Freshwater sport fishing in Montreal, Quebec and Ontario.

Ice fishing for carp - first attempt

2012-01-10T16:36:00.000-08:00

Headed our alone to attempt icing my first carp. The area I went to is supposed to be a good wintering spot for carp and other bottom feeders. An aquaintance was there a few days earlier with an Marcum underwater camera, and confirmed that their were tons of small carp around, as well as some channel cats.

I also took the opportunity to test my new 6 inch Fin Bore manual ice auger. Drilling holes was a piece of cake compared to my 8 inch Swede bore. However, due to the small diamter, I decided to go with oversized holes for carp, as even a small carp would be tough to pull through a 6 inch hole. I ended up drilling 4 holes next to each other, then getting rid of the connecting ice in between the holes. Made a few of these giant holes, so I easily drilled over 20 holes with it into 9 - 10 inches of solid ice. Didn't even end up with sore muscles. Anyone want to buy a used 8 inch Swede Bore?

I set up 2 carp lines. The first one was similar to my warm water setup, basically a sliding sinker on superbraid mainline with a superbraid hair rig. I improvised on the next line, figuring I would try to go stealth with flourocarbon and no connecting swivels. I first tied a hair rig onto about 20 feet of flourocarbon, then connecting it directly to my mainline with a uni knot. Used a couple small split shots to get it down, but still had to deal with the memory on the flourocarbon.

I use canned corn as bait, chumming lightly, tried some home made boilies as well. Set up my baitrunner, and clipped strike indicator bells on the rods. While waiting for the carp to bite, I set up a third rod with a Rapala jigging Rap, using a steel leader due to the high volume of small pike in the spot.

Fishing was very slow. Got spot checked by the game wardens, apparently they were out everywhere with the warm weather, as we're supposed to be getting a cold front and storm system moving in tonight.

Moved from spot to spot every hour or two. Nothing much doing most of the day. Finally, around 3 PM, I got my first hit on the flourocarbon hair rig. Not much of a hit and then nothing. I set the hook only to pull it out of the fish's mouth, not sure if it was a carp or possibly a channel catfish.

Went back to jigging the Rapala ice fishing lure. As nothing much was hitting, I removed the leader to improve it's action. Sure enough, I end up with a fish on, but it cut my line on the way up, so I'm quite sure it was a small pike.

That was it for the day. No fish landed, couple misses. Another guy fishing the spot came over to chat for much of the day, as his pike lines weren't too busy either. I think he ended up landing 4 on 10 lines. A few others showed up late in the day, and landed a small channel catfish on a live minnow.

I will probably hold off targeting carp through the ice until the bigger ones move in later in the winter. However, I may decide to try some open water winter carping again... Stay tuned.

Ice fishing for rainbow trout

2012-01-04T11:13:00.000-08:00

2012 is here, made it out for my first outing with my eldest son Ari. After pushing off the trip due to blistering cold, I ended up with the same weather for this outing.

After trying a few outfitters that stock mainly speckled trout, we decided to try a new one that has some bigger rainbow trout as well.

We headed up to Pourvoirie Coin Lavigne it the same Come / Zec Lavigne region of Quebec. With ground temperature of -22 and a wind chill of -34 in the early morning, we were in no particular hurry. We got up there a bit after 10:00 AM after a 2 hour drive from Montreal. We parked, packed our gear and one of the employees drove us up the mountain to Lac en Coeur by quad.

While he drilled our holes for us outside, my son and I got to work in the small cabin I rented. I set up a fire, while my son baited the "brimbales", Quebec's version of a tip up (actually a tip down).

Once the fire was going, I went out to set the lines. Dropped my first one down. As I was dropping the second one a few feet away, the first one went down, fish on! Pulled out 12 inch rainbow trout through the small hole, my first fish of 2012.

As I only paid for one license/quota (10 trout), we only had 5 lines to fish with. After setting up the rest of the brimbales, I got to work rigging the 2 ice fishing rods we brought along. One they were set up, we got to swapping them for 2 of the brimbales, as fishing with my "special" 2 hook setup with jigging rods is way more efficient and fun than handling trout on heavy Dacron line.

As soon as my first line hit bottom, I had another hit, fish on again! I landed 13 inch trout, which had my son commenting about me leaving some fish for him. I reset the line, gave him the rod, and proceed to bait up my new 30 inch Ugly Stik ice fishing rod, the newest addition to my Ugly Stik arsenal.

Sure enough, I got another hit as soon as the line hit bottom, pulled up a nice 14 inch trout. The medium action made it better than my other fast action rod, and my son was now freaking out.

As I went back to re-bait the line, one of the brimbales went down. My son grabbed it, and hauled out our biggest trout of the day, a 19 inch / 3 lb beauty. I guess they weren't kidding about stocking nice sized rainbows in their lakes, nor about being able to fill a quota in a few hours, as we were almost halfway there after the first hour.

That was it for the brimbale action. The rest of our quota came on the 2 ice fishing rods we brought. Using a multiple hook/micro jig set up, I actually caught my first ever double header of trout, something never done before at that outfitter, as everyone fishes the single hook brimbales. I eventually filleted some trout for shore luch, they turned out delicious as expected.

The only drawback was the cold weather. Though were were properly dressed, our holes kept freezing up within minutes. The spatula they provided didn't have a chisel like mine, nor did they provide a chisel. The 6 inch holes quickly turned to 4 inch holes, but their employee returned later in the day and drilled us some new ones.

In addition to the holes freezing up, my beer turned to slush withing a few minutes, so I had to let it warm up in the heated cabin. No sipping beer in my folding chairs while "enjoying" the weather. On the bright side, I got to test my new Baffin polar proven boots, rated good until -100 Celsuis (-148 Farenheit). They held up super well as expected.

I definitely recommend Pourvoirie Coin Lavigne to anyone wanting to try ice fishing for big trout. They stock more trout than any other spot I've been to over the last 15 years, and their rates a reasonably priced for the quality/size of their fish. Apparently, they stock 80,000 trout in their lakes every year (most during the spring/summer), and are stocking a new trophy lake with rainbow trout up to 10 lbs. They also have a nice lodge, fully equipped with a restaurant and bar, etc.

To get in touch with Pourvoire Coin Lavigne, call 800 872-1072, ask for Sylvain Turenne. Ask him to set you up in "my" spot, tell him I referred you, or simply give him my regards.

Happy 2012 from Freshwater Phil and the crew!

Pre winter carp fishing

2011-12-03T19:11:00.000-08:00

Well, it looks like I know myself by now. I though my previous carp outing was my last, with that possible "maybe one more" in the back of my mind. Despite a super busy work schedule, I made some time to head out to try some freezing water carping.

The weather was less than desirable, about 8 degrees, intermittent rain and high winds. Had the long johns, down coat, tuques, gloves a winter boots on to stay warm. Water temp must have been around 2 degrees, so I was surprised to see a few carp surfacing.

Rigged a few corn nibblets along with a popup corn on my hair rig, did some slight chumming so as not to overfeed them in the cold water. Took about 1.5 hours for my first hit. The line didn't peel off as it usually does in the summer, it just started moving slowly. As soon as I set, I knew the fish was a decent sized carp. It didn't fight too much, was kind of sluggish in the freezing water, but I didn't expect more from a carp in freezing water. Regardless, I was happy to land the nice 22 lbs carp, my record for latest carp caught in a season.

Though I doubt I'll go again before the winter, I won't say never...

Cold water carp fishing

2011-11-14T18:33:00.000-08:00

Cold water isn't very conducive to fishing for carp. Though I've caught carp early in the spring while there was still ice on the surface, as carp metabolisms slow down for the winter, they get harder to catch once the water temps dip below 50 degrees Farenheit during the fall. As such, I normally put away my carping gear by mid October.

I recently learned of a new spot where the carp were still biting despite the water temp being down to about 40 degrees Farenheit. With a warm, sunny day forecast, I decided to make it out to the new spot, a region I have never fished before.

I took along some frozen corn nibblets, as well as some small boilies I made a while ago. My fishing buddy decided to stick with frozen corn. We finallt hit the spot around 10:00 AM. Met up with some other people that had been fishing for carp there over the past week, they seemed to be on to some fish, most of them smaller than I had ever seen, small 1-2 pound carp. They were float fishing with tiny hooks, pobably #8 or #10, which would probably explain why most of their carp were that size, though they did eventually catch some better 10 lbs+ fish.

My buddy and I both started off fishing with corn. Took him about 1/2 hour to get his first one, a good 12 lbs carp. Nice start to the day. Fishing was very slow after that. After about 2 hours, he hooked one of the baby carp the others had been catching earlier on.

I switch to my home made boilies. Nothing doing for another couple hours, so we moved off to another spot. The new spot wasn't any better, and to make matters worse, the slight current kept fouling my presentation with dying weeds.

With less than 1 hour left to our day, I headed back to the first spot, as it was on our way back to the car. I hooked up 4 corn nibblets, along with a fake pop up corn nibblet I had bought over the summer on my hair rig. Sure enough, I got hit within a couple minutes of my first cast. The carp ran surprisingly fast considering the near freezing water temperature, and put up a nice fight. Finally landed it, noticed a big lamprey stuck to it's back. After a couple quick pics, I released the fish, but stomped the lamprey to death.

Needless to say, we were both thrilled to have landed carp big enough to make the drags sing. The sweet sound of the reel from those few screaming runs and the big bend in my new 9 foot Ugly Stik is the prefect way to end my perfect carp season... Well, maybe just one more outing ...

New fishing gear and tackle review

2011-11-03T19:35:00.000-07:00

The 2011 fishing season was by far the one where I've tried the most new fishing gear / tackle. Last fall, I won a $1000 gift certificate from Outdoor Canada magazine, which I put to good use by splurging on some fancy reels I never would have bought, as well as stocking up on a varitey of fishing lures and terminal tackle.

Here are my reviews by equipment type:

Reels.
This is where I splurged the most. I've never owned a fishing reel worth more than $50, so I bought one for bass/pike (Abu Garcia STX20) and another for carp/catfish (Penn Slammer 560 liveliner).

The Abu Garcia reel is extremely smooth, and delivers up to 15 lbs of drag, very impressive for a small, light reel. It comes with grooves in the spool, and matching elastic bands to hold superbraid lines to the reel to avoid line slippage. Overall, I'm very happy with the reel, though I'm not sure I'd pay the kind of money (about $150)if I had to buy it on my own. Only drawback is that it wasn't available in a 30 series, which would have been my choice. Faced with a 20 or 40, I pick the 20 due to it's light weight. In most situations, it holds enough 20 lb superbraid (6 lb diameter) for most of my needs.

The Penn reel is a real piece of work. Designed to still fish live bait in saltwater, it more than suits my needs for the monster carp I target so often. It holds about 400 feet of 65 lbs superbraid, also deliver 15 lbs of drag, although I rarely fish with more than 3 lbs of drag for carp, especially with superbraided line that has zero stretch. The transition from liveliner/baitrunner mode to normal is almost instant, and extremely smooth, unlike the cheaper Chinese baitrunner reels I've been using. It also doesn't jam up like they do, which is extremely important unless you plan on loosing rods when carps take off with them. Though I never would have spent that sort of money (about $165) on a baitrunner reel, I see myself possibly getting another one somwhere down the line.

Rods:
I'm not one to tinker with fancy rods. In fact, I can't stand them. A couple of my friends spend $150-$250 for bass/pike rods, and these rods are constantly breaking one way or another. Though they may be guaranteed, chasing after the rod repair guy is a colossal waste of time.

Over the years, I've found 2 brands I'm happy with; Rhino, and Shakespere Ugly stik. I already had a 6.5 Ugly Stik, I decided to get a 7 footer, as Basspro wouldn't ship anything longer into Canada. I had planned to mount the Penn liveliner on it, but to my dismay, it was too big. My friend Jimmy bailed me out by selling me an 8 foot Saltwater Ugly stick that was well matched to my new reel.

The 7 foot freshwater Ugly stick didn't do all that well as a bass/pike rods. It's a bit on the heavy side, and frequetly comes apart when casting a lot. I mounted a 40 series baitrunner and used it for carp, it did very well until the water got too shallow and I started getting frequent cut offs from big carp in the rocks.

The 8 foot saltwater Ugly stick is much beefier. It comes with a stronger backbone and longer butt. Surprisingly, the upper section is quite wobbly whern compared to the freshwater series. However, when it comes to fishing for big carp, a wobbly rod is a good thing. Acts as a shock absorber when fishing with stiff superbraid line and small hooks. It had no problems whatsoever handling big carp and channel cats, I even used it to troll small musky lures later on in the season.

Towards the end of the season, my local fishing store got the 9 foot freshwater Ugly Stiks in stock. I picked one up for my last successful carp outing of the season. After fighting the first fish of the day on it, I fell in love with the rod. Perfect combination of strenth and flexibity, very light too. Fits my Penn Slammer perfectly as well. It's only drawback is being too long to fit in my house or most cars without breaking it down each time. Just picked up another one on special for next season.

Line:

This season, I had the opportunity to test various lines under many conditions. Mainly superbraids, and briefly Flourocarbon as well.

Power Pro 20 lbs (6 lb diameter).

Picked up a 1500 yard spool at the end of 2010, was waiting to see how it faired in 2011. Spooled it up on my new Abu Garcia STX20 bass/pike reel. I immediately noticed it's benefits, strength and castability, as well as a major downside: zero resistance to sharp rocks. Funny how you can get a line that easier to cut on a rock than with a pair of scissors or a line clipper. Less funny when you start losing lures every time you graze a rock. I lost about 4-5 crankbaits, and that was it. The line is resigned to being spooled on my kids reels, or being fished in waters where the cover is logs or weeds.

Power Pro 50lbs (12 lb diameter) & 65 lbs (15 lb diameter).

While this line did well for carp in 2010 when the water levels at my hotspot were extremely high, the low water in the 2011 season quickly exposed the weak side of this line, anmely, it's low resistance to sharp rocks. Slightly more resistant than the 20 lb test version, I still lost a good 20 carp duie to cut offs, some while the reel was in free spool, before I even had a chance to get a hookset. Not to mention the expesive carp hooks and rest of the terminal tackle to go along with it. The 65 lb version didn't do any better than the 50 lbs.

In October, I had the chance to meet an American industrial engineer. Somehow, he started talking abut Spectra fibers. When i mentioned Power Pro being made from spectra braid, he exdplained how they streched the fiber to it's breaking point to give it the thin diameter. I guess that would explain why it snaps at the slightest tough of a sharp object...

Sufix 832 20 lbs test, 6 lb diameter.

I first saw this line at a fishing show early in 2011. I was hoping to get a chance to give it a try. A few weeks later, my buddy called me from the store, said they had the 20 lb version on special, so I asked him to get me a spool.

I spooled up my second bass/pike rod for our yearly family trip up North for the bass opener. Plan was to test it in neutral waters, side by side with the 20 lbs Power Pro. The Sufix 832 did extremely well. Cast just as far (if not further) as Power Pro, and is better in the weeds due to it being less round. Only drawback is that you have to handle it more carfully when trying to pull on it with bare hands, it cuts skin easily much like Fireline does. It also gets discolored quickly, but I don't think it affects it's performance.

Sufix 832 65 lb test, 17 lb diameter.

After the success of the 20 lb version, and the disastrous performance or Power Pro in the rocks, I picked up the 65 lb version of Sufix 832 to try on my carp reels. Results have been very good so far. About 15-20 carp landed in waters where they cut my Power Pro 60% of the time, not one cut off to date with the Sufix 832. I've switched my reels to it, as well as my hair rigs. Only drawback is that the carp seem to bit slighty more line shy due to it's 17 lbs diameter, wil probably tinker with the 50 lbs version next season as well.

Other lines I tried in 2011.

Tuff Line 80 lb, 20 lb diameter. Horrible line. I guy I fihed with hooked a mid sized carp which eventually spit the hook after a few minutes. When he brough in his line, I noticed 3 distinctive nicks where the carp had hit the rocks. A slight tug on each nick managed to snap the line like butter. Fish were also line shy due to it's 20 lb diameter.

Fireline XDS 80 lbs, 25 lb diameter. Extremely resistant to rocks, acually saw it chip of chunks from a sharp rock when running it along the edge to test it's strenght. Problem is it's diameter. Carp wouldn't get near it, as it's thick and rigid like telephone wire. Did manage a mid size channel catfish on it, but they don't require that sort of line. Also very hard to cast.

Seaguar AbrazX Fluorocarbon 25 lbs. After contemplating switching from superbraid to Fluorocarbon for carp, I researched some new lines. The review all point to AbrazX as being the most resitant to abrasion. I decided to tie some hair rigs from it as well, as it's supposed to be invisible to fish. The hairs ended up tangling on 50% of the casts. When they didn't, they did a fine job of hooking fish. However, when I set up a line with a 40 foot shock leader using the AbrazX, the first carp snapped it just as easily as they did the Power Pro. Also real tough to cast compared to thinner superbraid, so I stopped using it.

Hooks:

Got to test a fair number of specialized carp hooks this season. All hooks tested were size 4, and used in hair rigs with boilies as bait.

Monster carp tackle - These hooks are bottm line. Cheap, less sharp than the fancier brands, I had a number of carp spit them before I stopped using them.

ESP - Raptor and curve shank. I prefer the curve shank, the seem to do a better job hooking and holding fish. Teflon coated, micro barbed, extremely sharp and mid range cost ($0.75 - $0.80 per hook).

Kamasan B775 - Another good hook, sharp effective at hooking and holding fish, only started using them towards the end of the season.

Nash Fang X - Their number 4 are bigger than other brands, hooks are about $1.00 each. Didn't get to test them this season, but at that price, they better perform...

