What will the outfitters do?

[shakey legs 2]

Out of curiosity - what do you think most of the outfitters will target during the hardwater season on URL?  Do you think the majority will still try to exclusively target crappies with the occasional walleye as a bonus? or will they move closer in?  I know the last couple of years on URL from my experience that if you were consistently catching crappies there were not many walleyes around and visa-versa.  How about Russ & Judy, Kelly P.  and Buddy Hillman to name a few better known names?

[jigglestick]

shakeym, if i was in them shoes, which I am not, but being as familiar as a guy from the grand rapids area could possibly be with red lake and the fishing situation, what I would do is move to the more consistant north end of the lake and bang out holes all over from 4 - 9 miles out in search of a sustainable group of crappies. once on them I would do my damndest to stay on them, no doubt encountering walleyes along the way, keeping those areas in mind as well.

if the guides were to rely on the walleye fishing to stay alive, they would be looking for a day job in short time.
there are plenty of walleyes to be had, but the limmit of two fish and the fact that you can not enjoy a couple walleye fillets on the ice will make it highly unatractive and equaly unlikely that the average joe will spend two hundred bucks on gas and a full weekend rental for two walleyes.
they have to count on the crappies for at least one more year if not two to make it through.
once the limmit is increased, it will help, but not being able to posess fillets on the ice will be a hinderance, making the weekend trip unatractive.
I see alot of the traffic on the ice being stop and go trips where lake of the woods is the main destination.
I am not trying to be negative,  but the cards are on the table. look at opening weekend of fishing season for a solid example.
good luck to all the area buisnesses.

these are just my thoughts and opinions.
I still love red lake and I will still go, but I am willing to bet that for more reasons than I have mentioned here, it will not be two dozen times a season.

[cookie]

My thinking right now is we will start in closer for walleyes and work our way out further as the ice thickens. Hillmens will be punching a road way out. The crappies will again be the fish to find. Somehow I will try and not step on anyones toes as I look for those elusive crappies.Again I will be moving my houses quite a bit as I like my customers on new spots. Who knows how the lake will freeze?How much snow we will get?I think there could be a new road or two? and expect to see alot of houses running the shoreline in that 8 foot depth? If by chance we have alot of walleye fishermen then we will cater to them. There's no reason to think all the crappies have been caught all though they have been pounded. We will again see the true fishermen that are interested in the hunt.The dnr has stated there are still plenty of crappies?Again they will migrate to this end of the lake and if your in the right spot you should be  able to land a few. If your interested in catching  and releasing fish you should have a good time with the walleyes.

[Mayfly]

Crappies on Red.....isn't that a lost cause? People remanded optimistic all last winter and nothing happened. A few guys found some and had some good reports but then again it was only a few guys. I'm pretty sure that lake has been raped of crappies. What was it 2 year classes?? Hell, they should of put special regs on the crappies.

[jigglestick]

Tim, you are talking out of your ass.
put a little more thought into your comments in such a sensitive area of discussion.
are you basing this on personal experience or conceived notions based solely on the rhetoric found here in the forum topics of discussion?

crappies have allways been in red lake.
one comment I remember is " if you find the crappies, you are fishing to deep. move in shallower for the walleyes". this from before the days when walleye season was closed.
so....they will still be there in my opinion.
will we still be able to go out on any given outing and piss pound them? no way. but we will still be able to catch them fairly consistently, with the occasional piss-pounding thrown in the mix.
that should at least keep it interesting enough for the trip or two or three a season when you factor in the walleyes.
there is nothing like a red lake crappie or the stories that go along with having been a part of the most spectacular crappie fishing most of us have ever seen.

[Mayfly]

Of course there will always be Crappies in Red. The reason the droves of people went there over the past years was to catch lots of big crappies. That is why everyone that I know went there. That is why I went there as well. Why would I drive 5 hours to catch 5 big crappies. That is done with. Why I might go there is to catch 100 walleyes a day but not for the crappies.

[shakey legs 2]

Hey Cookie,

Thanks for replying.  I know that you and cousin Pete know the Lake as well as anyone.  I'm with you Jigglestick.  I have been going up since 1998 and will continue to go even though the hay days are long gone for crappies.  I live west of the Cities about 30 miles and it is a 5 hr. drive for me as well.  My friend that I go with has a cabin near Laporte so in the old portable days we would drive back and forth from there.  We are spoiled now and have a nice wheel house and stay on the ice.  We often joke about how nice we have it now when the bite is done but it's all about the experience and memories that they can't take away from you. Catching fish is secondary.

Good Luck to All and hope to see you on the ice this winter.

[Russ-Judy]

Iv been trying to put the right words together as a business point of view and also an ice fishmans view which I was before the business- its hard to keep the 2 different when your both so what I say you will just have to figure out which view Im using-
man we love crappies on our supper plates more than eyes- where can you go to get slabs like that-year after year- we scrounged to get enough money together for just an over nighter weekend from someone else (renting) it was the people that we met that kept us coming back more than the fish- they were second string on our fiddle- it was the fishing forums that brought us together before IBOTS even existed we were a group- it gave us all a place to meet and I tell you what you never met any better people that have lived there all there lives, some moved back, we went because of them and no we didnt just slaughter them any certain day- they still had to be found and as a large group we could hunt them down-we have been know to leave there with 0-2 in our bucket some weekends and didnt care, we came back again and again-now thats fishing- just as an example Im going to use Floyd and Sue-we met them at WW- Floyd was standing in the isle looking around (kinda that lost look)  I asked if he was looking for someone? Ya some of the forum group? ( there were only about 6 of us in the bar) no one I knew- within about an hour they knew 15 of us nuts as they arrived- im not sure he even had a house yet but they had a house within the next couple weeks and have been there every weekend for over 5 years from Chisholm Mn- they fished and crappies were an added bonus but when we were on them crappies- they produced--- my opion is and always will be-THEY should have restocked it with crappies not eyes

[Russ-Judy]

as a business view
I feel the pain as well for those clients that challenge the drive, weather just to get there; I feel discusted as they leave with little or nothing in the bucket some days and feel grand all over when Im on them and they have stories to tell- it not only hurts the business's but my reputation- as many of you know Im never hired as your guide;;-I sell my customer service and the best of 200 percent of it;; my motto is M NOT HIRED AS YOUR GUIDE iLL GET YOU DAM CLOSE BUT YOU HAVE TO CATCH THEM!!!! --I cant blame anyone if they decide not to come back, thats there reasoning and I wont argue it. I have no crystal ball to say there here, or when they will bite but I try hard to gather info to work a certain area over-there is no x on that lake that marks the spot!

you dont get excuses from me--Ill tell it straight out when you call for info- heres some comments I gave out last year and they are truthful-- not excuses

yes we moved again but we cant get you in your houses till we move them again because the ice settled and theres 3" of water around them

we can get to the spot we want because of the ice that broke up and wont allow us a good shot at getting there

i's 50 below with a white out- no were not on them but cant and wont move yet

theres football size pockets of slush in that spot and Im in slush right now but moved them

this is our fifth weekend white out in a row were running an hour behind and still plowing

theses things happened a lot last year and it showed on our average per house catch-not that the crappies wernt there and have declined we just couldnt get to them

if the business dosent sell by the end of deer hunting season in November we will be back for the hunt Iv always liked- those crappies may have declined but they didnt all go away with the amount of 6" ones we were catching and releasing last year