Brian Wise

Hey Guys, Here is the report and video from the second leg of our trip north in search of Muskie.... Muskie Musk. We leave our family for 9 days for 10,000 casts toward a Muskie. Muskellunge (Esox masquinongy) from the Ojibwa word maashkinoozhe, meaning “ugly pike”. Muskie like to cruse “patrols” looking to destroy whatever critter they choose. This is no ordinary fish. They are the apex predator in any water they live. Eating anything they can possibly fit in their toothy mouth. This is not a fish for the light of heart, mind, or body… North of Hwy 8 live the Maashkinoozhe. Tea colored rivers from the rust belt harbor the elusive fish. We cast flies that are larger than some house pets to a fish meaner than a doberman pincer on Starbucks. We arrive at camp around 1am, since we had to catch the evening rise on the Driftless, we drive by night. We set camp, charge camera batteries, and rig our titanium bite leaders. Sunrise and we rise, off to the musky river where hopefully the guy remembered to drop a johnboat off for us. Sure enough it was there. Now, nobody in the boat had ever casted for muskie before this, but it was easy to see why the fish loved this water. Slow pools with submerged vegitation haunted us as we casted furiously. We floated by submerged logs and gawked down into the amber water in hopes to see one. The river was very similar to home. Steep rocky riffles gently sweeping around the corner into deep slow glassy pools, we had confidence in this type water. Reading seams, drop-offs, shadows, submerged vegie, and woody debris there were fishing places everywhere! Yet….where were the muskie? Two days straight of casting 10wts and flies the size of a muskrat and no toothy critters. But…we did catch a few smallmouth bass that could have passed as bait in these waters. Powerfull dark and deep were the smallmouth bass here. We could catch smallmouth in the Ozarks so we quickly threw them back and kept casting, and casting, and casting…..all the way to Lake Vermillion. (Report and photos by Kyle Kosovich. Videography by Brian Wise and Aaron Scott, edited by Brian Wise)

Exactly. There is still very little pattern....catching fish everywhere from 1' of water through the main channel to the other side of the river in 1' of water instead of them being in one particular spot. Fly selection is basically anything you happen to get in front of any give fishes face and no pattern on it either. Fishing is better than it has been in a while but if we run into a solid pattern that holds fishing will go through the roof.

Exactly, and no offense taken or meant, seriously. I keep up with a lot of the rivers on this forum and this debate comes up more often on the NFOW than any other river listed here. I guess to see what is happening with the NFOW now (which everything is trending toward the BETTER) you would have to compare another river in the state (or mid-west for that matter) that has similar boundaries, a similar drainage, similar structure, and totally wild rainbows..........and there is no comparison in the Mid-West. The closest thing we have is the 11 Point but the only thing that makes the NFOW and 11 Point comparable is the river itself and not the fish because obviously even with absolutely NO homes, cabins, septic tanks, etc that river cna't truely support wild fish, they have tried their best to make that happen and it doesn't happen. I think that is the craziest thing in the world because if you take the NFOW back 40 years which is basically what we are talking about..............you have the 11 point in current day. I remember the river fishing better. One of my first memories of fishing was a certain day with a zebco 33 and I was around 4-5 years old and able to catch fish (TRUST me it wasn't skill, and still isn't now ) it was easier, period. But, in my life the biggest thing that ever happened to the river was the drought. That is the only thing you can physically point your finger at on a timeline, in comparison with water levels, and say "THAT hurt the river." The mid-90's brought the building boom on the river...when fish numbers were LOW. After that we had good water for several years and our numbers skyrocketed with each years spawn being bigger and better than the last and that is AFTER all the building started. Now you look at this year's young of the year numbers (which aren't out yet but trust me here) and they are going to be down. During spawn last year we hadn't had a flush since the previous spring.....the leaves from LAST Fall didn't get flushed out of the river until the massive floods we had this spring so water was LOW during spawn. In my eyes, and if you look at everything in the past and what is right in front of us the main problem is water levels. You know how I said that every river in the state fished better in the 70's? If you look back at water levels then compared to now....they were higher. When you look at what happens when we have "above average" water for several years (or what is "above average for us anyway)right now, we instantly see more success both in fishing and our spawn. This is kind of cool...something I hadn't sat down and put on "paper" or is it just my feable mind that can wrap around the jibberish I just wrote?

BAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!!!

