Have a safe and Happy New Year! Another inch of snow giving us a total of 12" of snow on the ground. Weather pattern predicted for the upcoming 10 days looks to be in the 20's, which is above average for this time of year. If your plans include ice fishing, call ahead to the resort you are staying at for current ice conditions. The Rainy River has not frozen over completely where we have reported open areas. With the reduced water levels, this should help. Mixed reports from LOW.

Looking at the river between Clementson and Silver Creek, there are now 4 open holes and one is growing in size. On Monday the level at the Manitou increased almost a foot again, with the level receding about 5". Warmer weather has been a treat. Hope everyone has a great Holiday Season.

Cold overnight temps the last 2 nights with warmer weather coming in the forecast. There are still 3 big opens holes between us and Silver Creek, with some of the houses that were out have been pulled in. I did see one vehicle out by a fish-house today.
Depends on who you talk to about the fishing on Lake of the Woods. Reports range from good to slow, but then . . . that's why it's called fishing!

FishingMinnesota.com Rainy River forum reports 9" of ice on the river. We are still getting light snow, after a total of about 6-8" of snow from the past few days. I also read the current was strong on the river. Looking at data from the internet, I see the Manitou Rapids level is up 3' so far this month. I-Falls started to release more water into the Rainy about mid-November. This is due to the optimum water level on Rainy Lake, which declines going into the month of January. With the stronger current, the poor ice conditions before all the snow, caution is the word!

According to reports from LOW, they have plenty of ice on the lake and fishng has been mixed.

We can still report areas of open water on the Rainy River between Clementson and Silver Creek. The river was not fully frozen over when we got all the snow, I would suspect the ice is in poor condition under the snow, so be very careful on the river. LOW reports 12" of good ice and starting today Walleye Retreat will be using their bombardiers for travel.

Looks like the ice-fishing season is off to an early start this year. According to Pete & Terri at Walleye Retreat, they have 6 houses out already. We've been "January Cold" this past week, no wonder it's making ice! Reports of good walleye fishing near the airport on FishingMinnesota.com. Although, Friday we still had big areas of open water on the river between Clementson down to Silver Creek, just a reminder to be careful when venturing out on the ice.