Lures:

Main lure I got to really test this season was the Lucky 13 by Heddon. I had 2 sizes, the larger one with 3 trebles did a great job, while the smaller one was mediocre. Aslo did a fair bit of casting using a 1/2 ounce Booyah tux tail spinnerbait with double Colorado blades. Cast a mile, works great, you can really feel the blades working even without a fancy rod.

Caddis neoprene stocking foot waders - First chance I got to test them in really cold water, probably around 40 degrees or so. They held snug, kept me warm, despite me being in waist deep, freezing cold water for 4 hours, as well as a slight drizzle all day.

Gardiner bait rolling tables (rolaball and suasage rolling tables). Despite trying a number of boiolie recipes, I haven't been able to roll a perfectly round boilie. Testing continues after much back and forth with their customer service department, but my small bait freezer is quickly running out of space. On the bright side, I won't be needing as many boiles next season...

My 2011 fishing season

2011-11-03T12:25:00.000-07:00

Well, it's that time of the year again, looks like my soft water fishing season is just about over. It was another great season. Caught some new species, discovered news spots, tried new gear and techniques, and made some new friends.

As I've been doing for the past few seasons, I'll summarize the season, starting with the predatory species:

Largemouth bass:

Had another great season. Caught about a dozen largemouth bass over 4 lbs. Devoted more time to catching largemouth bass at the surface on topwater lures. The technique proved very successful and much more fun than other bass fishing methods. Caught my biggest bass of the season (4.75 lbs) on a Zara Spook, and my 9 year old son Levi caught 2 bass one 1 lure on the same cast.

Had a great largemouth family trip up North again, and my dad managed to win the FPQ contest due to that trip.

Hope to target them under the ice during the winter...

Smallmouth bass:

Hardly fished for smallies at all this season, caught a few in the 2-3 lb range.

Walleye:

Din't get around to targeting them at all, mainly to the extremely high water levels during the spring. I only caught one all season, it came on my first outing fishing between chunks of melting ice in March.

Don't think I'll be targeting them too much next season either, though you never know when fishing the St Lawrence.

Northern Pike:

Put a bit more time into targeting and catching Northern pike this season. Found a few great new fishing spots for pike, for spring, summer and fall. Spring was pretty good for trolling, my 5 year old Eli caught his first pike on a Wally Diver.

I put some time and effort into catching them on topwaters as well, especially as pike and largemouth bass often share the same structure.

Also managed a few decent pike from the shore, all in biking distance from my home.

How to invest more time in targeting pike next season.

Musky:

Didn't bother with musky until the fall. Then 2 things happened:

1) I started biking down to the river and decided to put a few hours targeting pike/musky each time. Though I got a late start, I managed a couple follows and 1 small musky landed.

2)My friend and guide Mike invited me out to troll for muskies on a coupe occasions. Landed a nice one, lost even a bigger one. One things for sure, they always make for impressive pics.

Well see what happens next season...

Salmonides:

Brook/rainbow trout.

Not a species I target too often, I got a couple chances at them in 2011. Started off ice fishing for stocked rainbow trout and brook trout with the kids. Didn't do too well, but the outfitter guaranteed the fish. Ari caught one, we got another 19 from his freezer.

Lake trout / landlocked salmon.

Mike came through again, invited me out to troll Lake Champlain in May. Not something I'd ever attempt on my own, he put me on to some tasty fish.

Bottom Feeders:

Sturgeon.

Didn't target sturgeon much this season, so it's not surprising that I didn't catch any. If I'm going to be still fishing from the shore, I'd rather stick with carp, unless I get invited out to fish them by boat.

Channel catfish:

Caught a few while night fishing, then a few more that took my boilies while fishing for carp. Big surprise was this 14 lb catfish caught by my wife right in middle of the day during a heat wave.

Carp:

Last but not least, one of my favorite species. I devoted a lot more time to effectively targeting and catching them in conditions that were often tougher than in the past, due mainly to the extremely low water on the other side of the dam at Cornwall. Tried new rods, reels, lines hooks and bait, including some home made boilies for the first time. Took out new and old friends, family and the kids on many successful outings.

Starting with the kids, Ari, Avi and Levi all managed to catch their biggest carps this season, and while Eli isn't big enough to fight St Lawrence carp yet, He was there for the action as well:

Put some new friends and customers onto carping, as well as old friends onto new techniques for monster carp:

Finally, I landed my first ever mirror carp, an added bonus to my amazing carp fishing season.

Panfish.

Kids didn't get to do too much panfishing, but managed a fair share of bluegill, sunfish, rock bass, perch and bullheads, mainly early season before game fish were open.

There you have it. Another great season. Many big fish landed, and (probably) even bigger ones lost. That's what keeps us going back time after time. Many lessons learned, many good laughs, many good (and sometimes frustrating) moments.

At the end of it all, I plan to start again next season.

Dad wins fishing contest

2011-10-31T07:42:00.000-07:00

Ever since the FPQ launched it's annual fishing outfitter's tournament/contest, we've been participating. It was more of a tournament when it was first launched a few years ago, the prizes were a lot better too. My son Avi had won it at the time, topping out all competition in the kids category for bass.

This year, it was my dad's turn. Though it's a now a drawing based on all participants in the category instead of a tournament based on size, the win is still pretty sweet. His picture was drawn from about 100 participants in the 50 year + category.

He wins a spinning combo, $350 gift ceftificat at our outfitter of chaoce, a free 1 year subscription to Sentier Chasse peche, and a couple tickets to the annual Montreal fishing show in February.

Congratulations!

Catching muskies from the shore in Montreal

2011-10-25T08:35:00.000-07:00

With extended holidays over the past couple weeks, I haven't done much fishing. Finally got back into my regular schedule, and took advantage of sunny skies to bike down the the waterfront a chase muskies from the shore.

The cold water has killed off much of the dense weed cover, but dying weeds are still fouling up some of my presentations. Tried casting a Lucky Strike ol wooden plug as well as a Bomber Long A, both came back with some weeds more often than not. Water temp is a bit cold for topwaters, but despite the wind, I tried with the musky Jitterbug for in a couple shallower spots. Bucktail spinner didn't do much better, though the spinnerbaits came back clean on most casts.

Started of by hitting 2 of my spots, first one was where I saw a couple muskies follow my Musky Jitterbug a couple weeks ago. Nothing doing, not a fish in sight. Eventually found a new spot with less weed growth, was able to cast the diving lures and get a clean retrieve, but still no hits.

Decided to hit one more spot on my way home. Casted a variety of lures, still no hits. Finally decided to try something new, a home rigged contraption I've never tried before. Rigged up a 6 inch swim bait using a big jighead designed for fishing bass tubes. Attached two trebles with a thin wire to from a sort of double quick strike rig, put one of them in it's back, the other on it's belly.

I cast it out far, let it sink a bit and began the retrieve. Bang! Fish on, first cast too! Not the giant I had hoped for, the baby musky measured about 15 inches. Regardless, I was thrilled to finally catch one from the shore intentionally, as most of the few other muskies I've caught from the shore were incidental while jigging.

The fact that it came on a new home made lure on one of my recently restarted biking outings, overshadowed the size of tiny musky. While a tiny musky isn't much to brag about, it means that there are spawning sized ones in the vicinity.

Thanksgiving day fishing outing

2011-10-12T07:32:00.000-07:00

Kids were off school for thanksgiving, which put me on daddy duty again. As usual, fishing was the venue, especially with warm and sunny weather this late in the season.

Kids were split on whether to target bass or carp, so we decided to do fish carp for the first half of the day, then fish for bass the second half.

Set up 3 rods for carp, using a mix of store bought and home produced boilies of different sizes. Fishing was very slow, got one run after about 2 hours, fish snapped the line 50 lb Power Pro before I even had a chance to set the hook. As luck would have it,my new Sufix 832 arrived the next day. Carp haven't managed to snap the 65 lbs Sufix 832 yet, I plan to spool all my carp reels with it for next season.

We then hit our largemouth bass spot around 2:00 PM or so. Was hoping for a bass frenzy typical in mid October, but it seems that the water is still a bit too warm, probably need another week or 10 days until they really turn on. We still managed 8 largemouth bass ranging from 1 to 2 lbs, in about 2 hours of fishing. All of them hit spinnerbaits.

Kids were happy with the outing, and I taught them how to effectively fish a spinnerbait, as none of the other lures produced any hits.

Sewer fishing

2011-10-07T10:15:00.000-07:00

No, you didn't read the tile wrong, and no it's not a typo either. Was coming over to my parents house, and met my sister there. She didn't look too happy, as my brother in law had accidentally dropped their car keys down the sidewalk drain.

He called the city to come and open the drain, I imagine they could have waited for hours. Armed with a flashlight, line a treble hook, I attempted to snag his keys. The sidewalk grain isn't the kind with the grid; rather, it's one with a solid plate with a couple tiny holes, it's opening being on the side, which is where the keys fell in.

I spotted the keys under some leaves towards the back end of the sewer, which meant that I wouldn't be able to snag them without a rod. No sweat, got my 3 foot ice fishing rod, perfect length to reach the back end of the sewer.

Jigged the treble a couple times, caught the key ring on my fourth or fifth try. My sister was thrilled to not be stuck waiting for the city workers, and I saved us taxpayers a few bucks too.

Shore fishing for musky

2011-10-06T14:15:00.000-07:00

After my last musky outing, I decided to attempt shore fishing for musky. Though the Montreal region has no shortage of musky in it's waters, catching from the shore is quite the challenge.

To begin with, I don't have any musky gear, I sold most of it a couple years ago. What I do have left are a couple big Mepps bucktails, a musky Jitterbug and a Lucky Strike Ol' Wooden plug, probably intended for pike, as it's only 6 inches long.

My catfish / sturgeon / carp rods are too big or to cumbersome to haul around and cast all day, same goes for my bigger reels. So I took my larger bass/pike rod, a 6.5 foot Rhino. Medium action rod, has plenty of backbone, I've caught my biggest carp and catfish on that rod. My 30 series Abu Garcia reel is spooled with 20 lbs Sufix 832, so I filled the spare spool with 50 lb Power Pro just in case.

Headed out on back to back outings. First day was sunny with a cold front moving in, very windy. The spot I started at looked good on Google maps. Plenty of shoreline that looked easily accessible. After getting to the water and finding parking, I set out on foot carrying my net and rod in hand, my gear and water in the backpack.

Google maps can be deceiving. Most of the shoreline was very steep, and full of bullrushes everywhere. So much for spending the day casting the 3-4 kilometers I had planned on, I was lucky to find a couple spots that were barely accessible, and only after lots of trekking.

Changed areas after a while, to a spot I knew had occasional muskies passing through. Not much luck on the musky side, though I did have a small pike follow the Lucky Strike trolling plug I was casting. As I made my way along the shoreline, I hit a spot too shallow for my musky lures, so I tied on the one spinnerbait I brought along. Landed a small 2 lb bass on it a few casts later. Switched to 2 more fishing spots for musky, none to be seen, no hits at all.

Headed out the following day, this time by bike. Plan was to hit some spots I previously scouted in hope of getting a nice musky hit my lures. The bike gave me added versatility if required. The outing was kind of short, as I was swamped with work all morning. Finally got to the spots, started off casting a black bucktail spinner. Though I was burning it over the weed tops, it kept catching weeds every time I tried to slow down my presentation. I switched to the Musky Jitterbug. After about a dozen cast, I finally got a musky follow my lure all the way back to shore. It was small for a musky, probably under 2 feet long, but it had me thrilled. I wasn't able to figure eight a topwater lure from the shore, so I splashed it around a bit. The musky wasn't

too interested.

After casting for it repeatedly with no success, I worked my way down the shoreline with the Musky Jitterbug. No more follows, no hits either. The weedline was too thick to switch back to the bucktail lure, so I switched to the 1/2 ounce spinnerbait, more of a pike lure. Sure enough, I hooked a pike after a few casts, about 4-5 lbs. Spit the hook at the shore. Eventually switched spots, found a nice area to throw my bucktail, but no hits. I wood have liked to cast the trolling plug, but I didn't bring it on this outing knowing I was going to fish a weedier area.

I'm quite happy with the small musky following my musky Jitterbug, the pike I hooked was an added bonus. It will give me something to dream of for the next couple weeks. The kids are off school, so I should be on daddy duty, and casting musky lures with the little ones is out of the question. Will probably resort to carp or bass/pike next week, hope to chase some more muskies by boat the week after.

St Lawrence River musky fishing

2011-09-26T17:25:00.000-07:00

My friend and musky pro "Musky" Mike Phillips invited me out for a half day outing. Needless to say, I was more than thrilled, as I rarely have the opportunity to target muskies, let alone with an expert of Mike's caliber.

We headed out to the St Lawrence on his new 20 foot Lund, fully equipped with the latest electronics, kicker trolling motor, etc. Was hoping for at least one fish, the clear blue skies and warm front may have made for a nice day to troll, but not necessarily one for musky fishing in the fall. The clear water in that part of the St Lawrence River doesn't make things any easier for muskies that tend to get finicky when the weather pattern changes. Floating weeds and other debris kept us busy checking our lines quite often too.

Regardless of the tough conditions and short time frame we had on the water, Mike put us onto fish as I expected he would. We got our first hit within 20 minutes of launching. Fish put up quite a good fight. Wasn't a monster musky, but still a nice 40 incher, that I landed within a couple hard fought minutes.

Mike's been tagging muskies for the government this season, but he's caught so many muskies that he's already run out of tags for the season. He measured the musky, logged it into his book, and I released it in good condition after a couple quick pics.

Over the next 3 hours, we quick trolled many of his hot spots spread out over a good 25 kilometer range. Getting from spot to spot was a breeze, his 200 HP engine had us cruising over 90 KM/H. The muskies weren't too cooperative until the last minute. We were just about to call it a day, when another musky hits the line. Bringing it in, it felt heavy but didn't fight at all. Then, 10 feet from the boat, I saw the line coming up at high speed. The big musky jumped straight out of the water doing a twist while shaking it head, threw the lure, and swam off. It seemed to have been hooked funny, kind of on the outside of it's jaw. Best guess is that it hit the lure instead of taking it in as muskies and pike often do.

While I didn't get a picture or accurate measurement of the second musky, I was happy enough to have fought it to the boat, and even happier that I got to see it, otherwise I would have been losing sleep over the one that got away.

I highly recommend Musky Mike for anyone looking to tangle with our top freshwater predator.

You can view his profile on my guides page at: http://freshwaterphil.com/fishing-guides.cfm

Hope to chase some more musky this fall. Stay tuned...

More urban Montreal fishing

2011-09-19T12:59:00.000-07:00

After the instant success I had last time I combined a biking and fishing outing, I decided to do some more urban fishing around Montreal.

As you can probably imagine, it's essential to pack as light as possible, as I'm already hauling extra weight such as adequate amount of drinking water, bike lock, and everything else I need in my back pack. The fact that I live on the other side of the mountain doesn't help much, but it's a great workout climbing Mount Royal in both directions in order to get to the water.

Headed back to the same fishing spot as last time, was hoping another big pike replaced the one I lost their last week, but no such luck. As I noticed the weeds dying down in some areas, I will probably bring along some jigs and crankbaits, as I stuck with surface and subsurface fishing over the past couple outings. Casted a new spinnerbait for about 45 minutes, got 1 small hit near the surface. Couldn't tell whether it was a bass or pike.

Packed it up and headed to another spot not too far away. Hooked into another nice pike after a dozen or so casts, landed it this time around. A decent 5 lbs fish, got my revenge after getting my spinnerbait cut off last week. I fished the spot and some adjacent spots for another 1/2 hour or so, no more hits.

Packed it up again, and headed to a third spot. Explored some weedbeds with a snag proof frog, nothing much doing except for a tiny bass that hit one of it's legs.

Finally headed to my 4th spot of the afternoon, again kind of slow, all I got was 1 follow by a 1.5-2 lbs smallmouth bass.

Urban Montreal street fishing

2011-09-14T18:33:00.000-07:00

With all the time I devote to fishing, I decided to get back to combining it with another pastime I love, riding my bike.

Last summer, my double suspension bike got stolen. That put an end to my urban street fishing / biking combo I was just getting used to. The bike I eventually replaced it with was a lot lighter, but had no suspension. I quickly found out that instead of being able to ride further, I was riding less and less. Finally sold it this summer, and replaced it with an ultra light double suspension model. So now I have the best of both, comfort and light weight. Should keep me motivated to get more urban fishing and biking done.

Enough about my bike. With a cool, sunny afternoon in the forecast, I headed to a spot I had scouted a few days earlier. Looked like a good pike/bass spot, so I started off throwing my favorite spinnerbait. Double Colorado gold hammered blades, about 1/2 oz with a white/chartreuse skirt. Ultra sharp hook I just finished resharpening this morning.

First cast, I get nice sized pike follow my lure all the way back, thick shoulders, a good 6-7 lbs. Couple casts later, same pike busts the surface just as I finish reeling. Another few casts, he comes back with a vicious attack. Grabbed my spinnerbait from the side and inhaled it. I set hard, it heads straight for the weeds. Cuts my line and steals my best spinnerbait!

First time I've ever had a pike steal my spinnerbait, despite the fact that I never bothered using leaders. Must have caught a good 20 pike on that lure, as well as hundreds of bass and a even bowfin a couple weeks ago. Oh well, I'll have to replace it.

Kept fishing, no more fish in sight for about 1 hour. Decided to head to another new spot. I get back on my bike, just to realize I popped my back tire. End of outing, I know have to figure out how to get back home. Luckily, I had my wallet in my backpack, so I had enough cash to catch a metro back home. Took my about 15-20 minutes to get to the closest station, went straight to the bike shop and got the flat fixed.

