuring 8 miles in size and 2 to 4 miles in width. The lake reveals a few unique regions – the japanese basin, a shallow (20 to 40 ft. ), clean-bottomed area the western basin, a deeper (10 to 90 ft. ), irregularly contoured location with islands, rocky shoreline, shoals a lengthy, narrow, deep (10 to 70 ft. ) northerly arm. Contrary to many large, varied lakes, Nagagami Lake has great angling in all three locations:particularly for walleyes and northern pike (even though there is a wholesome whitefish population and some perch in the lake).
The lake is most uncommon in that, in the substantial jap basin, a extremely slim but successful weedline can be discovered significantly offshore wherever the lake base falls from 8 to 12 ft. For the reason that it is perfectly out in the lake and not continual, finding it becomes on of the keys to the lake’s fantastic pike fishing. A lot more on that afterwards!The h2o is stained from the at any time existing tannins leaching into the lake from bordering timber and soils. The lake warms up early for this component of the North and mainly because of its dimensions, can get incredibly rough when the wind blows. There are handful of boating dangers in the principal lake, besides together the rugged north-arm shoreline and amongst the island clusters. Isolated hazards are marked by the lodge staff members and have been cautiously pinpointed on a extremely in-depth, hydro-contour map of Nagagami Lake made by the lodges for their visitors. Crucial fishing parts are highlighted.
Also obtainable (by means of small, uncomplicated portages) are two compact lakes:Hiawatha and Pody. Both equally present exceptional walleye and pike fishing. At Pody Lake, a catch & release lake, monster northerns and more substantial than regular walleyes are caught routinely.
WALLEYES
With plenty of drinking water, assorted structural features and several incoming & outflowing key rivers, Nagagami is a walleye factory. And, simply because many lodges and camps function on the big lake, a river mouth sanctuary plan is in influence on the Foch and Obakamiga (“Buck”) Rivers until eventually mid-June. Walleyes are found all over the lake:in present-day flows at river web sites, along weedlines and in the greater weedbeds, off islands and pointes in excess of gravel bottoms, and on mid-lake buildings which includes many common shoals, humps, sunken islands, drop-offs and bars.
As proposed earlier, the spring walleye fishery focuses on write-up-spawn (male) fish, close to river outflows. It is not strange to see a pack of boats in a tiny spot with all anglers catching boundaries of walleyes and releasing numerous fish. Springtime is minnow time and Nagagami is a “minnow lake” all season lengthy. To secure the lake, minnows are very carefully collected and sorted just before becoming flown into the camps for fishing. Rigged on tiny snelled hooks, are living-bait rigs or very small jigs, minnows are fished at the mouths of rivers where by deeper parts have been made by the present or together present-day breaks/eddies. Other effective springtime/early summer walleye spots include the island team out from Pody Creek, an spot selected “The Flats” and the upper portion of the out-flowing Nagagami River (as significantly downstream as Moose Lake).
Summer months walleyes are commonly scattered and predictable, lower-gentle feeders. A few techniques are generally applied by Nagagami & Timberwolf Lodge guests:stillfishing minnows, backtrolling with dwell-bait rigs, and jigging. Standard, forward trolling with wobbling plugs or human body baits is practically unheard of here.
For each skilled anglers and vacationing households with children at Nagagami Lodge, stillfishing minnows was a common and productive method. No matter if anglers positioned by themselves out from a weedline or weedbed, together a dropoff that fell to 20 or 30 foot depths or atop the sunken islands and shoals, limits of great-having walleyes in the 1 to 3 pound variety have been the rule-working day just after day. Best periods bundled the early morning hrs, but the twilight moments were tops. Daytime fishing was given more than to pike. Dave and I took a whole lot of kidding about our fishing off the dock at night time with floats/bobbers. That is Alright. Every single night without having fall short (about 10:30) we’d slip down to the camp dock and capture 3 or 4 fantastic walleye for breakfast. By 1:00 or so we might caught our fish and ended up having fun with no-less-than-amazing displays of shimmering Northern Lights. Those evenings may perhaps have been the most pleasant I expended all summer months they undoubtedly ended up unforgettable!Get a second belief – inquire Dave!
