Glen Schmitt

Cass County’s Birch Lake is located just off the main drag in downtown Hackensack. Despite being located in town and featuring an excellent city-owned public access, the 1,267-acre lake is not extremely pressured from a fishing standpoint.
Birch hosts quality panfish and largemouth bass, along with decent numbers of walleyes. But it doesn’t seem to receive the attention one might think it would.

Located near the town of Mountain Iron in St. Louis County, West Two Rivers Reservoir is a unique fishery for several reasons.
The 713-acre system is an old reservoir, man-made in the 1960s to provide a water supply to the MinnTac taconite-processing facility. It’s mainly a shallow reservoir, especially the north end, and it includes five inlets that drain local wetlands and an outlet that flows to the St. Louis River.

Anglers who frequent Hubbard County have a seemingly endless list of lakes from which to choose. Panfish, bass, walleye, and northern pike fishing options are easy to find in this part of north-central Minnesota, and in many cases, all in the same lake.
That’s exactly what Lake Belle Taine offers.

Located a few miles north of Mora in Kanabec County, Knife Lake is one of the area’s more popular fisheries with local anglers. With the Knife River flowing in and out of it, this 1,266-acre lake is basically a reservoir that offers limited depth but a variety of healthy fish populations.

Pulaski is a 702-acre system with some depth, plenty of fishable structure, and extremely clear water. It’s noted for producing good numbers of largemouth bass and crappies.