I was super glad my new spot paid off immediately, despite losing the nice pike and my best spinnerbait. I plan to head back there next week.

Fly fishing adventure - first attempt

2011-09-14T06:03:00.000-07:00

I don't know how to fly fish, and have never tried before. Though I have a decent fly rod my son won a few years ago, I never bothered getting fly line or flies for it. I do eventually plan to give it a shot.

In the meanwhile, I found a type of bobber that allows you to cast flies using a spinning rod. It's called the Crystal cast, sold online at: www.spinandfly.com . I originally ordered in early August, hoping to have a last chance at longnose gar surfacing in the warm water. Due to postal delays, I only received them a few days ago.

With 25 degree weather in the forecast, I figure I may have a slight chance at finding some surfacing gars. I tied some crude hookless lures using some rope, added some red color using a magic marker.

I then found some old vintage flies from my dad's old tacklebox, sharpened the hooks until they were were sticky sharp. I figured I may have a slight chance at hooking into some carp if the gar didn't show.

Packed up some pike/bass gear just in case things went wrong. Also packed water shoes and put on my bathing suit under my pants. Knowing that I have a few kilometeres of trekking through dense bushes, I figured it may be easier to wade the shore line, and cool off at the same time.

Took the hottest day of the week off work, with my luck, we had 25 - 30 KM/H winds gusting. After dosing myself in bug spray to avoid ticks, mosquitoes and of critters found in the dense "jungle", I trekked about 1 kilometer. More rain had washed lots of slit into the water, visibility was about 6 inches. Needless to say, between the coffee colored water and the surface chop, I didn't spot any carp or gar where I was hoping to find them.

The forecast also called for thunderstorms, and after about 1 hour of casting the flies with no success, the clouds and thunder started moving in. There is a bridge further upstream, but in order to get there, I had to cross a stream. Off with the pants and hiking boots, water was still relatively warm. The vegetation on the other shore was too dense to make it through, so I opted to wade my way there, as close to shore as possible. This meant wading through lily pads and other assorted weeds. After watching and episode of "swamp people" a few nights before, I was sure happy we don't get gators this far up North.

Manage to slice open my leg on some sharp rocks I couldn't see, luckily it was nothing serious. Finally got to the bridge, and got out of the water. Cleared all dirt of my feet and legs. Made sure I didn't have any leeches attached to me, and stopped to rest.

The clouds cleared as fast as they had rolled in, so fishing was on again. I could go back where I started, but decided do go further downstream to another spot I figured I may have more success. As I got back in the water, I noticed I was heading into an area with very soft mud, almost like quick sand. Being alone, I wasn't about to take any chances. Off with the watershoes, on with the pants and hiking boots. Now had to cross a few hundred feet of extremely dense bullrushes, about 10-12 feet high. I really could have used my machete, as they were so thick I couldn't see 6 inches in front of me, nor could I see my feet. Finally manage to reach a small clearing at my spot, started casting the flies again, despite not seeing any carp.

Hooked into a small perch, and landed my first fish on a fly.

Having that out of the way, I switched to topwater lures. Go a small hit on my Zara Spook, not much else. Decided to trek further, again the bushes were too thick. Off with the hiking boots and pants, on with the water shoes. Waded the shoreline for another 100 feet or so, then finally hit some ground that was mainly tall grass. Back on with the pants and boots.

By now, the winds worked up too much of a chop for my topwater lures, so I switched to a spinnerbait on one rod, and a subsurface Rapala J-11 on the other. Hooked into a small 2-3 lb pike on the spinnerbait, came off right near the shore. Managed a couple more hits from some really small largemouth bass an the spinnerbait, nothing on the J-11. After a couple hours in the sun with slow fishing, I decided to change area.

Trekked a couple kilometers back to the car, stopped to pick up some cold beer on the way. Headed to an area on the St Lawrence River not too far away. The spot isn't too good this time of the year, overgrown with thick weeds. The high winds had the river in big whitecaps everywhere. Managed about a dozen small hits casting a Spro frog very shallow over a thick weed carpet, but none actually came out to take the lure. I fish next to my car, as I heard the storm rolling in. Sure enough, we got about 10 minutes of heavy rain. I sat it out in the air conditioned car, listening to some good music sipping my ice cold beer. More sun and another half an hour of fruitless fishing, I packed it up and called it a day.

Fishing pike on topwater lures

2011-09-08T08:34:00.000-07:00

Jimmy invited me out for some more pike fishing, Tony joined us as well. With some customers lined up, practicing will ensure successful outings and repeat customers.

We headed out after noon, started fishing about 2:00 PM. A few nice hits in shallow water, small pike and bass landed. We motored down to some of the hot spots, but the water was a lot murkier after lots of rain. As pike are visual predators, the fishing was very tough. Spinnerbaits were the only fighting chance. I tied one on that had orange/red blades, it seemed to outperform the gold and silver they were using, just as Tony had said they would.

Eventually, we switched spots to look for clear water. When we found it, the fishing went from being extremely tough to "on fire". Both Jimmy and Tony started hooking up on their spinnerbaits, while I focused on fishing a topwater lure, using my beloved Zara Spook.

I attempted to fish the Zara Spook using a small leader, but found that the only way to retain some walk the dog action was to keep the rod tip high. It still was getting the side to side slow motion I wanted, so I took the leader off.

As the topwater bite turned on towards evening, the Zara spook got hit over and over again. The key was to work it extremely slowly. When the pike weren't chomping down on it, they were hitting it hard enough to send it flying in the air, which gave us all a good laugh (especially after a couple cold ones).

Eventually, my Zara spook ended up hooking the biggest pike of the outing, a good 6+ lbs.

Unfortunately, I probably won't be able to stay out that late until next season. With the kids back in school, the dinner / homework / bedtime routine is largely my responsibility.

Making boilies - first attempt

2011-09-08T08:13:00.000-07:00

After doing some online research, I decided to attempt making my own boilies. From what I read, it's more rewarding to catch fish on home made baits, so I figured I'd give it a try.

I bought a few basic ingredients after researching many recipes online. When I finally tried to follow the recipes, I failed miserably on my first 2 attempts, couldn't get the dough to work properly. Fed up, I improvised and created my own recipe, substantially changing the fundamentals of what I'd read online. The dough worked on the first shot, I was soon rolling the "sausages".

With my boys off school for Labor day weekend, I took advantage of some child labor, and had them roll the sausages into a couple sizes of boilies, somewhere in the 10 mm and 20 mm range. The balls were a bit on the crude side, but it didn't matter at that point, I just wanted to boil and dry them to see of the dough worked. Sure enough, it did.

My kids were pretty excited to go out and try the boilies they made, so I took them out the following day. One of the local experts mentioned how bad the carp fishing had been all week, so I figured it would be a real good test. I set up 2 rods with my home made boilies, and 1 rod with the standard store bought ones I've used all season. I immediately noticed that the crude shaped home made boilies were very tough to cast accurately, especially into the wind. They took wild turns while flying, kind of like a curve ball having a bad day.

Despite not being able to efficiently chum my lines, the home made boilies got hit first. I was letting my kids try to fight the carp, so we lost the first couple fish. I eventually took the rod, and landed our first carp on a home made boilie. Not a monster, but a good start, and proof that they worked.

Throughout the day, the bite got really good at times, then died down for 1- 2 hours at a time. Levi ended up landing his biggest carp at 14 lbs, and lost another one in that size range.

Avi landed a couple big carp, lost another as well.

The home made boilie lines ended up hooking 6 carp, store bought ones only 2. All this despite running out of home made boilies halfway throughout the day, and not being able to efficiently chum due to their lopsided shape. To top it off, 4 groups of locals were at it that day, fishing different spots in the same area. They ended up landing a whopping 1 fish all day!

I didn't dream of this kind of success on my first attempt at boilie making. Now, I'm ready to get a couple small rolling table to make proper boilies for next season. I foresee more research in the future...

Multi species river fishing

2011-08-19T10:13:00.000-07:00

After dedicating the past 6 weeks to carp fishing, I got invited to do some multi species fishing by Jimmy, my top bass guide (http://thebasstracker.com ) in Montreal. Tony came along as well, so I figured we'd be in for an action packed afternoon/evening outing.

We launched around 3:00 PM, and headed to an area I haven't tried yet, so I tied on a spinnerbait. Landed a tiny pike on my first cast, followed by a perch on my next. Nice to see the perch was aggressive enough to take my 3/4 ounce spinnerbait!

Fishing got much better. The spot is a true pike "factory", I caught another 6 or 7 pike on the spinnerbait, going up to about 5 lbs. Jimmy and Tony managed their share as well, some somersaulting out of the water to Jimmy's torpedo. I'm guessing we caught about 25-30 in total.

In addition to the pike, I managed a small largemouth bass, as well as a nice 4 - 5 lb bowfin on the spinnerbait, first time that happened to me.

Tony managed a gorgeous 4.5 lb smallmouth bass as well.

As the sun started setting, we moved off to another spot to try some topwater lure fishing, one of my all time favorite techniques. First spot was a real jungle, all I could throw was a weedless Spro frog. Got about 6 hits, none actually took the bait.

We moved out of the jungle, to an area that had intermittent weed patches scattered around on a sandy bottom. I tied on one of my favorite topwater lures, a beat up Zara Spook that was originally white and red. Why Jimmy hooked into fish using a high speed presentation with his torpedo, I opted for a super slow walk the dog presentation with the Zara Spook. I skipped the leader to avoid ruining my presentation, despite being in pike infested water.

I was rewarded immediately, I nice 4.5 lb pike took my offering. A few casts later, I got another big hit right next to a thick clump of weeds. The fish dove into the weedbed, I managed to horse it out a continue a nice fight. I assumed it was another pike, until I got it boat side. Supersize largemouth bass for the area and time of year, my biggest bass this season (so far), and biggest I've ever caught on a topwater lure. Weighed in at 4.75 lbs. I forgot to measure it...

After releasing it, I stuck with the Zara Spook as it was on fire. I few missed hits, and I finally got another fish on. I was very surprised to see the big smallmouth bass jump, as I've never hooked one on a topwater lure as big as the Zara Spook. I landed the fish, a good 3+ lbs.

It was nearly dark by now, I we had to make it back to land the boat before while we could still see what we were doing.

After dedicating so much of my season to chasing big carp, it felt nice to pull out 5 species lure fishing on one afternoon, in addition to a couple lunkers.

Initiating friends / family to carp fishing

2011-08-05T08:04:00.000-07:00

As I mentioned in my previous post, I've spent much of my carp outings initiating friends & family into carp fishing, and old carp fishermen into using new tactics. Any fisherman at heart gets a special joy out of helping someone land a species they don't normally get to target, especially when they are among the biggest fish swimming in our river.

The most recent one, compiled a short video of his first carp, view it by clicking here.

My most recent "converts":

The "science" of carp fishing

2011-08-05T07:38:00.001-07:00

Carp have me obsessed again, basically all I've been targeting for the past 5 weeks or so. I've gone out with some new friends I introduced to carp, all while trying to break down the best possible all around methods and equipment to use.

The water has been dropping steadily at my spot. This created a 2 pronged issue:

1) The lower water means that my mainline is more exposed to the razor sharp rocks that make up most of the bottom in the area I fish.

2) The water temp is warming up fast, and the thermocline getting deeper every day. This forces the carp to "hug" bottom when fighting.

I'm trying to be as methodical as I can,giving each rod equal amounts of time, cast to the same spots, usually 1 hour each, then I switch.

Started off by comparing a line with 50 lb Power Pro to One with 65 lb Power Pro. The 50 got more hits and more cut offs. With the low water, I getting the 50 lb test mainline or hair rig cut off about 2 of every 3 outings now. The 65 LB Power Pro gets less hits, but less cut offs as well.

I then decided to spool about 60 feet of 80 Fireline XDS onto one of the reels. Had lot's of trouble casting it, and the fish are very line shy. Haven't managed one carp on it, all I caught was an 8 lb channel cat that took my boilie.

After realizing that the carp are that finicky about the heavy line, I decided to throw another couple lines into the mix. I picked up a spool of 65 Suffix 832, which is advertised as being extremely abrasion resistant, something superbraided lines are not known to be.

I also picked up a spool or Seaguar AbrazX fluorocarbon, billed as the most abrasion resistance line they make. Wanting to keep castability, I opted for 25 lbs, the highest resistance sold for that given line with getting into leader material (too stiff).

I tied some extra long hair rigs for the Suffix 832 main line, which produced lots of missed runs. At least they're not line shy. When I shortened my rigs on the last outing, I hooked up pretty soon. Problem is that I had about 40 feet of the 65 lb Sufix 832 as a shock leader, the main line was 50 lb Power Pro. As I hooked up about 125 feet offshore, the carp ran and cut my mainline above the shock leader. The result: Fish are not line shy, still inconclusive as whether or not it's abrasion resistance is as good as they claim.

The Seaguar Fluorcarbon AbrazX worked well as far as stealth. I also tied fluorocarbon hair rigs with it. I did noticed them getting tangled on the cast more often than the softer braid I use, which fouled up a few of my presentations. Landed a few fish on it, also got some cut offs, not any better than the 50 lb Power Pro when it comes to resistance, despite having a diameter about double the size.

So, it's back to the drawing board for the wave of outings. Looks like I'll need to use a lot more Suffix 832 as a shock leader, possibly use it as my mainline. Also look like I'm better of using braid for my hair rigs as opposed to Fluorocarbon, even if I stick with a flourocarbon shock leader.

I'll post the results after some more testing....

OK. Here I am a couple weeks after originally writing this post, more testing with much better results. I spooled the Suffix 832 65 lbs as my mainline, and used it to tie my hair rigs as well. A guy I went with picked up some 80 lb Tuff line braid to use as a shock leader. The Tuff line is extremely soft and seems very resistant to abrasion. Due to it's thick diameter, I opted for a hair rig I tied using 50 lbs Power Pro.

The Tuff Line got the first hit of the day. After a decent fight the guy I was with lost the carp due to it spitting the hook. Went he brought in his line, it was significantly frayed in 3 spots, resulting from direct runs into the sharp rocks by the big carp. The first fray was about 10 feet up the line. I gave it a slight tug and it snapped. The second fray was about 6 feet higher up. Same story, it snapped after a slight tug. The 3rd one held up fine.

The Tuff Line went dead for the remainder of the day. The rest of the fish seemed to shy away from the heavier / larger diameter braid, we eventually switched to another rod with 50 lbs Power Pro. The 2 rods were getting an even amount of hits. The Suffix held up great against some big rocks, I after hooking and fighting about 10 carp on it, it hasn't got any significant damage. Better than that, I haven't had any more cut offs. So it looks like I'm sold on the Suffix 832 65 lb line as both my main line and hook link.

I've also noticed a huge difference in regards to the amount of fish spitting hooks depending on the brand used. I was quite happy with carp hooks from Monster tackle, until I tried Teflon coated ESP Raptor hooks. The Monster hooks don't compare in sharpness, and I haven't had a carp spit an ESP yet, in comparison to about 25% spitting the monster hooks.

I'm really glad to have been able to make the time to do all this research. The cut offs had me obsessed to the point where I would lie awake at night thinking about them. After the past few days and a some nice big ones, I'm sleeping a lot better.

Fishing during a heat wave

2011-07-24T09:48:00.000-07:00

Despite extreme heat and humidity warnings, I made it out for 2 days of fishing during the hottest days we've had all season. The ground temperature hovered around 36 Celcius, felt like it was closer to 50 with the humidity. Last time I felt this sort of weather was when I spent a summer in Texas a number of years ago.

When fishing during a heat wave, there are a few essential ways to stay alive:

1) Drink plenty of water. I can easily drink close to 1 liter per hour.

2) Apply lots of sunscreen, even if you're not directly in the sun all day.

3) Sit in the shade. As I'm still fishing from the shore, I can afford to sit back and relax until the fish bite.

4) Take frequent dips in the water. The water temperature will be a good 10 degrees less than the outside temperature, and water will cool you down about 25 times faster than outside air of the same temperature.

So there I am, sitting in my bathing suit in the shade sipping some cold beer while intermittently gulping down water. Set up my rods for carp, wondering how they will react to the heat. Surprisingly enough, the fishing was quite good. Fishing with my son the first day, we hooked 7 carps in 4 hours, ranging from 8 to 20 lbs.

Returned the following day with my wife. She caught her first channel catfish after about 20 minutes or so, a nice 14 lb "river monster". I posed for the pic, as she'd rather have me hold it and get "slimed" instead of her.

I was kind of surprised to see a channel cat that size hit during a bright sunny day around noon, especially in the blistering heat. I usually don't get those until after dark. During the following 4 hours, we managed 6 carps, ranging from 10 to 24 lbs.

Another aspect I found interesting, was the quality of the fight each fish gave. While I first expected them to be a bit lethargic in warm water, I noticed that they were trying harder than usual to hug the bottom. After getting in the water, I figured out that the thermocline started about 6 or 7 feet down, which would explain why they wanted to stay in their comfort zone.

While some fishermen dread heat waves based on the species of fish they target and the style of fishing they choose, I've learned to enjoy them while they last, by targeting bottom feeders while staying as comfortable as possible.

Instructional carp fishing video

2011-07-14T13:25:00.000-07:00

As I often get questions regarding carp fishing tactics, I decided to shoot some footage of how to tie hair rigs, mount boilies and chum/bait a swim. After shooting the instructional footage, I headed the following afternoon to fish with my 15 year old son Ari, in hopes of catching a few to add to the footage.

Ari ended up catching his biggest carp so far, a nice spawned out 25 lb female that was probably closer to 30 lbs a few weeks earlier. I caught the action on the camcorder, and added it to the instructional video.

