This is a summary report of our 2006 Merwin Lake Fall Musky Camp. Normally the tiger muskies are in the shallows and can be caught off the shoreline logs and stumps this time of year. That has not been the case this year, for reasons I can only speculate about. I suspect the dam operator's raising and lowering of the reservoir's water level, which has fluctuated a lot this month, may be the culprit. I say that because my experience at Mayfield Lake has always been that water level changes were bad for the musky fishing. In any case, the tigers have been mostly absent from the shallow cover this month, and I don't believe the weather is to blame, because this situation continued to prevail even after clouds and rain rolled in. The September tiger musky fishing at Merwin is not a total bust, just slower than we've become spoiled to expect. So far, I've caught three fish (43 1/2", 40", and 35"), and all of them came from deeper water (12 to 15 feet) on bucktails worked slow so they'd sink to the bottom, and deep diving crankbaits. These fish were caught on Sept. 10, 13, and 15, at varying times of time, and in varying weather conditions. Mike and Tony haven't caught anything (except for a frisky 21-incher we caught twice in two days). I've also caught a 14-inch largemouth and a 16-inch squawfish on musky lures. We've also had a couple of missed strikes, and seen a few following fish, but we've also had several days when we didn't see anything, which is unusual here this time of year. From talking with other fishermen, I can say that several other muskies have been caught by other parties in the last 10 days, but they are all small ones, mostly 33 to 35 inches, with one 41-incher caught by a very happy gentleman who plans to have it mounted. I have no problem with that -- I had my first musky, caught in Minnesota, mounted -- but we release all of our fish, of course. As a very interesting side note, another gentleman told us he was fishing for smallmouth bass, and has caught smallies in Merwin Lake. I'm back in Seattle for several days to attend to personal business, and plan to be back on Merwin Lake again on Thursday, Sept. 21. If you are heading there this month, my advice is to fish deep on the drop offs near the shoreline cover, unless you see shallow fish. I think that's where they are. Twice last week, we had muskies come up from under the boat and stick their heads out of the water to look us over, so I don't think they're very far away from the shoreline. The water is clear and we can see the bottom to about 28 feet, and we haven't seen them laying on the bottom, so I suspect they're about 40 to 50 feet down. They will come up for your lure if they want it, so getting your lures 15 feet down, alongside the deep logs and on the dropoff edges, should be sufficient. It has worked for me three times so far. I should also mention that a high percentage of the muskies caught this month are coming out of Speelyai Bay, including my 40-incher, but the vast majority of this lake's tiger muskies are likely on the south shoreline of the main lake. I should add that us old codgers are not putting in long days; we're lazy, sleep late, eat breakfast at Jack's, and hit the water around 11 AM or noon and fish for 6 or 7 hours a day, so maybe there's an early morning bite that we're not aware of -- I'd certainly try that if you can get in gear earlier than we can get our creaky old bones moving (at age 60, I'm the "baby" of our group). Despite the slower musky action this fall, and absence of big fish, I'd say Merwin is very much worth fishing right now for those with patience and perseverence, and this still beats driving 2,000 miles each way to fish the midwest's heavily-pressured musky lakes, where 1 fish a month is a good catch. And who knows, it may still pick up. Water temps are currently about 66 to 68 degrees, and our past experience here indicates the musky fishing doesn't shut down until the water cools to about 62 degrees, which usually happens around Oct. 10, but the musky fishing may hold up longer this year if we get an Indian summer.

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