Both equally Mike Bauer and Ron Dunn, managers of the two lodges, effective fished walleyes the same way:back-trolling throughout mid-lake shoals with reside-bait rigs dressed with minnows. For this solution a depthfinder/flasher/graph is a should for finding the construction and then systematically working the bait rig up and down it till fish are contacted. Favourite places bundled a massive, marked shoal northeast of the Twin Islands, the “Banana Shoal” over and above that, and isolated humps in the major-lake basin like one particular off Chuck’s Point and yet another in the midst of the lake’s eastern basin. The latter place is difficult to find. Mike put us on to it in a driving rain 1 early morning. S ure that he was “screening our solve and mettle”, we dutifully backtrolled this place in the center of nowhere. Bingo-various much larger walleyes! Touche, Mike, but couldn’t it have waited?
While live-bait fishing is the norm at Nagagami, jigging accounts for fantastic catches of “yellows”. Spot is the key to prosperous jigging:over shoals/humps/sunken islands or alongside weedlines and dropoffs. Any important adjust in depth, bottom material or protect will entice and hold walleyes, primarily in the course of feeding durations. For Nagagami Lake walleyes, pink, white and yellow jigs in the 1/8 to 1/4 ounce sizes are advised with pink having the nod most times. Tipped with a small piece of worm or a energetic minnow, jigs should be forged and worked down ledges and humps, jigged in brief hops off further bottoms or cast and retrieved steadily in excess of shallow (6 to 10 feet) bars. On our sidetrip to Hiawatha Lake, drifting a jig & worm combo proved the undoing of scores of walleyes. Our very best catches (major fish) arrived off the head of the Banana Shoal the place we carefully located and marked a “bite” out of an or else regular edge. Everytime we drifted to that place we picked up fish, which include the a few largest fish of our keep and the premier caught at camp that 7 days. A little “one thing specific” location.
Don’t overlook weedbeds and weedlines as great places for walleyes. 1 bash at camp ceremoniously located, marked and fished a weedline at The Meadows and continuously caught limitations of much better-than-ordinary walleyes. Fish ended up suitable in there, at the base of the weeds in the only go over in that element of the lake. To get these fish, baits experienced to get suitable in, amidst the stems and stalks sometimes only to be grabbed very first by Nagagami’s opportunistic pike. Hey, that is Ok, much too!
Although at Nagagami, will not pass up the outstanding shore lunch fish fries put on at midweek by Nagagami Lodge and everyday (weather permitting) by Timberwolf Lodge employees at the Twin Islands. The good outdoors, very good pals and a sizzling shore lunch – “It won’t get any superior than this”!
NORTHERN PIKE
Through our continue to be at Nagagami, 1 detail grew to become abundantly very clear:pike fishing was provided significant priority by traveling to anglers, specifically “repeaters” who ended up not only common with the lake’s pike hotspots, but also really considerably aware of the probable for a mammoth northern pike-fish in the 20 to 30 pound range. In reality, even though possessing supper at Timberwolf Lodge 1 evening, one particular of the “regulars” produced a level of coming more than to us and demonstrating us photographs of past catches of huge Nagagami pike. This was prompted, no question, by her exhilaration more than getting just caught a magnificent 44-inch, 20-as well as pound pike at The Meadows, an considerable weedy spot off the Nagagami River outlet. Not an uncommon fish out of Nagagami Lake unheard of just about all over the place else.
Because pike, like walleyes, are predatory fish, their seasonal actions and feeding behavior often parallel those of walleye. Very frequently, the place walleyes are caught, major pike are caught, even on the identical baits. Resultantly, Nagagami northerns are fished with dwell baits early and late in the period and with synthetic baits or lures by means of the heat-h2o months.
Come spring, pike are the lake’s very first spawners and most aggressive fish. Right away just after the spawn, pike will begin taking reside-bait choices at common springtime sites:weedy back again bays and creek/river outflows. Leading spots at Nagagami Lake consist of the Pody Creek place and a channel nearby correctly dubbed “Pike Alley”. Significant live baitfish, in particular suckers, regularly produce the major pike in the early year, while occasional monsters will be caught by walleye fishermen, way too.