You can check out the video by clicking: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-Wpt73gbD8

Fishing bass and pike in Lac St Francois

2011-07-14T13:17:00.000-07:00

Headed out for an afternoon of casting with a friend that invited me on his boat. After launching into the Quebec portion of Lac St Francois, we headed out to try a few spots that may be productive on a hot summer afternoon.

First spot we hit started off well. I landed a largemouth bass on my second cast, and a small 3.5 lb pike a few cast later. Both took a spinnerbait, the thrashing pike ended up shredding/destroying the skirt I had on it. After landing another pike, my buddy headed out to locate some of the big smallmouth bass those waters are famous for.

We hit some submerged humps, not much success except for a 2 lb smallmouth I caught trolling on our way to a spot. We eventually targeted shallower water. Though we were able to see many bass as well as some decent sized drums, none of the fish were too interested. I ended up catching a couple very small largemouth bass near the shore, and as evening fell, we headed back out to the submerged humps.

My buddy did a lot better this time around, landing another pike and a few nice sized smallmouth bass, the largest being over 4 lbs.

My first mirror carp

2011-07-08T09:41:00.000-07:00

Headed out for another day of carping with my son Ari. Started getting hits shortly after setting up, but he kept missing the hooksets, probably due to being on a week long bass fishing trip the previous week.

When carp run with a hair rig, last thing you want to do is set like your trying to tear off there head, all you need is to slowly apply pressure in a sweeping motion to set the ultra sharp small hooks.

Anyway, I noticed what he was doing wrong after a few missed fish, and once I pointed it out, he was back on track. He started off by landing a decent channel catfish, I was surprised as I've never had them take a boilie before.

His next carp cut my 65 Power Pro in the rocks. He then ended up landing two more, the larger one about 15 lbs.

I allowed myself one fish (on 8 or 9 runs) on the outing, and with a miraculous stroke of luck, I ended up hooking my first mirror carp.

The fight was pretty much the same, but my excitement when I realized it was a mirror gave me the shakes. Finally landed it and was happy to hold it up for a couple pics, noticing that it was way slimier than any other carp I've ever held. Wasn't a monster, but at around 12 lbs, it's a nice start.

Bass opener family fishing trip

2011-07-04T04:38:00.000-07:00

Spent the bass opener fishing trip up North with my dad, 4 sons and some family friends last week. As we need to book well in advance, the weather is always the wildcard. As we fish for Largemouth bass well past their natural Northern limit, heat waves are crucial to good fishing conditions. On years when the humidex goes over 35 Celcius, the fishing is virtually non stop.

This year, we had cooler conditions, as well as 3 days of intermittent rain and thunderstorms, with a cold front coming in midway through our trip. Needless to say, the fishing was slower than we had hoped for, but we still managed to enjoy some good fishing.

As my dad isn't getting any younger (he's 81), I opted to rent a large SUV and pack us all in, so I can be the sole driver. Despite renting a large Suburban, we barely fit all our clothes, gear and food in it. Got to our lake a bit before noon, set up the boats with all our gear, and headed off to unload at the cabin.

The temperatures was still climbing at that point, the fish turned on early in the afternoon. By 3:00 PM, I had my first nice bass landed, followed by another nice one a couple hours later. Both over 3 lbs, caught while shore fishing during the BBQ before heading out on the boat for the evening bite.

As the evening rolled in and surface mirror like, I attempted throwing a variety of topwater lures I had brought along. I was determined to test them against each other on a lake where topwater conditions are quite tough (except during heatwaves). I tested Zara puppies, Lucky 13's and Pop R's. Overall, the Pop R outperformed all others by far.

As I was casting the Pop R near a stump where I had just seen a couple big splashes, a nice 2.5 lb bass jumped out of the water and inhaled my lure before it even hit the surface, much like a dog catching a Frisbee. Probably the most aggressive fish I have caught on that lake in 10 years. It jumped and even tail danced, quite unusual for a largemouth bass.

My 9 year old Levi was up before sunrise the next morning, hooked and lost a smallmouth bass just around sunrise, while casting a Pop R. That, along with the catch he had witnessed the previous evening, was enough to sell him on the Pop R for the rest of the trip. Took him along with my 11 year old Avi out for a couple hours, Avi landed another nice 3 lbs + bass. Managed some more nice ones throughout the day, including some back to back largies.

Though I didn't get to fish much with my 15 year old Ari, as he was guiding my dad most of the time, I did teach him how to properly fillet a bass. Indeed, he ended up cleaning 2 bag limits of big bass, great chance to practice on a fish I'd normally release around Montreal. However, when I'm in a clean, pristine lake, I'm happy to keep some to eat for my growing family.

Next morning, it was my 5 year old Eli's turn. He landed his first 3 lb bass around 7:30 AM.

Later on, Levi managed another nice on on his Pop R.

Next morning, while casting his Pop R, Levi managed a feat that I was lucky to witness for the first time (besides Youtube); he caught 2 bass on one cast on the same lure. Again, the Pop R was on fire.

The thunder clouds rolled in by mid afternoon, followed by a night of rain and a cold front. Though it made for a gorgeous rainbow, it really slowed down the fishing a lot.

Fishing didn't pick up until Thursday evening, our last outing of the trip, when, around 8:00 PM, we suddenly hit back to back beauties to end the trip.

As the spot gets more popular every year, I already booked my spot for the 2012 bass opener.

Fishing big bottom feeders

2011-06-20T05:50:00.000-07:00

As summer nears and the predatory species move further away from shore in many fishing spots, being primarily a shore fisherman, I switch to still fishing, mainly for big bottom feeders. The target species care carp, channel catfish and incidental sturgeon or eels.

Still fishing isn't for everyone. Many of my fishing buddies don't have the patience to just sit and wait for a bite, they constantly need to be casting, retrieving, jigging or trolling. For those that don't mind sitting for hours with a line out soaking bait, the results can be very rewarding.

Bottom feeders in the St Lawrence grow bigger than most predatory species (except for musky). St Lawrence Channel cats caught are often over 10 lbs. Carp or sturgeon under 10 lbs are almost laughable, most are substantially larger.

Then, there is always the lingering dream of catching the big one. On any given day, a still fisherman has a legitimate chance of landing that trophy without any additional effort. Same bait, same fishing tactics, just better luck.

Additionally, still fishing is quite good at night. The big ones come out to feed after dark, and are often less finicky. When the heat of the day becomes unbearable, night time fishing becomes my game of choice. I usually arrive when the last of the fishermen are calling it a day and packing it in.

Here are some useful tips to make your still fishing outings more enjoyable and successful:

1) Use proper gear. If you're after big fish, make sure your equipment is ready to handle them. I use 50-65 lb test line, spooled onto 40 or 50 series spinning (baitrunner)reels, many people I know go even bigger. Rods should have plenty of backbone. Circle hooks are a growing trend for good reason; they work. Bring along a good flashlight or headlamp for night fishing.

2) Focus on comfort. A comfortable folding chair is a good start. Bring along proper clothing. During the day, I'll wear a bathing suit under my pants, along with water shores. If it gets too hot, I'll go for a dip or swim to cool off. At night, bring along a long sleeved hoodie. Temperatures can drop significantly with cool wind blowing off the water, and they will help protect against the bugs.

3) Safety. Sitting for hours in the sun requires plenty of drinking water and sunscreen. Last thing you want is to get sunburn, dehydrated or heat stroke. For night fishing, bug spray is a must. Mosquito season is in full swing, and plenty of other bugs will leave you alone as well once your well sprayed. Make sure you bait your line before applying bug spray; once you do, avoid getting repellent on any part of your hands that will be touching bait.

4) Patience. This one is the most important key to productive still fishing. Bring along a book, possibly a laptop or iPad if need be. The longer your bait sits out there, the more chance something will swim by and pick it up. If a particular setup has worked in your spot before, chances are it will produce again.

We are lucky to live on an island surrounded by the provinces greatest diversity of big fish. Take advantage while the good weather lasts, even if only for a couple hours at a time. You may end up pleasantly surprised.

Testing new fishing gear and tackle

2011-06-17T12:20:00.000-07:00

In October 2010, I won an Outdoor Canada picture contest, reward was a $1000 gift certificate in Basspro Shops. I use it to splurge on some higher end gear that I wouldn't normally purchase.

This week, I finally got to test some of the new items:

1) 7 foot Shakespeare Ugly Stik:

I tried using it casting for pike / walleye / bass, but wasn't too thrilled. I then mounted a 40 series baitrunner reel that had previously been on a 6.5 foot Rhino rod. Idea was to land some big carp on it. The difference was noticeable. The extra 6 inches helps when you're short like me and have to keep your rod high up to avoid having them cut your line in the rocks. Biggest fish landed on it in 2 outings was a 24 lb carp. Looks like it's going to be designated as a still fishing rod.

2) Penn Slammer baitrunner reel:

I use relatively cheap baitrunner reels made in China. Though they get the job done, I was eyeing a few models to upgrade to before winning the contest. When I won, I jumped to the next level, choice was either a Shimano of the Penn Slammer. Most reviews favored the Penn, so I went with it. It's a nice gold colored saltwater model, 50 series. Needless to say, I was dying to receive it. When it finally arrived, it didn't fit properly into most of my rods. Luckily, my buddy had a new 8 foot saltwater Uglystik he wanted to get rid of, I was more than happy to take it off his hands. I had a free spool of 65 lb test Power Pro he had once given me, I spooled it up as my "big bottom feeder" outfit.

Finally hooked a decent carp on it, as well as a couple of nice channel cats. I was very happy with the reels performance in comparison to the cheap ones I've been using. The baitrunner doesn't jam every 3rd or 4th time you set it, and when the fish run, it doesn't sound like the reel may explode any second. Everything is ultra smooth, has a nice clicking sound to let you know a fish is running with your bait, very useful on darker nights.

3) 8 foot Shakespeare Ugly Stik - Saltwater series:

Got this rod as the Penn Slammer baitrunner reel didn't fit on my other rods properly. I am quite happy with the 6 foot Ugly Stik as a casting rod, as well as the 7 footer as a still fishing rod. The 8 foot "beefed up" version packs a lot more muscle, yet is still wobbly enough to where you don't feel as if your holding a broomstick. Fighting my first carp on it, I noticed the bend in the rod being more than the bend on my 7 footer. I was expecting a much bigger fish, but once I landed it, I realized it was the same size. I later confirmed this when hauling in some channel cats while night fishing.

4) 65 lb test Power Pro:

I've been quite satisfied with the 50 lb Power Pro that I've been using in the rock covered shorelines of the St Lawrence River. The 65 lb version seemed even tougher, and proved itself up to the test. My first carp on that line went straight into a rock pile where the line got wedged in the rocks. Yanking it free while fighting a 15 lb fish didn't managed to snap it, I landed the fish shortly after. Let on, I hooked 2 channel cats with that line. First one dove into the rocks. Again, I manage to horse it out and land it, a decent 8 lb channel catfish. Second one was trickier, I was actually fighting the fish while being wedged in the rocks, going back an fort putting extreme pressure/friction on the line's outer core. Eventually, it gave and snapped, saw the fish splash the surface as it did.

5) Gamkatsu Circle hooks:

My first time using these, they works wonders when fishing bait at the bottom, really taking the guesswork out of figuring out the precise moment to set the hook. Resisting the urge to set while they are playing with my bait, I let the big cats run properly before touching the rod. As they ran, I engaged the reel by slowly cranking it. Fish on, perfect hookset each time. The Gamkatsus are quite sharp out of the package, an extremely strong, leaving no change of the fish straightening them out during the fight.

6) Heddon lucky 13:

2 of my favorite topwater lures are the Pop R and the Heddon Zara Spook. As the Lucky 13 is somewhat of a mix of both, I picked up a couple diffrent sizes to test. After testing them, the larger size (about 4 inches) is my preference. I displaces lots of water when popping it, and has a semi walk the dog wiggle when jerking it, which also causes it to dive about 8 inches below the surface. Though I was targeting gar, I hooked a few nice largemouth bass up to 4 lbs on it as well. Bass opener up North is next week, can't wait to cast it over their nest to get their reaction.

All this new gear has given me something to dream about over the summer months, and makes the conquest for each species more interesting. Best of all, it was free!

Teaching and old friend new tricks

2011-06-14T19:38:00.000-07:00

As I've been neglecting one of my favorite species so far this season, I headed out for some carp fishing with an old friend that first gave me the idea of targeting carp in 2005.

We headed back to the first spot he took me to. Both of us have fished the area extensviely, but our techinques were quite different. He's old school, uses to a simple hook and sinker baited with canned corn, while I've experimented and evolved to hair rigs on sliding rigs baited with boilies.

First hit took about an hour, I landed an average 10+ lb carp. About 1/2 hour later, I hook into a big one, from the way it was pulling I'm guessing in the 20-25 lb range, possibly bigger. As it raced along the rocks in a drag busting run, it slashed my 50 lb Power Pro in the rocks, exactly at the same spot I lost a nice 30 lb carp last season. Pretty aggravating to lose 2 fish that size at the same spot, but that's fishing.

After about 3-4 hours of messing with some bullheads hitting his corn line, my buddy finally agrees to try a hair rig with boilie combination. Within 15 minutes, he lands his first carp of the season, about 15 lbs. About 3 minutes later, I hook up, end up landing a nice 18 lb carp.

Action slows down for another hour or so, suddenly we hit a doble header excatly at the same moment. As we both fight our fish, I'm wondering how I'm going to net 2 carp at once. Luckily, another angler fishing further down the bank saw us, and rushed over to help us out.

While my buddy landed his smaller 7-8 lb fish quite easily, mine was quite larger. It stubbornly refused to come close enough to get landed, I really had to tire it out. Finally got it in the net, ended up being the biggest of the day weighing in a 24 lbs.

By now, we'd been in the hot sun for over 5 hours, we decided to call it a day and stop off for a nice cold one on the way home, reminiscing about good times gone by hoping for more to come.

Eli's first pike

2011-06-06T09:54:00.000-07:00

Kids are off Sunday school until next year, so I'm now on daddy duty every Sunday. After the success we had trolling for pike a couple weeks ago, coupled with the forecast of no wind, I decided to take my 3 younger boys to teach them how troll.

Although we were 4 people, I only took 2 rods, as I wanted to ensure that things stay under control. Idea was to have 2 of the 3 hold a rod while trolling, then switch off every time a fish was caught.

We got out to our spot a bit before noon. First pass, Avi hooks up a small pike on a wally diver, about 2.5 lbs. We toss it back in, my 5 year old Eli takes his place. Within 2 minutes, he's got one on. Not quite sure what to do, he tries to winch it in with the reel, but isn't big enough or strong enough to do so. I show him how to use the rod to fight the fish, then use the reel to pick up slack line. As he brings the pike up near the boat, it dives straight down a couple times, bending the rod in half and nearly yanking it out of his hands. I finally net the fish for him, needless to say he's more than thrilled. It's his first pike, a nice 4.5 lb fish at that. Not too bad for a 5 year old.

Fishing slows down over the next couple hours, with a few missed hits, and some extremely aggressive perch attacking our lures as well.

We switch spots and catch a couple big smallmouth bass in the 3 - 3.5 lb range. Season's still closed, so it's back to the pike spot, still no hits. We finally motor down to a completely different area and Eli manages another pike in the 3 lb range.

Little Eli now has now earned bragging rights over his 2 older brothers. Furthermore, he seems to be one to spin his tales well, he's already decided that his pike looked more like a musky...

Sight fishing longnose gar

2011-06-03T06:31:00.000-07:00

First real heat wave of the season, I decided to headed out to attempt some topwater pike fishing, as the wind was very calm as well. After catching a couple incidental bass, I switched spots. More bass.. I switched spots again. 3 rd spot was tougher to get to as I have to trek through some woods, no fish in sight. Finally, after some more trekking through woods, high grass and swamp, I found the sweet spot.

Hundreds of carp circling near the surface, intermingled with lots of longnose gar. Prime conditions for sight fishing, something I don't get to do very often. I decided to attempt getting the gar to hit, tied on a big Heddon lucky 13, and started popping it right in front of them, as the were all in less than 2 feet of clear water.

First gar hit immediately, I actually managed to hook it in the beak. It came off easily as it was thrashing around the surface. As I was on a small 4-5 foot cliff with no way of bringing up a gar by it's beak without losing it, I tried a trick I had once read about. I cut a piece of line and tangled it around the 2 rear treble hooks on my lure. Plan was to have the gar hit the lure and tangle their teeth in it as opposed to getting hooked.

First try, I spooked a nice big gar, probably in the 3 foot range. Targeting a smaller one on the next cast, a nice 4+ lbs largemouth bass came up and crushed the lure. Not what I was targeting, but a nice surprise. After releasing it, I cast to the same spot, only to catch another 4 lb bass. Though back to back 4 lb bass on a topwater lure are really sweet, the season is still closed, so I moved along the bank to sight more gar.

Didn't take to long, I spotted 3 gar circling in the shallows. After 3 or 4 casts, I caught my 2nd gar of the day. Despite being somewhat tangled in my line, I still couldn't get it up the steep bank. A couple minutes later, I had my 3rd gar thrashing at the end of my line. Though I could have kept going for hours, I had to cut my trip short in order to beat the traffic, as I still had a long trek back to the car.

Though my trip turned out very different than I had originally planned, I was quite happy to target longnose gar, a species a rarely get to encounter, let alone target. These unconventional fish call for unconventional fishing tactics, but sight fishing for gar is something I can easily get into. Hope to target some more in the next few days...

