Rumors of 3-pound crappies spread across Minnesota, Wisconsin and the Dakotas like a hot tip on Wall Street. The history of Red Lake is not a pleasant one. It's the timeworn tale of man's contentiousness with nature. Resource mismanagement and greed has led to the demise of a once, great fishery. This time however, our abuse had a curious result a new species filled the gap left by the depletion of another.
Red Lake lies in the northwest corner of Minnesota's famed lake country.
It's greatest asset as a fishery stems from the hundreds of miles of cobble-gravel covered shoreline ideal for natural walleye reproduction. During most of the last century, millions of walleyes inhabited these waters and anglers feasted on their abundance. Local Native Americans had always exercised their treaty rights and commercially fished Red Lake for walleye. But in the early 1990's, market demand for fresh-water fish soared and in response, the harvest of all game fish increased dramatically. Brood stock of reproductive walleyes and northerns was decimated and by 1996, there was nothing left to catch.