2011 Leech Lake Walleye Tournaments

As the new year approaches I thought I would list a couple of the major walleye tournaments that will be held at Leech Lake in 2011. There are many smaller tournaments held at Leech Lake each year by local fishing clubs, but these are the two big tournaments that Leech will host this year.

I've fished in three professional walleye tournaments as a co-angler in the now defunct Professional Walleye Trail, but never one on Leech Lake. My first tournament was on Northern Minnesota's Cass Lake where I had the chance to fish in the same boat as 2004 PWT champion Scott Glorvigan. My second PWT tournament was on the Bays de Noc in Northern Michigan. And my third PWT tournament was on the Fox Lake chain of lakes in Illinois, where I finished 24th and won $700.

I have no plans to fish in any of the organized walleye tournaments on Leech Lake, but I do plan on doing a lot of walleye fishing on Leech in 2011.

Tournaments


Leech Lake Walleye Tournament, June 4-5

FLW Walleye Tour, June 9-11

Photo/Album: Post 10

Welcome to installment #10 of my Photo/Album series.

PHOTO

This photo was taken from our property on Ottertail Peninsula looking south toward Walker, MN. The point on the right hand side of the image is Big Hardwood Point, a favorite of walleye fishermen, and the island that is at the end of the sun's golden path is Goose Island, which also provides a wealth of structure that holds big walleye. I took this photo late in the afternoon on a cool, grey day toward the end of October, 2009.

ALBUM

In the autumn of 1976 I was attending Michigan State University in East Lansing, Michigan. One afternoon between classes I walked across Grand River Avenue from the campus into town and made my way to a record store that I liked to frequent. It was in this particular store that I purchased my first Thelonius Monk album. On this late Fall day as I walked up and down the aisles of the jazz section of the store, the music coming over the store speakers caught my attention. It was the music of jazz newcomer Pat Metheny from his first LP titled Bright Size Life. I bought the album and from that day on was a huge fan of Metheny's music. My wife Kathleen and I have seen him on many occasions, as recently as the spring of 2010 in Santa Cruz, CA. The first chance I had to see Pat Metheny perform live was in January 1978 at the Erickson Kiva on the campus of MSU, as the warm up act to Yusef Lateef (see poster above). What a show! Not only was Lateef amazing, but I got to see Pat Metheny as a kid in his early 20s with Jaco Pastorius on bass; and I stayed for both shows, 8:00 and 11:00 p.m. To this day, Bright Size Life is one of my favorite LPs. Enjoy the title song here.

Photo/Album: Post 9

Yes boys and girls, it's once again time for an entry of my Photo/Album series, where I post a photo from Leech Lake and share with you one of my favorite albums. I do this series as a way of reminding me of the beauty and splendor of Leech Lake, and to reflect on some of the great music I listen to, on vinyl, when I'm in the Northwoods. Now on with the show...

PHOTO

This photo is of our Chevy Blazer (now my son Joe's car) in front of the "Birches" on Sucker Bay, Leech Lake. Joe and I were visiting the Northwoods in February 2007 and spent a good deal of time on the lake ice fishing. On this particular day, we fished in about 10 feet of water over a weed bed that held a huge school of yellow perch. From 3:00 p.m. to about 6:00 p.m., Joe and I caught perch nonstop. We must have brought more than 200 perch through the ice. We kept only 8 fish and enjoyed a tasty fish fry for dinner.

ALBUM

By the mid-1970s, one of the most popular genres in music was "fusion," the combination of rock and jazz. The style was first explored by the likes of Miles Davis and Tony Williams in the late 1960s, but it really didn't hit its stride until the '70s. One of the biggest, best-selling fusion bands was Weather Report, and one of the band's most successful albums was Black Market, released in April, 1976, just a couple of months before I graduated from high school. During the summer after my graduation, this album figured prominently in my listening rotation. To this day it remains one of my all-time favorite albums. If you haven't heard this LP, you can listen to the title track here.

Leech Lake Management Plan 2011-2015

The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources just released its 2011-2015 plan for the management of the Leech Lake fishery. The good news is that the MDNR will continue to stock walleye fry into the lake in amounts varying from 7.5 million per year to 22 million, and those fry already stocked seem to be doing well. The natural hatch also has been strong the past 3 years. Good news for walleye fishermen.

You can read the 39-page plan here.

On a related note, I spoke to one of my Ottertail Peninsula neighbors earlier this week and she told me that there was already 9 inches of ice on Sucker Bay and that many of the hard-water angling fanatics in our neighborhood have pulled their fish houses onto the ice.

Early reports from anglers on the south end of Leech Lake, down near Whipholt, sound promising with good catches of keeper sized walleyes.

It's still too early to know if I'll be making a winter visit to Leech Lake or not.