Trolling Northern Pike near Valleyfield

2011-05-26T06:07:00.001-07:00

My buddy Jimmy invited me out on his new boat, a 20 foot Triton equipped with a 200 HP engine and most of the other bells and whistles. Plan was to catch some decent sized Northern Pike, a species that is most easily fished in spring.

We wanted to stay close to town, so we headed to the Valleyfield area. Valleyfield is well known for Northern Pike and smallmouth bass, but it was our first time actually targeting pike there.

We started off casting shallows and their drop offs to deeper water. I did manage one pike in the 4 lb range, the fish had the biggest tumor I have ever seen on a pike before, really disgusting. After incidentally catching a few spawning smallmouth bass, we switched spots.

We casted unsuccessfully for them all morning. Around noon, we decided to head out deeper and troll for them. We trolled mid range to deep diving crankbaits and eventually found our spot. We proceeded to catch 7 pike in the next couple hours, mainly in the 5 lb range. They were extremely aggressive and all put up better than average fights. One of them even swallowed my 6 inch lure, along with 3 sets of treble hooks.

Again, I had to leave early for daddy duty, it would have been nice to be able to stay a bit longer. Hope to head back there in the near future.

Fishing lake trout on Lake Champlain

2011-05-13T10:01:00.000-07:00

Continuing our outing on Lake Champlain (see previous post), we headed back to the main part of Lake Champlain to attempt fishing / catching lake trout, which promised to be bigger and more of a fight than the landlocked salmon we caught earlier on.

Mike's GPS was marked with many waypoints where he'd had excellent success during April, but we were already in the 2nd week of May. As expected, they had already gone deeper, so it was time to try some adjacent areas. After trolling through some "clouds" of bait between 30 and 60 feet, we decided to head to another spot. Again, we got hit as we were bringing in the lines, though it was my buddy that got hit this time. He was more than happy to finally catch his first of this elusive species, was nice to feel some big headshakes on the line as well. He brought in his fish, a nice 5-6 lb lake trout that joined the landlocked salmons in the livewell.

We decided to stay on the spot for a while, but fishing was slow. Then out of nowhere, Mike jump up and yells fish on! We didn't hear any clicker going off or noticed any bounce in the rods, but Mike's amazing 6th sense when it comes to fishing sensed a slight movement in the planer board. Again, he never ceases to amaze me, you;d think I'd be used to it by now after fishing with him a number of times, but he pulls this sort of thing time and time again. Needless to say, we were in awe. Back to the fish, I winched in a decent 3-4 lb lake trout, not too big, but good for the livewell to keep the first one in good company. Funny thing, just when I brough it in, it burped up a nice 5 inch smelt.

With no more hits, we tried to more spots, trolling unsuccessfully for the next few hours. We did mark many fish and huge swarms of bait, but no more hits. We called it a day around 6:30 PM. Filleting the fish when I finally got home, the small lake trout had about 7 or 8 smelt in it's stomach, and the bigger landlocked salmon had some as well.

Anyway, the trip to lake Champlain for lake trout and landlocked salmon was slower than Mike had hoped for, but more than successful for myself. I caught 2 new species that I had been planning to target but never got around to doing, in addition to gaining some experience setting and trolling with dipsy divers and planer boards. Did I forget to mention ending up with a couple tasty dinners?

Anyway, if your looking to catch some nice lake trout before the regular season opens in much of Quebec and Ontario, I strongly suggest having Mike take you out in April, when the big lake trout hit in good numbers. Just contact me and I'll put you in touch with him.

Fishing Lake Champlain landlocked salmon

2011-05-13T09:41:00.000-07:00

My buddy "Musky" Mike Philipps invited us out to Lake Champlain to troll some landlocked salmon and lake trout, needless to say, we were more than thrilled to go along for a chance to fish the "big pond" this early in the season. The Lake Champlain fishery is very maintained and stocked by both New York and Vermont, in what could be referred to as a "put and take fishery", much like the tributary rivers than run into Lake Champlain.

Mike's 20 foot Lund is equipped with a 200 HP motor, as well as a 15 HP kicker for trolling, which is ideal for a lake the size of Champlain, especially when the wind picks up. In addition, it's set up with multiple downriggers and extra rod holders for planer boards and dipsy diver rods. Mike's experience kept us tangle free all day, desptite troling 6 lines.

We launched on the New York side around 10:00 AM. As lakers fishing was slow in the morning, we headed over to the vermont side to fish Malletts Bay for landlocked salmon. The waves were considerably higher there, the water slighty warmer. Being a newby at landlocked fishing, I got to soak in some of Mike's experience with the species, as well as controlled trolling and managing the at a new level.

After about an hour or so, the clicker went off on a planer board rod, I was up for the first landlocked salmon of the day. Mike's rods were a bit big, and with the fish being kind of lethargic, the fight wasn't as good as I had expected. Nevertheless, I was happy to land my first landlocked salmon, measured about 18-20 inches, quite respectable for that lake. Into the livewell it went, and shortly after, another rod goes off. My buddy brough in the this one, noticeably smaller, not much of a fight either. We trolled for another hour or so, and as we were bringing in the rods to move to another spot, I got hit again. Another 16 incher in the livewell, it was time to head for lakers...

The lake trout outing will follow in the next post, if you are interested in trolling landlocked with Mike, contact me and I'll out you in touch with him.

First carp of 2011

2011-05-01T18:32:00.000-07:00

Though I normally avoid fishing on weekends due to crowds, with the weather predicted to hit over 20 degrees, I took my kids for a rare Sunday outing. Headed to the other side of the Saunders dam, plan was for the kids to catch perch and for me to supervise them while still fishing for carp.

Though the weather cooperated as far as temperature, a steady East wind along with rising water turned my spot upside down. As a result, none of the fish were cooperating, at a time of the year when I often get non stop action.

By mid afternoon, I noticed some carp splashing around in the warming shallows, so I made my way over to any area I don't normally fish due to heavy weed growth. With my luck, it was still fishable. After chumming with some different sized boilies, it took about 45 minutes or so for my rod to go off, baitrunner drag screaming that sweet sound I've been dreaming of since last fall.

I set, the big carp headed staight for the marsh, I managed to stop him just in the nick of time. Finally managed to get it close to shore for a glimpse, was considerably larger than the 12-13 lb average for that spot.

I loosened the drag slightly and handed the rod to my 10 year old son. Fish took off as expected. He brought it back to shore 2 or 3 times, but it was still full of energy. I finally took the rod after 5 minutes or so of him going back and forth with the big fish, landed it shortly after.

We guesstimated it's weight before weighing it, my son accurately called it a 21 lbs. Saw a few more carp jump, but didn't manage any more in the next hour or so, so we headed back and beat the traffic.

Winter took a bit longer than usual to leave this year, so it felt really nice being out on the water on the first warm day this season. Though the fishing wasn't too hot, I got to relax in the sun, and managed a quality fish that put up a great fight, in addition to putting huge smiles on both my sons faces.

Fishing bluegills and bullhead catfish

2011-04-17T12:31:00.000-07:00

April's here and in my fishing area that means closed season for most species of game fish. Kids of school for passover, took my 3 younger boys out for some shore fishing. As I've already caught tons of worms, we had plenty to go around. Set up the kids with small hook and sinker combos, tied on a micro jig for myself.

The bite was on almost immediately, with my youngest landing a couple bluegills. My others soon joined the action, caught more bluegill and pumpkinseed sunfish, as well as some bullhead catfish, perch and a few small sized largemouth bass.

Except for the bullheads, most of the other fish were still kind of lethargic, water is barely above freezing.

Hope to head out for another outing next week.

First open water fishing outing of 2011

2011-03-17T14:56:00.000-07:00

With the weather finally warm enough to fish without my line freezing to the guides or getting ice buildup, I headed out to fish a few spots around downtown Montreal. First sport I tried is an area with strong current. Couldn't fish it at all due to the constant barrage of floating ice chunks taking my line. Was tough getting to the spot, as the steep cliff I climb down was full of ice, made things very tricky.

Second spot was mainly covered in ice, with a few open areas. A back current made it possible to jig the spot with artificial worms, but still fishing was still tough. No hits after 2 hours, I headed to another area.

Showed up at my 3rd spot, lot's of open water big sheets of ice drifting back and forth between the wind and current. First cast, I hooked and landed my first open water catch of the season, a small 13 inch walleye. Second cast, I got bit off. I was then chased off my spot by the drifting ice sheets. Some were about 40 feet in diameter, they were spread over an area of about 800 x 150 feet.

I moved further down, no more hits. After about 1.5 hours, my original spot cleared up. I headed back, fished for another half an hour or so, no more bites.

Anyway, it felt real good being able to cast into open water again, not to mention fighting a fish. I hope to head back out next week if the weather cooperates.

Street fishing in Dallas, Texas

2011-02-27T13:23:00.000-08:00

Went down to Dallas for a few days to visit my son who's in school in there. The school had a parents weekend / PTA, and our schedule was extremely tight all weekend long. I would have loved to make it back up to Lake Texoma, but time didn't permit it. Instead, I took my son to explore some of the fishing spots in biking distance of his school, as I only had about 3 hours off.

First spot look real promising for bass. It was a canal that ran through private neighborhoods, my had spotted bass in there during the fall. With a new Texas law making it easier property owners being allowed to shoot trespassers without asking questions, I wasn't taking any chances. First bell we rang, the guy confirms that all the property is private, and no one allows strangers to fish, as the property owners would be liable to get sued if ever one of us got hurt.

OK, off to the next spot, a small flood control reservoir I used to fish at about 12 years ago. At the time, there were bass up to 2 lbs or so and tons of bullhead catfish. Sadly, most of it has dried up, seems like the fish all died, expect for some sunfish, tons of frog and snapping turtles. After wasting an hour or so, we headed back to anther creek, my son pulled out some more sunfish. Had to leave about 1/2 hour after getting there.

Pity I didn't have more time, the weather was sunny and 25 degrees all weekend long.

Ice fishing Lake Champlain

2011-02-27T13:16:00.001-08:00

The kids were off school for midwinter break, I headed out to lake Champlain hoping to have some non stop perch action, as I had in previous years.

A cold front was moving in after a snow storm, 40-50 KM / hour winds and blowing snow forced us to get a cabin.

The cabins were build real flimsy, mainly old pressed and plywood. They used old flooring for heating wood instead of logs. As I got the fire started and filled up the oven, the cabin actually caught on fire while I was setting the lines, which I luckily was able to put out with snow, thanks to my kids screaming "THE CABIN'S ON FIRE!!!". A couple minutes more, and it would have been gone.

The fishing was the slowest I've ever experienced on Champlain, only 2 perch for the day. Needless to say, the kids weren't to thrilled, being stuck inside because of the cold without any fish biting, put them off ice fishing for at least the rest of the season.

Ice fishing southern Ontario

2011-02-27T13:08:00.000-08:00

Managed 2 ice fishing outings in January, both were in Southern Ontario. One my first outing, I fished in 2-8 feet , seemed to be the only placed to find safe ice, which was 5-7 inches.

First trip was in the first week of January, caught tons of perch, pumpkinseed, and bluegill sunfish even though I was using only 1 line. They were hitting non stop from the time I started until the time I left, all were in 5-8 feet of water. Released all my catches on that outing.

Second outing was in the 3rd week of January. I major cold front had frozen most of the area, ice was 12-14 inches thick, which gave me the opportunity to fish a bit deeper. On the downside, drilling with my 8" manual auger was more tiring. Didn't manage any sunfish, the day was mainly perch up to 9 inches. I also managed my first bass through the ice, a tiny Largemouth that hit my jigging rap. Kept a few perch which I cooked for breakfast the following morning.

Ontario fishing license renewal not working online

2011-01-05T06:55:00.000-08:00

If you're planning any fishing in Ontario any time soon, don't wait for the last minute to renew your license, their online renewal system isn't working any more, at least for non Ontario residents.

I tried renewing my Ontario outdoors card and license this morning on the MNR web site, I got a system error and phone number to call. I called them, they confirmed that I'll need to go in person to renew it.

Seems like their 2011 rules/regulations e-pamphlet isn't working either...

Summary of my 2010 fishing season

2010-11-25T13:04:00.000-08:00

As I don't have any more outings planned until freeze up, it's time to post my yearly summary of my 2010 season.

I didn't do any ice fishing at all in 2010. I got fed up chasing small pike around Montreal, and most perch and walleye under ice just didn't make it worth my while last winter, as I got really busy with some work related projects.

I got out as soon as the ice melted in March, as spring came very early this year. Sold my boat in April, so I was mainly limited to shore fishing most of the season, besides for a few boat outings and a couple week long fishing trips.

I'll summarize by species, starting with personal best achieved:

Brown trout:
Went out for my first stream wading outing in June, managed to catch my first 4 or 5 brown trout ever. Though they were all under 9 or 10 inches, they made for a delicious meal.

Perch:
Not a species I usually write about, but a managed a 13 inch beauty trolling a Rapala CD-9 in the St Lawrence River. My son also manage a nice 12 incher in a lake up North during our annual summer vacation.

Musky:
Landed a nice 7-8 lb musky while jigging walleye, also lost a very nice 15 lb + musky that spit my jig.

That was it for personal records broken for me, though my kids broke their records for perch, bass, carp, bluegills, walleye and channel cats, as we did many varied outings that were highly productive.

Back to my standard species, starting with game fish:

Bass fishing was a mixed bag this season. The Smallmouth bass were fewer and smaller than the previous few years. Largemouth bass fishing was more productive, the numbers were crazy, but I didn't manage any over 4 lbs.

The pike numbers were OK, but for the most part, they were a lot smaller than previous years, biggest being a 4.5 lb pike caught on my annual trip up North.

The walleye were better than previous years. Though I wasn't able to troll my spots for big ones without my boat, I hit many in the 2-3 lb range jigging from the shore. My August trip up to Lac LeNotre was the highlight of my walleye season, also caught my biggest ones of the season there, two 4 lb fish.

Though I didn't dream of catching any muskies from the shore, I actually hooked two while jigging. The first one was a nice 15+ lb musky that spit my jig after a few head shakes, the second one was about 7-8 lbs, landed on my last outing of the season while jigging walleyes.

Off to bottom feeders:

I planned to target sturgeons more, but got caught up with other species most of the time. I did manage 1 small 5-6 lb sturgeon in June, most of my other attempts ended up with me catching channel cats or eels.

The channel catfish season was very short for me this year. June was good, but night fishing in the summer was dismal. Note that I was initiating my wife into fishing, and she can't take the heavy bugs that infest our shorelines after dark, so all my evening outing ended rather quickly.

Carp fishing was quite good this year. I switched over to boily / hair rig combinations, and my average size remained over15 lbs all season, up 3-4 lbs from previous seasons. I lost one in the 30 lb range, landed a few 20s, the biggest a 26 lb carp in September. I didn't do enough carp outings, hope to do more next season.

Managed 2 fishing / camping trips over the summer, one being a free trip my son won from the FPQ a couple years before. My first trip was the usual bass opener, fishing was a bit slower than the previuos year, but we still managed lot's a bass, along with some monster perch and pumpkinseed sunfish with the kids.

The second outing was a classic walleye adventure. Went to a new lake/region that I'd never been to with my eldest son, spent 5 days on a remote lake. The sonar we brought along really saved us, we managed to catch walleye and pike while trolling deep divers. When the trolling slowed down or was impossible due to wind, we drifted worm/bottom bouncer combos and did quite well. When the wind finally died down, vertical jigging did the trick.

After 16 years of marriage, I finally initiated my wife into fishing. After a few failed catfish outings, I took her carping, she ended up catching a few in the 15 lb range, as well as a nice 22 pounder.

All in all, another good season that I'm satisfied with, and lot's of nice pics for my collection.

Hope you all enjoyed your fishing season as much as I did, and wish you all the best for 2011.

Fishing stocked trout ponds

2010-11-09T08:04:00.000-08:00

My kids were off school for a day, I had planned to take them for one last carp outing, possibly to target some Northern pike as well. As the weather didn't look great, I feared they might get bored real fast if the fishing was slow, as I had a 4, 8 and 10 year old coming along on the outing.

I offered them an alternative of going to fish a stocked trout pond I had read about online, they seemed much more enthusiastic about that idea, especially as we'd get to keep and eat some fresh trout. They charge per inch, so the bigger the trout, the more you pay.

We headed over to the place about 1/2 hour away. Though their big pond was closed, they had a smaller one still open, which made the fishing ridiculously easy. I brought along one rod and tied on a small Rapala CD-5.

First cast, my 10 year old land a 17 inch rainbow trout ($14).
Next cast, my 4 year old lands a 12 inch rainbow trout ($7.50).
Next cast, my 8 year old looses a 12 inch rainbow trout .
He tries again and lands a 15 inch brown trout ($10.50).
Gave my 4 year old one more chance, he capitalized by landing a 15 inch rainbow trout ($10.50).
4 fish in about 5 minutes, most bigger than many people will catch in the trout streams around Montreal, cost me $42.50

They eviscerated the fish and bagged them for us, we came home and I filleted and cooked up the 3 rainbow trout, I froze the brown trout for another day. Tough to beat fresh caught trout for shore lunch (though I cooked them at home).

The fishing didn't require any skill whatsoever, but at least the kids had a blast, I'll probably return with them next season when the bigger pond is open and the weather is nicer.

Montreal Musky

2010-11-02T17:00:00.000-07:00

Been quite busy with work lately, but took a few hours to make a quick trip to the downtown Montreal area to attempt catching some walleyes. The current in this particular spot is moderate, but heavy jigs are required to cast out to where they normally are.

Started off using a 1 OZ jig and grub combo, eventually went down to 1/2 OZ. The walleye weren't participating at all, my buddy and I didn't hook any, nor did the 5 or 6 other people fishing there.

