Minnesota has just over 100 lakes and rivers considered prime for muskie fishing, and the state Department of Natural Resources wants your input on how to manage them.

This week, the DNR started a yearlong process as fisheries staff rewrite the statewide muskie management plan for the next 15 years.

Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) fisheries biologist Dan Wilfond holds a big female muskie captured during test netting on Island Lake Reservoir north of Duluth, Minn. In March 2024, the DNR started a yearlong process as fisheries staff rewrite the statewide muskie management plan for the next 15 years. As part of reworking the management plan, the DNR is seeking input from anglers. (Courtesy of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources)

By many accounts, muskie angling in the North Star State is good, including the fact that state records for both kept fish and catch-and-release fish were caught in recent years. (Both from Mille Lacs Lake.)

But the DNR knows that not everyone is satisfied with the current state of muskie angling here, so they’re asking anglers to take an online survey to start the planning effort. The agency also has reached out to meet with angling groups like Muskies Inc. and the Minnesota Muskie Alliance.

“Do people want more fish? Do they want to catch five fish a day? Or would they rather have fewer but bigger muskies? We are asking for that input right now, on a statewide basis,” Leslie George, the Northeast Region fisheries manager leading the effort for the DNR, told the News Tribune. “This is about the next 15 years of muskie management. … Take the survey and tell us what you think.”

The process isn’t about specific lake or river regulations or goals; those are set in individual lake plans. Instead, the management plan is the DNR’s guiding philosophy on how to manage muskies statewide.

Keith Okeson, past president of the Lake Superior Chapter of Muskies Inc., said the DNR is already five years overdue in rewriting the plan. Since the last plan was written, Okeson noted, muskie angling pressure has greatly increased while stocking has declined.

“We had a world-class muskie fishery in Minnesota until about five years or so ago, and since then, it’s gone downhill, mainly because they aren’t stocking enough,” said Okeson of Moose Lake.

Okeson cited Mille Lacs as an example.

“The fishing pressure there went way up, the stocking went down, and all we see now are the big, trophy fish, the 55-inchers,” he said. “We need to see more year classes coming up through the system, not just in Mille Lacs but all the lakes.”

George said the DNR has been gathering more and different types of data in recent years that can help guide the muskie plan.

“We know more now about what lakes are producing well and what lakes maybe are under-producing,” she said.

While the last muskie plan also included northern pike, the new plan will be on muskies only, George said. Pike have been well accounted for in recent, region-specific changes in management efforts, such as length regulations.

“We’ll let those changes settle in for a few years and then take another look at pike down the road,” she said.

Changes in muskie management could include more stocking, and stocking bigger fish that are more likely to survive, George said.

Of the 102 lakes managed for muskies — that’s just 2% of the state’s fishing lakes — about 60 are stocked. The remaining lakes have self-sustaining populations. In the past, the DNR has stocked 10- to 12-inch muskies. But research shows many of them get eaten by bigger fish and that waiting another year, to release 15- to 20-inch muskies instead, might produce better results.

So far, the DNR has no plans to introduce muskies to waters where they don’t currently swim, George said, but that could change with public input.

“The focus is how to make the lakes we have better, provide a better angling experience,” she said.

A 2018 statewide angler survey found about 11% of Minnesota anglers pursue muskies at least one day each year, and that’s more than 100,000 people. Okeson said he believes the number is even higher now, and anglers use the latest sonar technology to find muskies easier.

Allen Brandt, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) fisheries specialist, Jason Kahler of the Lake Superior Chapter of Muskies Inc., and Alisha Hallam, assistant DNR area fisheries supervisor, remove fish caught in a test net on the St. Louis River Estuary during a muskie research effort in 2023. In March 2024, the DNR started a yearlong process as fisheries staff rewrite the statewide muskie management plan for the next 15 years. As part of reworking the management plan, the DNR is seeking input from anglers. (Courtesy of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources)

“We have a lot more muskie fishermen than we did 10 years ago, and they are getting a lot better at catching them,” he said.

A webinar about the muskie plan update process is planned for this fall, and the public will be able to review and provide input on a draft plan by next winter.

