Duluth, MN (Northland's NewsCenter) --- Fishing opener is an important weekend for many Northlanders, as well as many Northland businesses.
This year, though, anglers may have to head somewhere other than northern Minnesota.
"I'm not fond of it, and I think it's hugely too early," Minnesota resort owner Carole Scott said. "I think it's very premature."
It, in this case, is an announcement by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR), closing several bodies of water near the Canadian border for the state's May 14 walleye fishing opener.
The DNR made the call because of an expected late ice-out in the northern part of state, but resort owner Carole Scott said that decision will hurt her bottom line.
"People from Minneapolis make up a good percentage of our business, and they're not as likely to come up," Scott said. "Every time we miss out on a big group of people because they think the weather is off, it hurts us financially."
The closure of lakes to the north though, will inevitably increase traffic on lakes to the south, where anglers will have to turn for opening day 2011.
"Probably a lot of people that go up north are going to be spending their opening weekend down here on our local lakes like Island Lake, Boulder Lake, and Fish Lake," Chalstrom's co-owner John Chalstrom said. "Those lakes will probably have a lot of extra traffic this year."
Chalstrom said his store might not see an increase in business, necessarily, just a change in when that business comes.
"Normally our biggest day of the year is the day before opener because that's when everyone comes through when they're going on trips up north," Chalstrom said. "So this year, with so few people going up north, the bigger day will probably be Saturday."
A Saturday that could be boom or bust, depending on your location.
You can find a full list of the affected bodies of water at the Minnesota DNR web site.
Posted by Zach Schneider
zschneider@northlandsnewscenter.com
0 comments:
Post a Comment