As I was shore fishing an area along a rocky shoreline, I had to speed up my retrieve just before the shoreline break area to avoid getting snagged in the rocks. I did so after each cast. As I'm "burning" my jig back in, I feel a nice thump on the line, fish on!

The fish was pulling a lot harder than a walleye or occasional smallmouth bass caught at that spot, I originally thought I may have foul hooked a sturgeon, as they are quite numerous in that area. I was taking my time playing the fish, but as I eventually brought it in, I was shocked to see a mid size musky at the end of the line.

The fish wasn't interested in being landed, and started acrobatics by jumping out of the water, then darting side to side. I was lucky to have it hooked in the corner of the mouth, as I had no leader. I made an effort to keep my 6 lb diameter line away from it's teeth, and eventually landed it by hand, as I don't bother bringing a net when shore fishing for walleye. The musky was released after a couple quick pics, though it wasn't in the best shape, as it jumped into the rocks with a big hook in it's face. It swam of real quick, I hope it survived.

That surprise musky made my month, as I haven't had much time to fish over the past few weeks, and the fish I've been catching have been small to mid size. I wouldn't have played it that long had I suspected it was a musky all along, but the fact that I did made it a lot more enjoyable.

Picture worth $1000

2010-10-20T12:27:00.000-07:00

Ever since one of my kids won the FPQ tournament in 2008, I've been entering free fishing contests on a regular basis. I was hoping luck may strike again, and it did, just in time for my birthday too.

Sometime over the summer, I entered an Outdoor Canada picture contest, using some pics I had taken while fishing with the family. A couple days before my birthday, I get a call from Mr. Bob Sexton at Outdoor Canada, telling me that the picture won 1st place in the contest. I was delighted to find out that the prize is a $1000 gift certificate as Basspro shops.

I received the card today, and have already started ordering items with it. I'll be stocking up on some of my usual lures and terminal tackle, and splurging on some fancier reels and gear for myself, as well as for my dad and son that appear in the picture, which will appear in their winter issue.

Couldn't ask for a better birthday present.

I thank God for the win and Outdoor Canada for the generous gift.

Shore fishing with my wife

2010-10-20T12:20:00.001-07:00

My wife took a day off work, with sunshine in the forecast, she decided to try cooler weather fishing. We did a shot 3 hour outing. My idea was to target sturgeon before the season ends in a couple weeks, but she wanted to do some casting too, so I brought along some jigs for her to practice with.

Fishing was slow as I expected. She managed to jig up lots of dying weeds until her arm was sore, and the sturgeon weren't interested in the dead minnows I brought, as my worms all died last week. Luckily, I brought some frozen chicken hearts along as well.

With about 1/2 hour left, I baited the sturgeon line with chicken hearts. About 5 minutes before the end of the outing, I noticed the line twitching, I set the hook and had a fish on. I was surprised to see it was a mid size catfish, first time I've caught one at that spot. Unfortunately, it had swallowed the completely, no way of removing it without dissecting the fish, so got a quick picture and cut the line.

Fishing Lac St Louis in Montreal

2010-10-17T07:48:00.000-07:00

Headed our for a couple outings around Montreal, to fish the Lac St Louis portion of the St Lawrence River. First outing was a quick 2 hour shore fishing trip, that was all the time I had that day. I was targeting walleye and smallmouth bass using 3/8 OZ jigs with 3 inch grubs.

The water is still chocked with drifting weeds, so it was very hard to get a clean cast. I did manage 1 decent walleye when I finally avoided picking up weeds on my line, kept it for a neighbor that asked me to bring back some fish.

Headed out on a friend's boat the following day, for some multi species fishing. trolled for muskies unsuccessfully, until we got to a smallmouth bass spot. The bass weren't co-operating much, except for a tail hooked smally my buddy landed.

We switched to a shallow weedy area to target pike and largemouth bass. The fishing was slow, but my buddies managed some small pike and a largemouth bass on spinnerbaits. Hope to head our their again next week, possibly bring along some live shiners if I can get some before we head out.

Great thanksgiving day fishing outing with the kids

2010-10-11T18:54:00.000-07:00

My boys were off school for thanksgiving, I took 2 of them out for some pre-winter shore fishing. Nice sunny skies but a bit cold in the morning, I started them off on live worms. They caught tons of perch and bluegill sunfish, many doubleheaders.

As the afternoon warmed up, I switched them to casting crankbaits and Rapalas. They caught lots of small largemouth bass, with more doubleheader action.

Switched spots when the fishing died down, hoping to get into some bigger largies. The second spot proved even better than the first, but the bass weren't any bigger.

Both my sons aged 4 and 10 really enjoyed the outing, as the action was leterally non stop all day long. I'm sure they'll have some real fishing tales to tell at school tomorrow.

Carp fishing bait - Boilies vs corn

2010-09-16T10:57:00.000-07:00

As the weather cools and those North winds bring in cooler air, the cooling water starts the pre-winter feeding frenzy that many fish in Canadian waters go through every year. Carp are no exeption, and fall is a great time to catch fish before they hunker down to hybernate through the winter.

I headed out for an afternoon of carp fishing with a couple friends, both are local fishing guides, but don't typically fish for carp. I put one of them onto carping a few years ago, he and I have gone out together quite often, but not too much this season.

I mentioned my recent success with using boilies as carp fishing bait instead of corn, but he wasn't convinced. This led us up to a fishing challenge: Both guys used lines baited with corn, while I stuck with boilies as bait. The water was chummed with both baits, and we all fished the same spot to keep things fair.

The fishing was a bit slower than I hoped for. It took close to 3 hours to get the first run, I hooked up on my boilie line. Brought in the fish, a nice 10 lb carp, actually my smallest from that spot so far this season. As they fished 2 lines versus my 1, I scored double points on my fish, which put me in the lead 2-0.

About an hour later, I got my second carp, just about the same size as the first one, again on the boilie line. 4-0 Phil.

Another hour went by with a missed run on my line until my next hookup. This fish was a bit bigger. My line crossed my buddies, he untangled while I fought the fish. With his line out of the water and the fish running towards my other buddies line, he started bringing in his line. To our surprise, he had a small largemouth bass hooked up on his corn baited line, but it didn't count for the purposes of our competition. My carp was still on and fighting hard, eventually ended up in my landing net. The carp was a lot bigger, it actually weighed in close to 26 lbs, my biggest landed carp this season.

And that was all she wrote, I took the competition 6-0, while landing my smallest and biggest carps of the season from that spot.

Walleye fishing Le Domaine Shannon

2010-08-26T09:10:00.000-07:00

In 2008, my son won the Le Tournoi de Peche fishing tournament sponsored by the FPQ. One of the prizes was a week long, bear hunting and fishing trip to Le Domaine Shannon. As we don't hunt, we didn't bother doing the June bear hunt. Though it's been nearly 2 years, I finally made it up to Le Domaine Shannon for the free trip with my older son Ari.

Though the trip included meals, I didn't go with that option as I keep kosher, and prefer to be alone on a lake without the fishing pressure / noise of all the other fishermen at the lodge. So we reserved a small cabin on Lac LeNotre, (aka Katch).

Le Domaine Shannon is located north of Zec Petawaga, near the reserve faunique de la Verendrye. The main lodge on Lac Seguin is about 365 KM from Montreal, the 2 cabins on Lac LeNotre are another 28 KM North.

We headed out on Saturday night, around 2 AM, reached the forest road past Grand Remous at 5:00 AM, following signs to Le Domaine Shannon as well as about another dozen or so outfitters in the region.

Heading up the road at daybreak, we were greeted by a big black wolf that came rushing at our car. I swerved to avoid it, and was somewhat amused, as I was under the impression that they were more finicky. A couple minutes later, we spotted a mid sized black bear crossing the road. That's when I told my son that "we're in wild country now".

About 1.5 hours later, we arrived at the main lodge, about 1/2 hour before they opened for breakfast. We bumped into some American anglers that make the 600 mile trip from Pennsylvania each summer to fish Lac LeNotre for walleye. Apparently their dad has been going there for 47 years!

We finally met the owner Sylvain Danis, he directed us on where to go, and informed us of the outfitter regulations. Walleye have a slot limit of 12 - 22 inches at the fork, and pike must be over 24 inches. The bag limits are generous, allowing for 8 walleye and 10 pike per license, as they are located in Zone 14.

We headed out for Lac LeNotre a bit after 7:00 AM, and spotted a rare cougar crossing the road with a rabbit in it's mouth. We arrived at our cabin around 8:00 AM, unloaded out gear and loaded the boat.

The cabin wasn't anything fancy, it was a bare minimum fishing camp, but equipped with propane lights, stove, fridge/freezer, as well as a bathroom with shower.

The boats were nice 18 foot fiberglass, with brand new 9.9 four stroke Mercury engines, which really made trolling enjoyable without the fumes of a 2 stroke. I mounted our portable sonar, which proved to be a crucial asset to our success.

To get to the lake, we had to make our way down a small river, which was about 4 feet lower than usual. It made the way in and out of the lake treacherous, as it's only about 1 foot deep in some spots, and is filled with boulders.

We got on the lake at about 10:00 AM, and the waves seemed big for our boat. We decided to attempt jigging, and set anchor. The stone anchor wouldn't hold, so we slowly drifted back towards the river. I hooked my first walleye of the trip with 5-10 minutes, a nice 16 inch keeper.

After attempting a bit more jigging without results, we decided to troll deep divers. I went with a Wally Diver, my son used a Blue Fox diver. Over the next 2 hours, I managed another 2 walleye, my son landed 1 and lost 2 more, all keepers in the 1.5 - 2 lb range.

We returned to the cabin just as the rain started falling, as we had been inside a cloud all morning. I filleted the walleye, had some lunch and headed off to bed. The rain got heavier, culminating in massive in massive thunderstorm and lighting show over night, which actually shook the cabin.

Next morning, the sun was out, we decided to troll for pike. We kept the deep divers on, and sure enough I hooked into 3 pike that morning, only 1 was big enough to keep.

After filleting it and having a nice steak BBQ for lunch, we headed back to the lake. This time, the waves were a lot bigger than the previous day, made trolling just about impossible. Noticing big schools of walleye on the sonar, we tied on bottom bouncers, followed by a 4 foot lead with a simple hook and worm on my rod, and a worm harness on my son's rod. The method proved successful, we landed another 8 walleyes, all 15-17 inches, we actually had to start releasing them, as we were over the bag limit. We headed back to shore around 6:00 PM.

Next morning, the wind and waves got even worse, trolling was almost impossible again, though my son managed a couple small pike. As our walleye bag limit was already full, we headed back to the main lodge to determine if there were other lakes we could attempt for some of the monster pike we saw mounted in the lodge. Unfortunately, most of those lakes were only accessible in a 4x4, and we were in a car, as the rental company couldn't deliver the SUV I had reserved. In addition, we would have to carry the 100 lb + motors wherever we decided to go, so we decided to stay put. I bought a license for my son, so the challenge was now to catch another bag limit of walleye, as we ate enough walleye, until they we coming out of our noses.

We got back to the lake, and started drift fishing the waves after lunch. The wind and cloud cover helped, and within a few minutes I hooked into a bigger walleye, turned out to weigh 4.5 lbs. I was sure it was over the slot limit, but as it only measured 21.5 inches at the tail fork, so we kept it.

Next drift produced another big walleye, almost identical in size, but it was full of tumors all over it's body, so I released it. We then managed another 4 walleye, though my son lost one right next to the boat.

The drift died down with the wind towards the evening, so we started trolling again. My son managed another Northern pike, a 26 inch keeper.

Next morning, the sun was shining bright, not a cloud in the sky. We fished all day long, switching from trolling pike, to drifting for walleye, back to trolling deep diver. Not one hit for most of the day, until my son managed another walleye towards evening. At least we didn't get skunked.

Though we had the cabin reserved until Friday, I preferred to leave Thursday afternoon, so our Thursday morning challenge would be to catch the 3 remaining walleye for our bag limit. The lake was calm for the first time, slight rain falling. We trolled for about 1.5 hours, I managed 1 walleye that hit in about 50 feet of water, but lost it right next to the boat. As the rain died, the lake suddenly turned calm for the first time during our trip. The surface was mirror like.

I decided to try jigging a big school I had marked on the sonar. We got on top of them, dropped our jigs, and the bite was on! My son landed on right away. Not wanting to spook them with the anchor, I reversed right over them again as we had drifted off. We dropped our jigs and again, my son pulled another keeper out. This was getting too easy. I reversed again, dropped our jigs and bang, fish on again, I landed my first blue walleye.

We could have fished out the whole school, but our second bag limit was full again, and the mission was accomplished. I still had to clean the fish, make lunch, pack the car, and drive a good 5.5 - 6 hours back home, so we headed back to the cabin at 11:00 AM.

Overall, I was very satisfied with the quality walleye fishing we had. I must say that the sonar really saved our butts, we would have been clueless without it. It was the first time that I was that dependant on the sonar, and also the first time I was able to consistently catch the fish that we were marking. Even better, the entire trip was free.

I never imagined getting this quality of walleye fishing in mid August, especially on a big lake like Lac LeNotre. I can only imagine the great walleye fishing they must have their in spring. If catching nice sized walleye in big numbers is your goal, I recommend you give Le Domaine Shannon a try.

Their toll free number is 888 449-3285. Be sure to ask Sylvain or Serge to set you up in the same spot as Freshwater Phil for guaranteed success.

Fishing carp with hair rigs

2010-08-09T18:44:00.000-07:00

Most of the carp fishing I did up until last season was done using boiled corn as hookbait. It worked well until gobies reached my carping grounds. Ever since then, fishing with canned or frozen corn has become a lot harder once mid May rolls in and the gobies join the other bait fish in stealing the corn before the carp get to it. I've experimented with fermented corn which is a bit harder, but the stuff smells horrible and a pain in the neck to haul around. It's also hard to chum it out to the distances I cast to.

Last season, I started experimenting with boilies mounted on hair rigs for the first time. I had limited success, but they still outperformed the corn for most of the season. This season, I have switched over completely to boilies. It's a lot cleaner, baitfish don't bother with them, an I can effectively chum with a catapult no matter how far I'm casting.

After downsizing from 20 mm to 16 mm, I've noticed a huge difference. The carp are hitting a lot more, and to my surprise, the average size is up close to 5 lbs! I've also been experimenting with hook size for the hair rigs as well as hair length. Though most carpers seem the prefer a short 1/2 inch hair rig, I've found found that my hookup ratio increases from 40% to 90% with a longer 2.5 - 3 inch hair rig when using a 16 mm boilie.

I also picked up some smaller 12mm boilies, though I haven't got around to trying them yet. I will probably run the short / long hair rig test with only the 12 mm's, and then run another test using 12mm against 16 mm to determine which works best.

My wife and kids are only too happy to be part of my research team, as I like to fish 2 lines side by side for effective "scientific" testing. They've all beat their personal bests this season.

My wife's first carp fishing trip

2010-08-01T13:22:00.000-07:00

After being married to a fishing nut like myself for 16 years, my wife finally decided to try fishing this summer. Though we'd been out on a few evening outings around town, the fish haven't co-operated much, and she can't take the bugs that come out as the sun sets. I finally took my wife out for a short carp outing, goal was to have her hook, fight and land a decent sized carp.

We got to our spot around noon, I set up 2 lines with boilies on hair rigs, as sweet corn as bait is just about useless for carp these days due to the massive amount of gobies that eat off the bait. As I was casting quite far from shore, I chummed with boilies as well.

After an hour or so without a hit, I switched spots, and got hit within the first couple minutes. My wife grabbed the rod, got a good hookset, and the fight was on. I coached her through the process, as she had to get used to letting the fish fight the rod and time the retrieve in between the fast runs the sent the reel screaming. After a few minutes, she had her first carp in the net, a decent 15 lb fish.

She landed her next one bout 20 minutes later, almost identical to the first one in size. About 15 minutes later, we missed a false start, but within another 15 minutes or so I had a big one on the line. Unfortunately, it spit the hook in the first minute or so.

About 10 minutes later, her line goes, and the fight was on again. The fish made it easy on her as it ran straight for us. By the time it realized what it had done, it was 20 feet away. That's when I realized that it was bigger than I imagined. I finally landed it in the net, turned out to be a spawned out female that weighed in at 22 lbs. My guess is she would have been closer to 27 or 28 lbs were she still full, as she measured exactly 3 feet in length.

With my luck, it was now time to go, as we had errands to take care of. I enjoyed showing her what makes me head out in rain, sun, cold or hot weather. I hope to go on many more outings with her.

Carp fishing with my kids

2010-07-27T09:56:00.000-07:00

Took my 3 older sons for a 1/2 day outing, plan was to target carp and pike from the shore, as the winds were gusting at 40 KM/H.

Got to our spot at about 9:30, set up two lines baited with boilies mounted on hair rigs, and a 3rd line with a 4 inch minnow.

We got our first hit withing 1/2 hou, Levi landed his first carp. I realized that I forgot to bring along my net, so I got in the water to land it, as I was in my shorts anyway.

About 20 minutes later, the line goes again, I set into a mush bigger fish and hand Avi the line. He doing a good job until it heads for a spot where he was sure to lose it. I horsed it out of the spot for him, and managed to get it right near the shore. That's when it took a deep run along a sharp rocky ledge and snapped my 50 lb Power Pro. I estimated it's weight somewhere between 25-30 lbs, biggest carp I've hooked this season.

Seconds later, the pike line goes hard, Avi grabs the rod again. The fish starts taking drag, and I had a good hunch that it wasn't a pike or bass, as it was fighting like a carp. Turned out to be a smaller carp, in the 7-8 lb range. It's the second time I've caught carp on live minnows. On both occasions, the steel leaders I was using didn't seem to deter them.

