Musky America Magazine December 2024 Edition

for their own guests or for Lee to rent out. Lee's Boat Livery eventually built up a fleet of 26 boats, set anglers up with guides and sold pop and refreshments out of a huge piano crate which was converted into a shelter. Chris and Elsie (Slater) Lee eventually paid Northern States Power $10 a year to lease the land and built a permanent home and place of business there, a business which is now known as Herman's Landing. In time, a solid resort community became established on the Chippewa Flowage, which became noted for its excellent walleye fishing, slab crappies and one of the finest Musky fisheries in the country. Being known as a lake to produce good numbers of Musky during the 1920's, by 1938 the Chippewa Flowage had matured and began producing consistent catches of huge Musky over 35 lbs. The Winter Dam Fish Hatchery, active during the late 1930's and early 1940's, extensively stocked fry into the flowage and other area waters. After the war, fingerling Musky were stocked because of their much higher survival rates. The flowage quickly earned a reputation as the place to be for all serious Musky anglers, reaching its first peak in Musky production during the late 1940's and early 1950's. After that, big fish numbers dropped off a bit but the numbers of fish caught remained at a consistent level. The fishing was still very good and huge fish were still being caught on occasion, but the number of Musky caught in the 15 to 30 lb. range was comparatively low.

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