Big Water vs Small water Muskie Fishing

Casting for Muskie in big water is a completely different than in small inland lakes. In a small lake you have a few prime spots and mainly that is where you go 90 percent of the time. I would say that in most waters you only have 10 percent of it that holds fish most of the time. That means that on a 500 acre lake there is 450 acres of dead water. I would say that a good Muskie Hunter would figure out a small lake in a season or two as it depends on how much time he spends on it. The water I fish the most, is around 330,000 acres so I have 33,000 acres where I should catch a fish but I also have 297,000 acres that you usually won't find a fish. I have been fishing this body of water for 78 years now and I might know where the fish are most of the time in about 50 percent of the 10 percent of the fish holding water. In small lakes you can find areas where a creek comes in and it will hold fish for you and it might be in a nice quiet spot and the big fish feel safe but it big water any creek that comes into it usually has boat traffic on it in most cases that creates a different set of problems for the Muskie fisher person. A weed bed on a drop off that holds bait fish is ideal in small waters and it does work in big waters but the drop off on a smal like is a very small area but on a big big water lake that drop off can run for miles. We have one such drop off line where I fish that is several miles long and there are weeds here and there along it. The funny thing is very few of these weedy areas hold fish most of the time. Muskie like to move to other areas a lot. On a small body of water you can find the places they move to without to much trouble. On my lake they might move 10 miles or more. So this is a much bigger problem for the big water fisher person. Muskie are really a river fish and they really like moving water. To give you an idea about big water compared to small water lets take my lake St Clair and Cass Lake Minnesota. Cass is a good sizes lake and has a lot of current seeing as it is part of the headwaters of the Mississippi River. I have fished this lake about 5 times and I have learned almost all of the really good spots on it. I know there are a few more and within a week or two of steady fishing I would have a fairly clear picture of most of their movements and feedin areas. I will give you two years of fishing on my lake and I think you will find that there is a great difference in finding areas here that hold fish compared to Cass. It really is just the fact that the water is so vast and so much of it looks alike. There is another factor not mentioned so far and that is depth. Lake St Clair is more than likely the shallowest Muskie fishery in the world. Anchor Bay the Nortern end of the lake is over 45 square miles with a maxium depth of 14 foot. The Main lake of way over 400 square miles except for the shipping channel has a depth of 24 feet. That is the reason I see more fish per day here than other lakes as they are always nearer to you. Fishing the Great Lakes proves much harder also. There are monster Muskie in all of the Great Lakes but they are also very hard to find. I wish I had a hundred lifetimes so I could fish all of the Muskie lakes in the world. I know a few areas to catch Muskie in Lake Huron, like Geogian Bay for one and the North Channel for another.