Ari then missed his hookset on 2 consecutive runs about an hour apart, I think I might have retied the new hair rig with the lead too short. The fishing then died down, we left at 2:00 PM.

Shore Fishing heatwaves

2010-07-25T08:26:00.000-07:00

Shore fishing around Montreal during heatwaves can be tough. As I don't own a boat anymore, and my buddy's boat has been stuck in the shop for the past month, I've got no other choice than to make due with what I can.

Since the massive heat wave at the start of July, fishing for big channel catfish has been the slowest I've ever experienced. I've been out a number of times with my wife, the kids and some friends. Despite fishing a variety of popular baits such as live & dead minnow, worms, chicken liver, and chicken hearts, we've been getting skunked time after time.

Carping has been slow as well, though I did manage a small 8 lb carp and missed another on the one outing I've done so far in July.

Pike have been better, though they are a lot smaller than usual. I managed a couple under 2 lbs during an evening outing with my wife, as well as 3 more in the 2.5- 3 lbs range on a 1/2 day trip with my son.

I have some more fishing planned, probably for carp, pike and possibly trout in the next week or two. I'll keep y'all updated.

Fishing with children

2010-07-08T16:24:00.001-07:00

With the massive heat wave that has been around this week, shore fishing has been dismal. I didn't even bother going out until evenings, as the daytime temps stayed about 40 C with the high humidity.

As panfish as the only consitent bite when shore fishing in this sort of weather, I took my 4 year old son and 6 year old nephew out for an evening of panfish, sunfish being our main target. I decided to try using some left over chicken hearts and livers that I had from a previous catfish outing, but to my surprise the fish were less than interested.

Still, we managed to hook about a dozen sunfish and perch in about an hour. Nowhere near the numbers we would have caught fishing with worms as bait, but the children were happy just to be out fishng, both left with big smiles.

Channel cat shore fishing in Montreal

2010-06-30T13:24:00.000-07:00

Went out for a couple hours with my dad this afternoon hoping to hook into some sturgeon, now that the season's finally open. Setup our lines at about 12:30 PM using big worms balled up as bait.

First hit came about 1:15, just as a big cloud passed over us. I hooked into a small fish, probably a 3-4 lb channel cat, it came off before I had a chance to land it. About 10 minutes later, I hook into a big one, I was sure it was a sturgeon from the way it was pulling down. Turned out to be a 10.5 lb channel cat, my biggest so far this season. Missed a couple more hits, and then we had to leave at 3:00 PM.

I was hoping for sturgeons, but was pleasantly surprised by the channel cats. They seemed to turn on whenever heavy clouds passed over us, maybe the 30 KM + winds helped as well.

Family bass fishing vacation

2010-06-27T12:19:00.000-07:00

Just got back from my yearly family fishing vacation, we spent a week up in the Gatineau valley region of Quebec with my dad, 3 of my sons and some friends.

The weather co-operated for the most part, but overall, fishing was tougher than the past few years. The evening bites was particularly slow in comparison to my previous trips there, it was almost non existent this year.

We all still managed to catch decent fish, and I have a few more good fishing stories to tell. Here is a rough day by day summary of the fishing.

Sunday June 20th. We arrive at about 12:30, unload, get the boats a rods set up, we're on the water by 2:00 PM. I have my 2 younger sons, while my older son takes my dad on his boat. Only big fish landed is a 2.5 lb bass that actually leaped out of the water to take my brand new Zara Puppy. I'm happy with the topwater catch, and release the bass as we're still a few days before the bass opener in that zone.

Monday June 21st. The topwater bite is non existent. My buddy catches a giant 5 lb bass in about 20 feet on a tube, but other than that, bass fishing is slow. I take my two younger ones out for some jumbo pumpkinseed sunfish, they land them up to 10 inches big.

My 9 year old Avi also landed a Jumbo 12 inch perch. I filleted it, only to find a couple dozen worms in the flesh.

Tuesday, June 22nd. I land another 2.5 lb bass around 7:00 AM. I head back to the cabin, pick up my son, and fish until 9:00 AM, at which time I manage a nice 4.5 lb Northern Pike. Finally, some decent shore lunch, and I get some more Y-bone removal practice to boot.

We spend the rest of the afternoon landing big Pumpkin seed sunfish and smaller bass up to 1.5 lbs.

Wednesday June 23rd. Finally, the long awaited bass opener. I head out for the morning bite, and we hit instant success. First cast, my son Avi lands a 2 lb bass.

Next cast, I hook into a 3-3.5 lb bass. As I hand the rod to Avi to fight the fish telling him not to let it run into the trees, the fish dives into a sunken tree and gets caught up at about 15-20 feet down. I wait for it to come free but it doesn't. I snap the line, and start again.

I cast to another sunken tree, and hit another big bass. Again, it runs directly into the branches. This time it's caught up at about 6 or 7 feet suspended over 25 feet. I see it stuck in the sunken tree, and decide I've had enough. I undress, tell my son not to do as I do, and jump in. Despite not having goggles, I see the fish enough to be able to grab it by the mouth, rip it free from the trees and hook, swim back to the surface, and dump the 3 pounder into the boat. Another great fishing moment, and story that will probably remain etched in my son's mind for years to come.
We head back to the cabin, while my older son and dad go out. They also mange a few nice bass, up to 3 lbs.

During the early afternoon, we experience an earthquake, first ever felt by the owner of the in his 54 years. Some of my buddies are lucky enough to be out on the water at the time, not much chance one would ever experience an earthquake while out on a lake. Some felt it in the water, other just heard the forest rumbling. I was on land, as were the rest of my family. Turned out to measure 5.0 on the Richter scale and was centered about 100 KM away.

Thursday, June 24th. After a night of heavy rain and and overcast daybreak, I head out with Avi again, as Levi can't seem to wake up after having too much fun around the late bonfires and fireworks. He manages another quick 2 lb bass, while I land a nice 3.25 lb bass, which turns out to be the biggest one of the trip for me. The rain chases us off the lake, besides, I'm in over my head with another 1/2 dozen bass to fillet for my dad and friends.

The sun shows up by mid afternoon, along with a cold front. The lake is now buzzing with high powered bass boats, as la fete national brings the yearly crowds in to fish the opening weekend. Not much of a bite that evening, I head off to pack it in about 8:30 PM. We leave on Friday morning.

Time to start dreaming/planing about the next year's outing.

My biggest perch

2010-06-10T06:00:00.000-07:00

This week seems to be the weeks of the biggest fish in my family. My eldest son caught his biggest carp, followed by my next son who caught his first (and biggest) eel, followed by the next one that caught his first (and biggest) channel catfish.

Yesterday was my turn. I headed out to fish the St Lawrence River, trolling a spot I found a few weeks ago. Started of trolling shallow for pike, but all we hit were some mid sized smallmouth bass. We switched to a deeper section of the river, and I tied on a Rapala countdown (CD 9). It got hit within a few minutes. As I was bringing in the fish, I thought it was a small walleye, turned out to be a monster 13 inch perch that weighed in at 1.2 lbs.

The weird thing about this perch, was that it looked like some sort of mutant. The black bars on it's sides were almost non existent, nor did it have the telltale hump on it's back like most Jumbo perch. It seemed to have a pink roe sack coming out of it, even though perch roe is normally yellow, and the perch spawned a long time ago.

My fishing buddy thought it might be a hybrid crossed with a smallmouth bass, but that didn't make any sense to me. I can't imagine two fish that are that different from each other getting crossed. To me, it was just a mutant "monster".

My son's biggest catfish

2010-06-09T13:36:00.000-07:00

2 of my son's both came home with 100/100 on their final exam's last night, so I offered them a some night fishing as a reward. Of course, they eagerly accepted.

It was too late to pick up minnows, but I have a bunch or worms I've been collecting for our yearly trip up North in a couple weeks, so I "borrowed" some. Though worms aren't my ideal bait for big channel catfish, I know they work for multispecies in the St Lawrence River.

We got out on the water close to 8:00 PM, my 9 year old won the coin toss for the first fish. Sure enough, the baitrunner reel starts screaming withing the first 15 minutes or so, he sets the hooks and the fight is on... He lands his first eel after a minute or so. Nothing big, probably 22-24 inches and kind of thin.

About 1/2 hour later, the catfish rod starts bouncing, time for my 7 year old to step up to the plate... I hookset for him, and know that he's going to have a hard time fighting the big catfish, as that rod and reel combo is the heaviest I have, and he's a short lefty using a tall right handed set up. Surpisingly, he manages to bring the fish to shore, but can't lift the rod high enough to land it.
I help him out, and his eyes almost pop out of his head when he sees the 8 lb + channel cat.

After a couple snags and small fish eating off our worms, we head home around 9:30 as I'm out bait. Glad to see the channel cats are back just in time for the summer. Hope to catch many more this season.

My son's biggest carp

2010-06-08T08:27:00.000-07:00

Took my 14 year old son Ari for a day or carp fishing, as I haven't been carping since last season. We headed out the the Long Sault area, and I was surprised to find the water level a bit higher than normal, in contrast to the extremely low water levels East of the Cornwall dam.

There were a number of people fishing for carp when we arrived, one was landing one just as we got out of the car. We didn't get any of the spots I hoped for as they were already taken, so we had to chum from scratch. We set up one line with corn as hookbait and the other with a boilie on a hair rig. We chummed with corn, boilies and some specialized carp pellets.

The carp fishing was a slower than expected, took 2.5 hours to get the first hit on the boilie. As my son set the hook, his reaction was "this one's big". It gave a nice fight with many hard runs, and pick up some floating weeds patches on the way, so the rod was bent over in half for most of the battle. He finally landed it, it weighed in at 18.5 lbs. A friend of mine had asked me to bring back a large one for him to try smoking, so we kept it.

About 1.5 hours later, the hookbait line takes off, somehow the fish managed to slice my 50 lb Power Pro before I even had a chance for a hookset, something that's never happened to me with that line before, as it's generally the best line when it comes to fishing big carp in the rocks.

As our plan was to target pike as well, so we switched to lures after 3:30 PM. We hit some different spots, didn't manage any pike, but caught some largemouth bass up to 3 lbs on a variety of lures.

Fishing brown trout

2010-06-03T10:58:00.000-07:00

As previously mentioned, I'm dedicating more time to shore fishing this season as I no longer have a boat. I've been wanting to break in my new waders, and finally got the chance yesterday, as I tried my first serious attempt at trout fishing.

The river we went to has some brown trout and rainbow trout as well, I'm not too picky about which I catch as long as I'm catching them. Plan was to drift small worms in the current on light gear, while wading the river. My backup plan was to use small spinners and lures in case the trout weren't interested in our offerings.

First spot we hit was an instant success, my buddy hooked up to a small brown trout within the first few casts. I moved further downstream and managed my first brown trout (ever) a few minutes later. We kept at it for another hour or so, caught about 6 small brown trout up to 8 inches.

We decided to move to another spot in hopes of catching bigger fish. Second spot proved better than the first one, and was more scenic as well. We managed another 8-10 brown trout, biggest one was a 13 incher landed by my buddy. The next few spots we hit weren't too exciting, a few small perch was all we managed.

The wading experience was interesting. The current was strong at time, and made the rocks seem even more slippery. I managed not to fall under close to the end of the day, when I tripped backwards over a rock and the current knocked me off balance. The waders held up well, and kept me very warm, as they are neoprene stocking foot chest waders. I'm glad I went with the stocking foot, as I'm able to turn them inside out to dry after going under.

Overall, I don't see what trout fishermen find exciting about catching fish that size, even on ultra light gear, except that trout taste good (we kept some for the table). Still, cleaning fish that size is a mess, and I'll probably have to fish rivers where the trout grow a lot bigger in order to really enjoy fishing for trout.

Fishing Jumbo pumpkinseed and bluegill sunfish

2010-05-25T11:49:00.000-07:00

Took my 7 and 9 year old boys out fishing on Victoria day, as they were off school. Plan was to target the big panfish and possibly some pike.

Started off fishing Rapalas and spinnerbaits, no pike hits, just a few big bass. I downsized my 9 year old to a smaller lure, he started catching big rock bass on every cast.

Switched my 7 year old to a worm and bobber combo, he started catching a mix bag of panfish, including rock bass, perch and big Bluegill sunfish.

As the day wore on and the temperature kept climbing, the sunfish seemed to grow in size. Lure fishing died down, they were both on the worm and bobber system for most of the afternoon., catching fish on nearly every cast.

Some of the pumkinseed sunfish were close to 1 lb, and the bluegills were even bigger, many hitting 12 inches. They caught a good 50 or 60 of them, the action was often non stop, so I barely had time to fish. Needless to say, they were thrilled with the outing.

Seems like the heat wave kickstarted the spawn, we saw many species doing the mating dance, including bass, carp and gar.

Walleye fishing Quebec season opener

2010-05-17T19:06:00.001-07:00

Headed out to the Quebec side of Lake St Francis a couple days after the Quebec walleye opener with my eldest son.

Plan was to spend some time seeking out both pike and walleye in a stretch of river we'd never been to before.

Started out fishing classic pike structure, non to be found. After running and gunning about a dozen spots with lures and spinnerbaits, we stumbled on some nice rock structure that seemed perfect for walleyes.

We switched to jig and grub combos, managed a jumbo 12 inch perch and some small smallmouth bass.

We then switched to trolling deeper water and hit one walleye in the 3-4 lb range, as well as some of those big smallmouth St Francis is famous for.

With that part of the mission accomplished, we tried for pike again, but weren't able to find any.

Fishing pike season opener in Southern Ontario

2010-05-12T11:44:00.000-07:00

After a long winter, it was nice to get out on Lake St Francis a couple days after Pike and Walleye opened in Ontario's zone 20.

As I just sold my boat, a tagged along as my fishing buddy launched his new boat for it's maiden voyage.

We headed to my first spot, some saw some nice pike and mid sized muskies basking in the sun. As our luck would have it, they were totally inactive, nothing we tried would get them to budge.

Off to our next spot, a bit shallower and the water more stained, sun coming out and temp heating up. So did the fishing. The pike started off hitting on spinnerbaits, and towards the evening, they were even hitting big topwaters! Talk about active fish...

As usual around this time of the year, the bass were sharing the hotspots with tons of bass, so we caught our fair share of those as well to say the least, some in the 4 lb range.

Day ended up with 12 pike landed and realeased, unfortunately they were all under 5 lbs. As my dad says, "Better than a slap with a dead fish".

More shore fishing

2010-04-23T05:22:00.000-07:00

Finally sold my boat. Looks like I'll be doing more shore fishing this season. I still have my 7.5 HP outboard, so I'll be able to rent boat in a couple locations around town whenever I get the urge.

I plan to get back into some carping, as I neglected that species ever since getting the boat. Hope to target some more channel cats and sturgeons too.

I also picked up neoprene stocking foot waders, and I'm considering taking up fly fishing as well.
I have a brand new fly rod/reel combo that I've never used, and one of my friends offered to show teach me how to fly fish. He's and excellent trout fisherman, so I'll possibly get into a (tasty) species that I haven't targeted yet.

I hope to have some new and exciting blog posts this season.

Fishing panfish with my sons

2010-03-25T19:25:00.000-07:00

My 4 sons aged 4 to 14 were off school today,so I took them out for a day of panfishing. Weather was nice and sunny, though a bit on the windy side.

We headed across the Ontario border to zone 18 hoping to hook into some nice bluegill sunfish, using live worms I caught in front of my house the previous night.

The bluegills never showed, but we managed to land 3 perch between 5 and 8 inches, and missed about 5 or 6 others. Kids had a blast, my wife got a break from the kids, and I got back to doing what I enjoy most.

Fishing 10 lines in Winter

2010-03-21T09:57:00.000-07:00

Funny how I manage to figure something new out every time I read the fishing regulations guide. I noticed that in the Montreal area (zones 7 & 8), we are allowed to use 10 lines between December 20th and March 31st.

I imagine they were thinking of ice fishing when they put this rule in place, but because of the wording, it turns out that we can fish open water with up to 10 lines per person. I confirmed this with a conservation officer just to make sure before I posted this, I wouldn't want anyone getting into trouble because of something they read here.

I doubt anyone can handle 10 lines in open water on their own, maybe 3. But it leads to some wild ideas. Imagine hitting some schooling fish, or heading out with a bunch of friends at once. It would likely make a very interesting Youtube clip.

If you do intend to take advatange of the multiple lines allowance, I suggest printing that section of the regulations, just in case you bump into some uneducated / overzealous anglers or conservation officers.

First outing of 2010

2010-03-09T09:07:00.000-08:00

Finally got around to going on my first outing of 2010. As I didn't do any fishing since October 2009, I was itching to get out for some open water fishing with all the nice weather we've been having.

I had some big frozen shiners in my freezer from last season, I defrosted some headed out around 2:00 PM. Got my line set up, felt great to actually be able to cast again. The wind was howling at 40 KM/hour gusts, but I enjoyed the sunshine sipping cold Heineken as I was dressed in a snowsuit.

The fish weren't around or at least they weren't interested in my offerings. I called it quits after about 2.5 hours.

Petition to stop the Asian carp invasion

2010-01-25T13:04:00.000-08:00

Found this petition asking Obama to get off his lazy ass and agree to shut the locks connecting Chicago’s carp infested waterways with the Great Lakes to prevent Asian carp from entering Lake Michigan and the other Great Lakes.

Takes less that 1 minute, click: http://www.stopasiancarp.com/

New Sunfish bag limits in Ontario

2010-01-19T17:51:00.000-08:00

Happy 2010 to all readers! This is my first post this season, still haven't got around to ice fishing, been too busy.

