Is rain good for muskie fishing?

Often yes — for the light and the weather that comes with it, not the water falling. Steady rain usually arrives with thick cloud, a falling barometer and wind, the same package that produces the classic muskie activity spike ahead of a front, and raindrops break up the surface so the low-light advantage lasts all day instead of two hours. Fish it like a long dusk: cover water over weed edges and rock with bucktails and topwater, and finish every cast with a figure-8, because followers are harder to see under a pocked surface. The exceptions are a cold, hard rain on the back side of the front, which fishes like the post-front shutdown, and any thunderstorm — a graphite rod on open water is a lightning risk, so get off the lake.

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