Nasty weather keeping anglers indoors

The weather took a turn for the worse on Saturday.
It started with Sunday night and Saturday morning filled with a series of thunderstorms.
This was followed by heavy rain and high winds Saturday afternoon. To make matters worse the temperature plummeted to 7 C (40-something Fahrenheit, I think).
Fortunately we were able to get everyone into and out of camp via the Lickety Split before the high winds hit.
Just about all the new fishermen wisely stayed in their cabins or the lodge, waiting for a break in the weather.
The rain ended some time overnight. I need to make one more trip to pick up guests today and am hoping the wind will lay a bit.
The forecast is for things to improve this afternoon and to see the sun again starting Monday.
Click to go back to our website:
www.bownarrows.com
Click to see the latest on the blog:
www.bownarrows.blogspot.com

Red Lake fishing report; it's hot

Fishing is excellent in this, our first week of fishing.

Everyone is catching large quantities of walleyes and as expected, many of them are the great-eating sizes 14-18 inches.

We knew this was coming by the many small walleye found in natural resources fish studies last summer.

There are also lots of big pike being caught. In the photo above Junior Williams from Ohio hoists a chunky 38-incher which he caught and released.

The weather has been beautiful. It's been sunny and warm and the fish are hungry after their long winter's nap.

Click to go back to our website:

http://www.bownarrows.com/

Click to see the latest on the blog:

http://www.bownarrows.blogspot.com/

Our guests are here and the fish are biting!

Our first guests just arrived and promptly caught a bunch of big northern pike and some walleye.
The warm spring and normal lake levels promise a great year for fishing.
Biggest northern pike that I heard about from people fishing yesterday was 38 inches but there were lots caught in the 30s.
Our walleye fishing always gets better and better as the water warms but people fishing for pike yesterday were catching walleye casting pike lures. That's a good sign!
I'll get some photos on the blog this week.
We've been ultra busy up to this point with out construction projects and opening camp.
Click to go back to our website:
http://www.bownarrows.com/
Click to see the latest on the blog:
http://www.bownarrows.blogspot.com/

Gorgeous weather for rebuilding docks

With the septic system installation now behind us, staffer Landon Broennle and I have turned our attention to rebuilding the crib docks ruined by last year's flood.
We've completed the docks for Cabin 1 and 10 and that just leaves Cabins 5 and 7 still to do.
The other cabins have floating docks.
We have been wearing chest waders which leak a bit but the big shock comes when frigid lake water goes over the top.
Mother Nature has been on our side in this endeavour. No sooner did we get into the lake for the dock work than the weather turned warm and sunny. Temperatures this week are supposed to be in the mid-20s C (mid-70s F).
We had a thunderstorm yesterday afternoon which may have sparked some forest fires someplace in Northwestern Ontario as the bush is very dry. Virtually the only precipitation since the monsoon ended last August occurred two weeks ago when we were digging for the septic system. It probably rained an inch that week.
Today our other staffers arrive: Emily Godin who worked for us last summer and Kristina Belanger. Their immediate task will be to whip the cabins into shape before the first guests arrive on Friday.
We're almost ready to roll.
Click to go back to our website:
http://www.bownarrows.com/
Click to see the latest on the blog:
http://www.bownarrows.blogspot.com/

What we've been up to the last few weeks

We got into camp record-early April 21 and had to break a bit of ice on the trip.

We have since been working night and day installing a new septic system for the entire camp. This system uses Ecoflo biofilters which are large underground tanks filled with peat moss.

My friend John Belanger and new staffer Landon Broennle and I spent about a week barging in the Ecolflo tanks plus a half dozen enormous septic tanks and the peat moss.

Then we brought in an excavator and a tracked loader and the actual installation began by Canadian Shield Consultants who designed the entire system for us.

Everything in the ground was amazingly completed in a week and we have since been installing the electrical system to run the whole operation. My brother-in-law Ron Wink has done the electrical work for us.

That too is now complete and there are just a few minor plumbing connections to finish.

The temperatures have been below normal and the only rain we received occurred the entire week of installing the tanks. (That figures!)

Because of the cold temps I expect fishing patterns to be pretty much normal, despite the early breakup of ice.

The forecast this week is for beautiful warm temps. Hope that is the case.

Click to go back to our website: http://www.bownarrows.com/

Click to see the latest on the blog:

http://www.bownarrows.blogspot.com/