Wollaston Lake Coe Hill

[jugfish]

Hi everyone, looking to chat with some people who may have experience fishing Wollaston Lake in Coe Hill.

I've had a small off-grid cabin on the lake for a number of years and have always found the fishing extremely tough and different than other lakes I've fished in the past. Over the years, the biggest pike I've caught has been ~10lbs, but outside of that they're all in the 2-4lbs class. Walleyes are sporadically caught as by-catch and the bass are moody - i'm used to flipping docks and using top water, but they all seem to be in dense weeds or heavily suspended. All in all, its been a frustrating bunch of years, but i've kept slugging away. For the pike, its said they're on the secondary weed lines, but still no luck even when I've found them.

Recently i got a small boat back into my life, so i've been re-plotting the contours using quickdraw maps and re-visiting the old areas on the lake. The challenges remains

One of the biggest things I've noticed is the lack of general fishing info on this lake. 0 Navionics, extremely limited posts on the net. Is the lake just crap for fishing? I've seen a ton of nice boats on the lake this year, so im assuming that cant be the case. Just seems odd.

Anyways, hoping a few of you or at least 1 may have some information or maybe even put me into touch with someone who does. I am 100% willing to put in the work much the same as I did to learn swinging for steelies on most Lake O / G Bay tribs and urban pike/bass fishing in Toronto, but maybe having a few questions asked would be much appreciated.

Cheers and tight lines,
Joel

[mitch seguin]

Angler's Altas has a map of the lake.

[Ronzo]

I snapped a picture from my Backroads Mapbook and PM'd it to you. Good luck!

[OhioFisherman]

http://fishing-app.gpsnauticalcharts.com/i-boating-fishing-web-app/fishing-marine-charts-navigation.html?title=Wollaston+boating+app#13/44.8350/-77.8400

 

[akaShag]

That is an INTERESTING looking lake, by that bathymetric chart!

[jugfish]

1 hour ago, akaShag said:

That is an INTERESTING looking lake, by that bathymetric chart!

Thanks everyone for the replies!

@akaShag , its definitely a cool little lake, but certainly a challenge. Last week i was able to map most of the central part of the lake where all of the large deep shoals and that 30-40 hump exists. Saw lots of people trolling the northern side of the lake adjacent to the deep stuff in the 20-40 foot range, assuming for walleye and or pike. I got into a couple, but all fairly tiny hammer handles. I was really surprised not to find any fish hanging off of the 30' hump adjacent to the deep 

 

@OhioFisherman , do you by any chance know where/how they source those maps? most of it looks correct with the exception of the 30' trough in the northern west bay. From my recollection its a fairly consistent 20' flat that gets to 7-10' with dense weeds. Told there are largies there if you dink and dunk the mats...

[misfish]

Map looks like a pregnant alien. LOL

 

Very very cool lake structure for sure Doug.

[grimsbylander]

I've never fished Wollaston but if you've had that much difficulty locating fish they may be relating more to baitfish than obvious structure. Have you ever gone looking for balls of baitfish out over that really deep stuff? Just a thought. 

[OhioFisherman]

@OhioFisherman , do you by any chance know where/how they source those maps? most of it looks correct with the exception of the 30' trough in the northern west bay. From my recollection its a fairly consistent 20' flat that gets to 7-10' with dense weeds. Told there are largies there if you dink and dunk the mats...

Jug, exactly? no. https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/bathymetry/

https://www.ausableriver.org/blog/how-are-bathymetric-maps-made

https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/navigation/making-nautical-charts.html

Just from past experience, some lakes produce numbers, some lakes size, some are capable of either or none. I wouldn't invest a lot of time  and effort in a lake that wasn't offering something of interest? You have a heck of a lot more lakes than we have here.

[akaShag]

2 hours ago, OhioFisherman said:

You have a heck of a lot more lakes than we have here.

But he has an off-grid cabin on this one, so he probably would like to figure it out.... or yes check out a more productive lake in that area if Wollaston continues to be a bust.

I used to go to a hunt camp on a lake in that same general area.  The bathymetry was probably similar, it was a very deep lake in the middle, over a hundred feet deep.  The Ministry used to stock it with trout - first rainbows, and then speckles, and in good numbers for the surface area of the lake.  It was nearly impossible to catch those trout, and it took me probably a decade to figure out why.  There was so much forage in the lake (mostly minnows) that the trout had their fill any time they felt like eating.  Every trout we caught was round like a football.  So anyways what I did was jig very aggressively for them, both open water and ice season, and that seemed to attract at least a few fat trout.

It may be that Wollaston Lake is also very fertile, with a huge forage base.  One way to test this theory would be to put out a few minow traps (if legal in that FMZ) and if you haul in a trap full of minnows after a couple hours soak, there is possibly the answer to the question.

But how to catch fish that are already stuffed like piggies, I do not know the answer to that question.  I would tend to go reallly aggressive with presentations, based on where the graph tells me there are at least some fish.  I will be interested to hear what happens here.

Doug

 

 

[pokeherman99]

Hey Joel, I had a cottage on Wollaston for 30 yrs lol, just recently sold, I am not very techy , but if you can personal mssg me so i can send my cell number I can help dial you in a little bit more on the bass/walleye situation.....

cheers,

 

Dave