Muskies are a large, popular predator fish native to Minnesota. The Minnesota DNR manages muskies by stocking them into waters, setting harvest and season regulations, population monitoring and research as well as providing outreach and education about muskies.

As part of the plan update, the DNR is considering ways to enhance muskie stocking in lakes that already have muskies, how to ensure that hatcheries can produce enough quality-sized muskies to meet stocking needs in these lakes, and options for improving public education surrounding muskie biology, ecology and management.

Don’t blame muskies

Muskies are often blamed for eating other popular but smaller game species. But recent Minnesota DNR science on muskie diets shows that, on a population level, pike and bass consume much more food than muskies in the lakes where they are both present.

The research found that muskies consumed a wide range of prey, but the primary makeup of muskie diets are yellow perch, white sucker, bullheads, invertebrates and northern pike. Cisco can also be important in those lakes where their populations are abundant. Walleye are not an important component of muskie diets.

Some big fish

Minnesota’s largest kept muskie was caught in 2021 and was 56 inches long and weighed 54 pounds. The largest catch-and-release category fish was caught in 2022 and was 58.25 inches long and estimated to weigh 65 pounds. Both came from Mille Lacs Lake.

Take the survey

To learn more about muskies in Minnesota, go to dnr.state.mn.us/fish/muskellunge/index.html.

To take the DNR muskie survey, scroll to the bottom of that page and click on “Tell us what you think.”

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A boy was critically injured in a Friday night shooting and St. Paul police took a 13-year-old girl into custody.

Police said they are investigating the circumstances of the shooting.

Officers responded to a report of a person shot just before 9 p.m. in the 800 block of Pierce Butler Route in the Frogtown neighborhood. They located a boy, believed to be 11, who had been shot in the head, said Sgt. Mike Ernster, a St. Paul police spokesman.

St. Paul fire medics rushed the child to Regions Hospital where he was being treated for a life-threatening injury as of Friday night.

Police learned a 13-year-old girl was a possible suspect, found her in the 100 block of Charles Avenue and took her into custody, Ernster said. She was expected to be placed at the Ramsey County Juvenile Detention Center on suspicion of second-degree assault.

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What was supposed to be a heavyweight bout Friday in Denver quickly resulted in a no contest.

The Timberwolves delivered an early-round knockout of the defending champs, dropping the Nuggets 111-98 to reclaim the top spot in the Western Conference and give themselves the inside track to the No. 1 seed with just two weeks to play in the regular season.

Minnesota (51-22) is now even with Oklahoma City in the standings and owns the tiebreaker over the Thunder thanks to a better Northwest Division record. The same will be true with Denver (51-23) — who’s currently a half-game back of both teams — even if the Nuggets win the final regular-season meeting between the two teams on April 10.

So Minnesota owns both head-to-head tiebreakers and only could potentially lose out on the top spot in a three-way tie situation. That’s why Friday’s tilt was so massive. And the Timberwolves delivered a resounding message for all around the league to hear: The West may very well run through Minnesota.

If the goal is to be playing your best basketball at this time of year, Minnesota delivered further evidence that it’s doing just that. The Wolves have won seven of their last eight games, with six of the seven victories coming via double digits, including impressive triumphs over the Clippers, Cavaliers and now the Nuggets.

The Wolves blitzed Denver from the get-go Friday. They led by as many as nine in the opening frame and opened the second quarter on a 12-4 run to go up 15.

The lead ballooned to 26 in the third quarter.

Denver edged Minnesota 115-112 just 10 days prior, but that result came on a night where Minnesota was missing Naz Reid and Rudy Gobert, on top of Karl-Anthony Towns being out. The Wolves were literally center-less.

Towns, of course, was still out Friday, as was Denver star guard Jamal Murray. But Gobert’s presence made all the difference for the Wolves. The center finished with 21 points, 11 rebounds and three blocked shots while engineering another masterful team defensive performance.

Everything Denver did offensively was difficult. The Nuggets — who pride themselves on ball and player movement — simply couldn’t operate on that end of the floor. Denver shot 40% from the floor and 29% from deep.

