Lake of the Woods is a body of water located in Manitoba, Ontario and Minnesota. The shoreline is over 40,000 km's, however if you include the shorelines of the14,522 islands located in Lake of the Woods, it is over 104,000 km's!
Lake of the Woods is home to walleye, northern pike, perch, sauger, crappie, smallmouth bass, largemouth bass, lake trout, lake sturgeon, whitefish, suckers and muskellunge.
Muskellunge, also called muskie, sometimes get confused with the northern pike. To distinguish the two, muskellunge have dark verticle bands or bars on a lighter background, whereas northern pike have light spots on a dark green background. The tail fins on a muskellunge are pointed compared to the rounded tail fins on the northern pike.
Lake of the Woods is well known for muskellunge fishing, and people travel a great distance to come here to try and catch the big one. I have only caught 1 of these fish, and it was a total accident. We were fishing for walleye, using 8 lb fishing line and a jig, and it caught the eye of a muskie! I have never reeled in a fish that big before and it took a lot of work. Since then, I have tried several times without having any luck.
Above is a picture of Muggle Husband with a muskellunge that was caught off of our back dock at our cabin in Lake of the Woods. Notice the dark vertical bands on the lighter background and the pointed tail fins.
N 49 54. ABA
W 097 06. CBD
To solve the puzzle, correctly answer the questions below.
A = The average weight in lbs of a muskellunge caught in Ontario that is 5 years old and 30 inches in length.
B = The number of muskellunge that I have intentionally caught.
C = If you were fishing in Ontario can caught a muskellunge that was 26 inches in length and 5 lbs in weight, what would be a reasonable guess of its age in years?
D= The number of muskellunge that I have accidently caught.
The information in this cache description may help you with the puzzle cache Going Fishin' in LOTW, GC69FR3.
Sources:
- http://www.mylakeofthewoods.com/Fish-Species.php
- http://thefishinguide.com/pikemn.shtml
- http://files.ontario.ca/environment-and-energy/fishing/198234.pdf
***Congratulations to Jean Déniche, klblue, Geo-Smart and V A for the FTF!***