Paco Lake Fishing Guide, Lake County, Minnesota

• Overview

  Paco Lake lies within the bounds of Lake County, Minnesota. The water sits 1,539 feet up. It covers about 17 acres, so this is small water you can walk round in under an hour. The town to know is Grand Marais, 40 miles out. Thunder Bay sits 85 miles out, and it is the nearest city worth the name. It sits well inside its county, with no border complications.

• Where to Fish on Paco Lake

  We hold no depth figure for this one. The productive water is a rod length or two out, not a hundred. Bays and points beat straight shoreline every time on water like this. Survey and observation records for Lake County include white sucker, yellow perch, northern pike and rainbow trout. Those are county-wide records, so not every one of them will be in this water. Paco Lake repays a walk before the first cast.

• Seasonal Patterns

  Averages move between 4°F in January and 65°F in July. Winter puts a hard lid on this one. The open season starts with the thaw, near enough late April. The lid tends to go about late April and return around late November. Right after break-up, and again as the nights sharpen, is when to go. Expect Paco Lake to follow that timing.

• Tackle & Baits

  Whether the bank is open is not something our records settle. A camping area sits within half a mile of here. Largemouth respond to soft plastics tight to cover; go weedless where the growth is heavy. A landowner's word beats anything printed elsewhere. Rules for boats are stricter than rules for the bank in many places. Cook County Lake sits 0.2 miles off and takes the overflow. None of that is settled for Paco Lake in what we hold.