At the time the drinking water warms, pike will scatter commonly in the course of the lake-to weedbeds/weedlines, shoals, present flows and deep-drinking water basins – where ever their forage, oxygen and temperature necessities are met. It is at this time that fish start chasing down much larger, more rapidly-moving baits – e. g. spinners, spoons, bass spinnerbaits, bucktails and jerkbaits. At Nagagami, this period of time places fish in the weeds and anglers on the lookout for the lake’s weird offshore weedlines. Once located, these weedlines consistently produce plenty of balanced northerns:fish averaging 5 to 8 lbs .. Each our hosts realized these weedlines properly and unerringly kept us in the vicinity of them and “on pike”. Ron is a diehard pike fanatic and spoke constantly of the lake’s more substantial northerns:historic catches, fish hooked and lost, the season’s most effective, the lake’s prospective for a 50-inch, 30-pound gator!
The 44-inch fish mentioned earlier was caught on a bass spinnerbait, yet we took our finest pike on spoons and spinners. Nonetheless, Ron insisted that, if you were being to fish strictly for a trophy, a jerkbait worked over and around the weeds would be the most effective lure. To be sure, he had a assortment of these wooden freaks – baits in the 7 to 9-inch selection labored most effective. Oh sure, he had a pair of “baseball bats” in there, way too. Established alternatives at Nagagami Lake consist of Suicks, Teddy Baits, Reef Hawgs and Hello-Fin Foolers. Casting and doing the job these baits is difficult do the job, so if you troll check out a Believer, Swimm Whizz, Magnum Rapala or enormous, jointed Kwikfish. Make guaranteed that your products can handle this variety of tackle and pressure before experiencing a working day of irritation or even worse, getting rid of the fish of a life time.
As mentioned a second in the past, Dave and I efficiently pitched #4 or 5 Mepps Agilia Prolonged/Huge Killer spinners and significant spoons (Daredevle, 5 Diamonds) to the lake’s weed-oriented pike. By basically moving about the perimeter of the eastern basin, fishing the intermittent weedline, we enjoyed fast-paced pike motion throughout the afternoon. When fishing pike like this, be sure to equip oneself with suitable tools for extracting deeply taken baites from cavernous, toothy mouths – a “gag” to hold the fish’s mouth open, extensive-achieve hookouts, pliers or cutters. The watchful and quick removing of hooks and speedy boatside resuscitation will insure a effective launch of fish not meant for the evening meal desk. Smart capture and release is an artwork type as significantly as it is a science.
Two other locations ought to have particular recognition when it arrives to Nagagami pike fishing:The Meadows and Pike Alley. With existing flows and plenty of weed address, these spots continuously produce heaps of pike as perfectly as trophy-position fish. Bass spinnerbaits, jerkbaits, spinners, spoons and bucktails will get a great deal of interest from massive, aggressive northerns. Hold on!
WHITEFISH
Even though lots of northern lakes have extremely healthier whitefish populations, they are rather considerably underfished. At Nagagami Lake through late August by way of mid-September, whitefish action is outstanding and the lodges offer a steady smokehouse service to their clientele. Smoked whitefish tends to make for great ingesting, keeps well and increases every single angler’s legal “hold”. With generous limitations and controlled dip netting practices to complement angling, “whitefish-ing” really should be extra to the itinerary for late-season visitors at Nagagami and Timberwolf Lodges.
NAGAGAMI LODGE
Located on the northern arm of Nagagami Lake, this 2-star housekeeping resort features exceptional facilities:spacious, modern-day log cottages, generated hydro, sturdy 19-foot Powassan cedar-strip boats, reputable OMC motors, a central recreation lodge/conference region with VCR/videos/Television and a pool table, guideline company, bait, fish-cleaning station, smokehouse, etc. Cabins feature 2 or 3 bedrooms, bedding & liner assistance, modern-day complete-measurement appliances, wood-burning heaters, 3-piece tub (shower, flush toilet, sink), operating very hot and chilly water, electrical lights, entire kitchens.
Air Provider to Nagagami Lake is presented by Horne-Air (Hornepayne, Ont.) by using Beaver aircraft.