“We’ve got that defensive mindset. We’ve got an individual mindset that we’re not going to let our guy score on us. And you can sense that down the bench,” Wolves guard Mike Conley said in his postgame television interview. “When guys are playing that way, you get the energy picked up a little bit, and defense can travel. So that’s how you win on the road.”

MVP frontrunner Nikola Jokic had 32 points and 10 rebounds but just five assists, and he shot 11 for 24 from the field. Minnesota has done a better job than everyone else this season of eliminating the distribution that makes Jokic so special.

The big man averages nine assists per game but has 10 total in three games against Minnesota. Nuggets fans and analysts on social media noted again that Minnesota matches up better than anyone else with Denver.

The reasoning for that belief in the past was centered on Minnesota’s sheer size with Gobert and Towns. And that obviously helps. But Minnesota continues to give Denver issues even without Towns’ presence.

The Timberwolves’ length and execution suffocates Denver.

And offensively, Minnesota’s balanced, heavy ball movement approach continues to hum, as it has for weeks. Conley continued his recent dominance by scoring 23 points on the strength of 5-for-6 shooting from deep. Anthony Edwards scored 25 points, including five late free throws as Denver desperately tried to claw back into a contest in which it was never competitive.

Jaden McDaniels added 17 points. Minnesota was just 9 for 28 from deep, but a blistering 63% on two-point attempts, including going 9 for 14 on non-paint two-pointers.

In three meetings, Minnesota now owns two blowout wins over the Nuggets and a narrow defeat in which the Wolves were down three bigs.

The current standings may very well reflect the current truth: The Timberwolves are the best in the West. And they only appear to be getting better.

“We’ve still got a ways to go. We’ve experienced some ups and downs along the way, but this team has experienced a lot, we’ve fought through injuries, we’ve fought through some losing streaks, some winning streaks,” Conley said. “Figuring out how to sustain winning is tough to do, so this group is learning, and hopefully we’ll put it all together at the right time.”

Federal authorities say a 19-year-old St. Paul man involved in a shootout between occupants of two vehicles last year that led to a police pursuit and a crash into a downtown restaurant has pleaded guilty to illegally possessing a machine gun.

Moesha Isiah Hart

Moesha Isiah Hart was among the three people arrested after one of the SUVs, which was stolen, crashed into the Ox Cart Ale House in Lowertown, according to the U.S. attorney’s office in Minneapolis.

According to the charges, St. Paul police were called just before 4:30 p.m. Feb. 15, 2023, on a report of shots fired in the 300 block of Luella Street near Interstate 94 and Ruth Street. The caller said people in a black Jeep were chasing and shooting at the occupants of a white Jeep and that the gunfire sounded as if it were from an automatic weapon.

Officers spotted the black Jeep near Third and Ruth streets; the front license plate was missing and the rear window had been shot out. The driver fled. Officers pursued the Jeep on Ruth Street to Minnehaha Avenue, McKnight Road and Interstate 94. When the Jeep exited the freeway at Sixth Street, the police pursuit was terminated for safety reasons, the complaint said.

The Jeep continued to flee and eventually ran a red light at Sixth and Wall streets, crashed into another vehicle and then into the unoccupied Ox Cart Ale House, which was temporarily closed. The driver of the struck vehicle was not injured.

The three suspects then jumped out of the Jeep and tried to flee police on foot before being arrested. In addition to Hart, James Quran Baker, 18, and a 17-year-old male were arrested.

On the floor of the restaurant, near the Jeep’s driver’s side door, officers recovered a loaded Glock Model 45 9-mm pistol with an inserted high-capacity magazine and an attached switch, a conversion device that turns a handgun into a fully automatic machine gun. Approximately 11 cartridge casings were located in and around the driver’s area of the Jeep, including one outside the Jeep on the floor of the restaurant. Police later determined that the Jeep had been reported stolen in St. Paul in December 2022.

Hart was charged with motor vehicle theft, fleeing police in a motor vehicle, aiding and abetting drive-by shooting, possession of a machine gun and possession of a firearm without a permit.

Hart pleaded guilty Thursday in U.S. District Court before Judge Jerry W. Blackwell to one count of possession of a machine gun. A sentencing hearing will be scheduled later.

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