Elk Lake Fish Shelters

15 documented locations. 45 structures. Antrim County, Michigan.

Every documented shelter site on Elk Lake, cross-checked against association records and state permit data - and re-surveyed by a biologist in 2025.

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Copy the file onto an SD card, put the card in your unit, and use its import or waypoint menu. If the unit can't see it, move it out of any folder. Read the notes first.

Fishing the whole chain? All 63 locations across Torch, Elk, Bellaire, Clam and Intermediate in one file: Elk River Chain (ZIP)

What's down there

Three structures at every location - a hardwood crate packed with brush and rock, a fabricated slab tree, and a stump cluster with the roots still attached. 45 in total, sitting in 15 to 25 feet. Placed 2012-2013 by the Elk River Chain of Lakes Fish Shelter Committee under Michigan DEQ permit 12-05-0008-P.

An Elk-Skegemog Lakes Association biologist survey checked these in 2025 and found them in place.

Before you keep anything: the 2026 Michigan Eat Safe Fish Guide lists these limits for Elk Lake.

Always check the current guide before you keep fish. Michigan updates these every year and they can change without warning — what is listed here is the 2026 edition, read in July 2026. The live guide is at michigan.gov/eatsafefish, which has a lake-by-lake lookup and full serving sizes.

Accuracy

Good to about 80 feet in any direction. Idle over the mark and read your sonar rather than expecting to drop straight onto the structure.

Every location the permit accounts for is here - 15 permitted, 15 built, 15 mapped.

These are the documented shelters, not every piece of structure in Elk Lake. Plenty goes in without paperwork and none of that is here.

Where this came from

Coordinates published by the Three Lakes Association and the Elk-Skegemog Lakes Association, who ran the project with several partner organizations. Counts, depths and dates come from Michigan EGLE permit 12-05-0008-P via mienviro.michigan.gov.

We didn't put these in the lake - volunteers did, over five years. If this file is useful to you, consider joining or donating to one of those associations.

Fish them considerately

Frontage here is largely private. The water is public, the shoreline is not. Give docks room and don't leave line on the structure - a shelter wrapped in braid stops holding fish.

The rest of the chain

The Elk River Chain is fourteen lakes and rivers over 55 miles. Five of them carry documented fish shelters from the same program:

All Michigan fish shelter downloads →

Found one that isn't where we said? Tell us: [email protected]
Coordinates are approximate and not for navigation.