We hear this exact "point" try to be proven every-so-often.......my reply......Name 1 wild river in the state that didn't fish better 30 years ago.....or 1 smallmouth river that didn't fish better 30 years ago....lake...pond...puddle that didn't fish better 30 years ago. I don't think people really understand what it takes to be a 100% wild rainbow trout fishery, especially in the mid-west. Wild fish are at the mercy of nature, period. It's not like the trout parks where they stock more fish than were taken yesterday....they haven't stocked this river with rainbows in almost 50 years...numbers will go up and down for the rest of existence. MDC keeps VERY good track of the NFOW. I may dog them now and then but they do a good job of trying to keep a very close eye on their wild trout. Like others have said, the trend over the last several years have been numbers going UP......but, I ask you this, if you saw numbers going down------What would you do? This is a wild river, there is nothing you can do unless you try to change law and make it a catch and release stream when harvesting probably wouldn't be the problem, mother nature would more than likely be the culprit. I don't know anyone that really fishes the river, and has for longer than I have been alive, that has anything bad to say about the NFOW right now. If you have fished it for 30 years you saw the drought of the 90's pretty much stop the fishing as there were basically no fish. Then in the mid-2000's we saw a JUMP in numbers. THEN in the late 2000's we saw a boom in numbers. It has fished better in the last 5 years than I have ever seen it fish. I would kill to have been able to fish these rivers back in the 70's, I really would have. But comparing the rivers now to how they fished in the 70's is like comparing how YOU were back then compared to now. Shoot, I was a 5'8" guy that had a 44" vertical and could dunk when I was 18.......at 31 now, I would pull a hamstring if I tried to touch the net.

I am totally feeling you.....it was weird for me to "slow down" the tempo of this video and set it to something slower. I PROMISE the Chippewa video will more than make up for the lack of A. Hard Riffs or B.Steady Thug Beats....Musky or not.

Funny you bring that up.....I can answer your question if the fishing is taking a back seat to the cinematography by telling you a story. I hit an hour of the most awesome hopper fishing I have ever seen...........and not a single fish in that video was caught on a hopper. So I can, without a doubt, say that the fishing was first and foremost on our minds. It's kind of funny, I get the question a lot "How do you shoot all that video?" or "Do you ever get to fish if the video camera is in your hand all the time?" My usual answer is "No, the oars are in my hand all the time." We are really blessed to do what we do (and by "we" I guess I am saying "I" am lucky to guide as much as I do) and when we fish for ourselves we are pretty die-hard....and that will show up in the next 2 videos of this trip. Throwing 10wts and 12" flies until you can't lift your arms is pretty awesome--kind of hard to shoot video when your arms are shaking from casting and stripping like that but we got some really, really cool stuff! And yes, the ladies were having a party because they didn't have to hear us talk about Musky, the Driftless, and HUGE flies for 9 days. We will throw the Chippewa video, report, and photos on here next week and I usually don't say stuff like this but the Chippewa video is crazy-awesome....even if we do say so ourselves.

Hey Guys, Here is a quick report on our Whirlwind trip North...Musky were on the brain but we had to stop on the Driftless since we were pretty much going through there. The next report and video will be on the Chippewa River, Wisconsin. The Driftless. In the beginning. Three fishermen go on an adventure, a long way from their familiar waters, the Ozarks. The first stop….. The Driftless Region, Wisconsin. Similar to the slopes of home, any Ozarker wouldn’t be able to tell the two apart once fog crept through the valleys and the sky went grey to blue in the dusk. The bottom of the hills similar limestone bluffs rose above the stream valley and the streams were cool and clear like the Ozarks but these streams had more sediment, there was no clean gravel but black glaciated soils from the crop laden hills above. This is where the journey begins…. Just as we arrive in camp, aka dairy cattle pasture laden with cow pies and flies but at $10 a night for all of us and the land-owner bringing us fire wood every evening how could we say no. Our good friends from Chicago Land are stumbling out of their tents as we stumble from the truck after driving all night. Like true fish heads they stagger first to their fly rods and make a few casts before the morning coffee. We catch up quickly on times past as we rig fly rods. Tying 6x tippet has been easier to tie, no sleep for 24hrs is catching up as the sun rises through the fog on us. (by day 7 tying knots is worst though) Blue River is our first stop after legalizing ourselves to the Wisconsin wardens. Beer cheese curds and sausage sticks are for lunch this day and for the next week. Yes, fishing is more important than eating. Anyway. We all split up to fish alone, reconnect with the water and reflect what is on our heart at the time. By noon some have passed out in the field along the river and others are catching the biggest trout of their life in these waters. After depleting beer supplies we head back to camp to recharge and get ready for the evening round of fishing. This is when sky opened up. We hid under a small tarp and told tales of big fish. Soon the sun came back and we headed back to the river. We claimed an awesome stretch of river on the Blue. It had a magnificent prairie with flowers and grasses over 6’ tall (You probably wonder how Brian made it through this), well luckily our friends from Chicago are 6’8’’ or better and we just followed them to the water. The cameras could not do justice to the sunset, the fog, and the setting we fished in but the smiles and laughter of good friends described it all. Night fell and the campfire called us home. We cooked and reminisced of past adventures together and planned the new ones. Soon we were to turn the page to the next adventure. Musky Country. The Muskyteers hit the last of the Driftless that morning and headed North, toward toothy critters…. (Trip Report by Kyle Kosovich, Photos by Aaron Scott, Video Editor Brian Wise)

