Fished Curlew Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning. This was my first trip to the lake scouting for Muskies. The sky was high and bright both days, not the best for musky fishing. The water is still plenty cool as well. We saw 4 fish the first afternoon. None of which were under 15 lbs., with one easily topping 20. Two fish followed low and slow in the early afternoon and they came out of weeds up against shore. Later in the evening I had one fish follow a crankbait up to the boat but couldn't trigger a strike. We saw an additional fish while cruising around another weed bed. The only lures getting any attention were minnow baits. Sunday morning was another good day to see fish, but it was still hard to trigger strikes. 3 more fish were seen, but none followed. These fish were sitting in the shallows sunning. I tried many different baits. I focused mostly on smaller, spring baits like suspending twitchbaits and small bucktails. My partners, throwing spinnerbaits and other various minnowbaits did not hook up either. I have been fishing the stained waters of Newman and Hauser lakes for some time now with good results, but it was nice to see this quantity and quality of fish. I think the clear environment of this lake will prove challenging. I guess I'll find out through the summer and fall. Please practice catch and release! Good luck.

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