Any tagged Smallmouth Justin?

Agreed. The bite is still very much like a summer-time bite.....except the browns are moving and not in the usual summer-time holds quite as much.

I'm just wondering where all the stripers that were on the upper end ended up......they are ghosts, gone. Justin, you going to be on all of the shocking floats?

If the stripers are affected they will not do anything with them unless Justin takes it upon himself to stab them in the face with a bowie knife when they surface. I had this conversation with AJ Pratt in 2008 when the stripers moved into the river after those floods and he said that basically MDC has a no kill policy and would be forced to move the fish and keep them alive and there is no good way to move fish that large in any numbers......BUT exactly like back then MDC shocked a certain part of the river VERY recently and didn't make it overly known, for some reason.

Proud of this one I am.....the force is strong in you King of Bling.

Agreed...or all the water 'worth' hitting anyway.

KING OF BLING STRIKES AGAIN!! Nice!

I got your back...King

Still holding it up high.....shoulder....aching..... and hoping I'm not the only Barney Stinson fan.

Agreed on the Vibrams.....minus the fact that I have never walked around in Stilettos for a comparison. (holding my hand up and yelling "UP HIGH!!")

I do have some really big flies....but not as big as those shad in the river. That is crazy, those things are pletiful too! I was wondering myself about them moving back down when it gets colder.....then they would all stack up at Dawt Mill and we could run some live bait and swimbaits through there and TEAR THEM UP! Going to talk to the striper guru this afternoon to see what his thoughts are on their movement. My personal thoughts (and I am not a major striper guy) is that we need a bump in water levels to really target these fish. When the water was up and still green we got chases and hook-ups, since the water has cleared we have only gotten some follows (NOT chases) and I haven't had anyone hook-up with a striper in my boat in a LOOONG time.

They are crazy tough during the day....have to wonder if it has something to do with all of the canoes going over them, maybe they will settle down as the river settles down now that the major part of the season is over (now my boat will probably go over them more than anything as guiding season goes crazy). We saw 2 or 3 fish below your house last weekend Justin, one of them was pretty sizeable too. I would guess the exact same size range 8-30 pounds, with one of them going a little bigger I am SURE. Haven't fished below Patrick in forever because of how the fishing has fallen out down there but still hearing reports of a few fish down that way too. I still say a grabbing hook with some skis would be awesome.

Ok guys, Consider this a call for a lynch mob. I wanted to make sure these fish were going to be staying in the same area for a while before I started throwing out coordinates but, guys, we counted 42 stripers in the hole above McKee bridge. These fish have been there for well over a month and it doesn't look like they are going anywhere (besides hopefully a few freezers.) The weird thing is they are hanging on river left and staying, for the most part, on the left side of the channel. We have fished to them a TON with only a couple of follows during the day.....but we had a spin-fishing trip go out and get the whole pod to follow a rattle trap. SICK 'EM...and forget how to Catch & Release. Brian

Actually Wrench, talking with the guys on the White the blooms get bigger with more flow which I thought was crazy. That picture is for sure the massively bad end of the stuff.....but I have seen the C&R area below BS Dam in not 'that' much different shape.

If me using rubber soles instead of felt gives my little boys a 1% better chance at not having to see the North Fork of the White or any other Missouri trout stream infected with Didymo then I say great. It may not "decimate"...but how awesome would it be to fish here...................

Going through around 70 gigs of video.....it will be a little while and the video will be cool. You will get to see a 4/0 hook ripped out of my shoulder too. :-)

Very cool! Just spent a few days in the Wisconsin side of the Driftless a couple of weeks ago. Such a cool area.