Logged on to the MNR web site to renew my Ontario license yesterday, figured I check out the new rules. Turns out that zone 18 where I do much of my Ontario fishing now has bag limits for Sunfish. Posted on http://www.mnr.gov.on.ca/278713.pdf

OK, limits on a new species are nothing new, but this new rule has to be one of the strangest ones I've seen to date.

To begin with, they sate that "Many anglers from the US travel to Zone 18 specifically target sunfish, and they generate millions for the local economy".

Does this sound normal? People actually come across the border to chase the the almighty sunfish, when we've got the country's biggest muskies, walleyes, smallmouth bass and carp swimming in the same waters? Are Americans that desperate?

Now for part 2: The bag limit is 300 fish. Doesn't that seem just a "tad" high? If they claim to be doing this to protect the species, how's that going to help? Besides, are they implying that up until now, Americans have been taking more than 300 sunfish back across the border?
Who the heck is going to clean al those sunfish, and how much meat are they going to be left with by the time they're done?

On the bright side, they are alowing only 30 fish over 7 inches, so they are offering a bit of extra protection for the "giants".

My kids have had great days catching tons of big Bluegills and pumpkinseeds, but personally, I've never seen any adults targeting sunfish around here. We also never kept any, just not worth the mess and effort.

Is there something here that I'm missing / don't know about, or is this the most ridiculous fishing story of the year?

Wrapping up another great fishing season

2009-11-11T18:12:00.000-08:00

My boat's been stored for winter as I didn't manage to sell it over the past few weeks, though I might have found a buyer for next season.

Anyway, fishing has been super slow lately. Went out for a few short outings to some spots around town, nothing much doing except for some small perch...

The following recap is a summary of what this season was like for me:

Ice fishing for pike was terrible. Though I only went on a few outings, perch were the only fish I caught consistently through the ice this season. Was really looking forward to ice out by the time April came around.

On my first outing, I started off the season beating my personal best carp (and any other fish I've ever landed), with a monster 32.5 lb carp. That had me super pumped, really no better way to start off the season.

That carp turned out to be the first and last of the season for me. Though did some guided carping trips during the spring, my clients fought and landed all the fish, I merely put them onto the spots and provided the gear. Still not sure I want to attempt any more guiding next season, it really took the fun out of it for me when the bite was slow.

Moving onto pike, I had big plans after the the good 2007 and 2008 seasons I had. This season turned out to be a big let down as far as pike too. My biggest all spring was under 4.5 lbs, and I managed a 6.5 pounder up North during July. I really hope they'll be back to their old hunting grounds next season.

Walleye were abundant as in previous years, though my size average went down drastically. To be fair, I didn't really target them as often, and the smaller 14-16 inchers are better eating anyway.

Bass were the one area where the season was phenomenal for me, especially largemouth bass. I can easily say it was my best overall bass season ever. I landed close to 300 bass, the vast majority on lures, including my biggest largemouth at 5.25 lbs. I re-discovered top water fishing like never before, to the point where I'm almost sworn off anything except for the rush of a topwater hit. Though I was exposed to new killer tactics such as wacky rigged Senkos and tubes, nothing beats a good topwater bite. To me, it's fishing at it's best, combing ultimate relaxation with ultimate excitement. The season was highlighted by my yearly trip up North for the bass opener, 6 days of perfect 30 degree weather, great fishing with family and friends, who can ask for anything more?

After most of my spots got overgrown during July, I got into night fishing for channel cats, something I had been missing for most of my fishing career. Yes I caught some nice ones here and there, but I really targeted and caught them like never before. They kind of replaced the poor carping season I had, as most of the ones I caught were over 10 lbs, the biggest a 14.5 lb fatty. Still fishing at night during the summer was extremely relaxing. Sipping cold beer from a lawn chair, waiting for the baitrunner to start screaming, fighting the big ugly cats (and eels) in the current were quite a blast, hope to get back into it next season.

I started dabbling in sturgeon fishing late in the season as well. Did manage a couple in the 7 lb range, hope to put some more time into targeting sturgeons next season as well.

The kids all had great bass and panfish seasons as well, I'm sure they'll be itching to go out by the time the ice melts as well.

The tacklebox is just about empty now. All my lures are sorted and stored for next season, as are my rods and rest of my gear and terminal tackle. I was lucky enough to sell of the vast majority of my musky gear which was never really put to use, I even got back everything I spent and then some.

I'm already dreaming of next spring and we haven't even seen any snow yet! I can't really say I'm looking forward to ice fishing, but I know myself well enough. By the time first ice is safe enough, I'll have long since been suffering from cabin fever and convinced myself the "the big one" is waiting for me right under my feet... OK, maybe not. But I'll likely attempt taking the kids out for some perch and possibly some stocked brookies.

Hope you all had as great of a season as I did, good luck toughing it out for the next 6 months.

Fishing big smallmouth bass in October

2009-10-19T18:31:00.000-07:00

Sunny skies and no wind, we decided to take advantage of one of the last few good fishing days in October, as my boat will likely be winterized in the next week or so, unless I manage to sell it before then.

As clear windless days are a rarity in October, we decided to cruise around the gin clear waters of Lake St Francis in search of trophy smallmouth bass which can hit 7 lbs this time of the year. Our plan was to fish some deeper areas or target the ones we spot visually in shallower water.

On our way out, we spotted a small carp and a very nice Esox, not sure if it was a big pike or small musky. We fished the areas adjacent to the seaway, until we drifted right over 2 monster smallies in about 3-4 feet of water. We anchored about 60 feet away, and started casting towards them. My buddy tried tubes and Senkos unsuccessfully.

I started with a CD 11 Rapala Countdown, then decided to try something "crazy". I found a rig my son had tied for catching small perch, basically a sinker with about 6 inches of line leading to a small #8 or #10 hook. I buried it into a live worm so as to keep it weedless. I bounced it along the bottom very slowly, and on my 3rd cast, I hooked into one of the monsters. On it's first jumped, it snaped the hook right off the rig, looks like my son didn't bother stress testing the knot.

The fish was a true fall monster, one of the biggest if not the biggest smallmouth bass I have ever hooked (my PB is 5.1/2 lbs). We got a very good look at it, as it jumped about 3 feet out of the water, conservative estimate of 5 lbs, very possibly over 6. Needles to say, I was mad at myself for not checking the knot / rig before putting it on. Still, It felt good hooking into a smally that big in a situation where they usually won't hit much.

The fish didn't go far, we saw it cruising around, no longer interested in our offerings. We tried to catch the other one, also a nice one easily over 4 lbs. This one wouldn't bite, we even managed to bounce our lines off it's back.

Eventually, we headed to calmer waters as the wind picked up, managed a small largemouth on a tube and a big bluegill on a worm.

Largemouth Bass fishing in the fall

2009-10-16T08:56:00.000-07:00

With sunny skies and calm wind conditions, we headed out on the boat for some late season fall time largemouth bass fishing. Over the years, we've hit different patterns at this time of the year. Sometimes they are extremely active and will hit deep diving lures, other times they need to be finessed with rubber worms, tubes and curly tails, or fished with live bait.

My buddy started of with tubes, my son with curly tails, I went with lures. They both managed 4 largemouth bass each, up to 3 lbs or so, as well as a big crappie. As I hate using rubbers, I eventually switched to a red and white spoon hoping for some pike. I got a nice hit on my second cast, just adjacent to some weeds in bigger waters. The fish stayed down during the fight, I was sure it was a decent pike until I brought it up. It was a nice 3 lb+ largemouth bass, not too long but very thick.

Hope to head back for another outing before the end of the season, will probably go with live bait.

Fallfish in St Lawrence River near Montreal

2009-10-14T13:02:00.000-07:00

Went out with my 14 year old son for a quick 3 hour afternoon fishing session, as I had a few hours to spare an he was still off from school.

After last week's success with the sturgeon, we decided to attempt it again, we set up our lines with worm balls on sliding sinkers.

First fish hit within 1/2 hour, my son took the rod and landed the first fallfish I've ever seen coming out of the St Lawrence River. I know that some of the waters connecting to the river from the Laurentians have them, I was very surprised at the catch. The fish measured 16 inches, might have weighed close to 2 lbs, far bigger than the average sized ones we've caught up North.

That was it for the bite, except for or worms getting eaten off every now and then.

Fishing sturgeons at parc Cite du Havre

2009-10-06T18:19:00.000-07:00

With the kids off school, I decided to take them out for some local shore fishing. I've seen people fishing Parc Cite du Havre for sturgeon in the past, so after doing a bit of research, I decided to give it a try.

In addition to my standard carping / catfishing rod which is a 6.5 foot medium action, fitted with a 40 series baitrunner reel spooled with 50 lb Power Pro, I took along a stiff / heavy action 7 foot catfish rod, fitted with a 50 series reel spooled with 65 lb Power Pro. I also picked up some 6 ounce puck sinkers which I used to rig wormballs on a 3/0 wide gap hook sliding sinker setup.

Got to my spot at about 10:00 AM, joined a bunch of locals for some elbow to elbow fishing, definitely not my favorite type of fishing conditions. Within 30 minutes, I had my first hit. I set the hook and thought it was a big clump of weeds until I reeled in a 3 lb redhorse sucker. As these waters contain the rare copper redhorse, all suckers in the area must be released, so I revived and released it after snapping a shot of it.

About 45 minutes later, my older son's baitrunner goes off, he hooks and lands a 1 lb smallmouth bass.

My 2 younger ones weren't enjoying the outing much, as they kept getting stuck in the rocks due to the fast current. By noon, they both had enough, so I was forced to leave early to take them home.

Not wanting to waste the rest of the day, I headed right back out to another spot with my older son, figured we would attempt another try at catching either sturgeon or channel cats. We setup the heavier rod with a wormball, and the Rhino with a dead minnow. Sure enough, after about 1 hour, the heavier rods starts bouncing lightly, I figured it was probably a small panfish going after the worm. I set the hook just to be sure. I thought I hooked the bottom, until it started moving...Fish on!

This fish had my broomstick like catfish rod bent over almost to the halfway point, I figured it must be a sturgeon or really big channel catfish. Turn out to be a 32 inch / 7 lb sturgeon, really a lot smaller than I thought. I guess these fish a extremely powerful, especially in fast current. I've hooked fish double that size in the same place, they didn't put up half the fight this one did. We snapped some pics and released it in good health.

We now set up the other rod with a worm ball as well. Sure enough, after about another hour, the rod starts twitching, and my son calls out that it's "his fish". OK, I pass him the rod, he sets, stats reeling and tells me there's nothing on, until he realizes he's got a lethargic rock bass that swallowed his setup.

We set up again, but the strong winds blowing cold air off the river right at us force us to leave by 4:00 PM with no more bites.

Anyway, this sturgeon fishing has me pumped up now, as I can only imagine what it would be like to hook into a mid size or big one as opposed to the "baby" I caught.

Canada boaters card / license exam

2009-10-02T09:00:00.000-07:00

The deadline for all Canadian boaters that operate any type of motorized boats is finally here. Before September 15 2009, many fishermen and anglers were still covered by the exemption for personal watercrafts / boats over 4 meters in length.

Now, even boaters using an electric trolling motor must have a valid boaters card, otherwise known as the Pleasure Craft Operators Card (P.C.O.C). Boaters caught without it will face a stiff fine of $250 plus surcharges, which can amount to a total of $325 depending on the province.

I took my test online at http://www.boaterexam.com/?id=1259 , they offer the free study guide, and free re-tries for those that don't pass the exam the first time around. The site is endorsed by Bob Izumi, and if you click through to sign up for the test from my blog or web site, I'll actually earn a few bucks too.

Catching bass on rubber worms, senkos and curly tails

2009-09-25T07:35:00.000-07:00

Fall is back again, the cooling water temps have the largemouth bass holding close to bottom. Although fishing rubber worms such as wacky rigged senkos, or tubes and curly tails on jigs are extremely efficient (especially this time of the year), it is one of my least favored methods, still can't explain exactly why.

Maybe it's the monotiny of just casting to spots and waiting for a hit over an over again, maybe it's the snags, or possibly the panfish giving "false" hits. Weirdest thing is that I really like still fishing with live bait, which I find extremely relaxing.

Back to the outing, my buddy was fishing Senkos for a good part of the 1/2 day outing, while I switched between a variety of lures that run at different depths. As the weeds are dying off, I was able to avoid cacthing grass even when using 3-4 foot divers in a few of my spots. As all I got in a couple hours was 1 hit on a POP-R, while my buddy was hooking into fish on his wacky rigged Senko, I switched to a curly tail on a jig for a couple minutes, just to avoided getting skunked. Sure enough, I landed a 2 pounder on my first cast.

With about 1 hour left to the outing, we both decided to fish the dying "slop" using Spro frogs. We got about 10 hits, no hookups, although we did come very close. One bass actually took in my frog and spit it out immidiately right on the edge of a weedbed. Still, the explosions of those big largies coming through the weeds are anough to give you a nice thrill, even though they often miss by a foot or so.

With about 1 month left to my boating season, I'm hoping to get a couple more bass outings before it ends.

Another eel fishing at night

2009-08-25T06:53:00.000-07:00

This night fishing thing is turning out to be interesting. I've caught more channel catfish and eels in the past month, than in the rest of my fishing "career" combined.

Last night, I took my older 14 and 7 year old boys for a few hours of night fishing. Got there too late to pick up live minnows, so I brought along some dead ones I had frozen after the last outing.

Fishing was quite slow. We got set up around 7:45, got our first hookup an hour later. From the way it pulled, I was sure it was a medium sized channel cat. I let my younger son Levi fight it, turned out to be another eel. Measured over 3.5 feet, was quite thick, must have weighed about 6 or 7 lbs.

Unfortunately, it swallowed the minnow head first, and I was using a smaller #2 baitholder hook instead of the usual 3/0 wide gap, so the hook went too far down it's throat for me to even see it.

I cut the line to let it loose, and though it swam off without a problem, I'm gueessing it won't survive long as it's going to have lot's of trouble feeding.

About an hour later, my older sons Ari got a nice run, but yanked the hook out of the fish's mouth when he tried to set.

That was it for the night, as my younger son had fallen asleep and had to be in school this morning.

Shore fishing outings

2009-08-20T05:49:00.000-07:00

Ever since my trip up North in mid July, I've pretty much stuck with shore fishing, something which I don't do as often as I used to ever since I got a boat. As the boat is docked in an area that is extremely choked with weeds in the summer, fishing there this time of the year is often less than thrilling. Shore fishing is extremely relaxing for me, as I'm usually still fishing, and I can spend time attending to my kids needs a lot more, thereby allowing me to take them on family outings.

With camp over and school only starting next week, I took my 3 younger sons out for a day of mixed species shore fishing along with my dad. Weather hit close to 40 Celcius with the humidex, luckily we we in the shade most of the time. We still fished for carp and pike unsuccessfully, but managed tons of gobies along with a perch and small largemouth bass using live worms.

I also managed to get spot checked by the MNR conservation officer again, it's the 3rd time at that spot in 12 months, was the same guy as last year. Seems like 2 guys are running the same area in South Eastern Ontario. Glad to see my license fees are actually going somewhere.

Headed out the following evening for some more night time shore fishing for channel catfish, took my 8 year old son Avi for his first attempt at fighting fish that size. After picking up some live minnows, we set up at about 7:00 PM, managed 1 rock bass until dark.

First channel catfish hit at about 9:00 PM, Avi was thrilled to fight it, wasn't too big though, about 5 lbs or so. About 1/2 hour later, my buddy hooked into an 3 foot eel. Man are those things slimy, I was peeling slime like Elmer's glue of my had for the rest of the night after handling it.

Got the second cat on a bit after 10:00 PM, this one about 7 lbs, again Avi brought it in but was afraid to land it, as he's got some kind of fear of their whiskers. A couple minutes later, my buddy and I hook unto a double header, we land 2 cats in the 10 lb range, one long and thind, the other short and fat, Avi was too tired to fight it so I did the honors.

By this time Avi's whining that he's tired, as it's nearly 11:00 PM and way past his bed time. Pity, the fishing was just heatin up, but I headed home to get him to bed.

Chilhood fishing spot revisited.

2009-08-10T13:44:00.000-07:00

Went up to visit my eldest son Ari on Sunday. He's in an overnight camp in the La Minerve section of the Laurentians. As a kid, I went to the same camp, learned much of what I know about fishing on the local lake, Lac Desert.

Though the camp is on the lakefront, access to the lake was very restricted by the lifeguards for fear of drownings. The boating activities were run by counsellors, none of which were into fishing. I had to fish in hiding for a few summers, eventually, I became a staff member and was given more freedom.

I spent 3 summers between the agees of 14-16 exploring the are around the lake, most of which was un-inhabited. I caught my first big bass there, as well as tons of smaller ones, rock bass, sunfish, perch, bullheads, some wild brook trout and even a small laker.

I returned a few times in my early twenties, rented a boat from one of the locals I knew, had some real good trips up there. As I brought up a portable sonar, I was able to finally check out some of what I had previously been fishing in "blindly".

While visiting last Sunday, I returned to some of my favorite shore fishing spots outside the camp with my 4 sons to show them where I fished as a kid. I was saddened to see that the miles of once beautiful shorelines, have been replaced by cabins and high powered water skiing boats buzzing all over the lake.

To add insult to injury, once free boat launch was now become privatized by the lake association a.k.a. lake mafia. The lauch itself used to be a real hotspot, with 2 long wooden docks that jutted out right into some prime bass fishing spots near sunken trees. The docks have been removed, the area is now covered with thicks weeds.

I did manage to access some of the spots that used to be teeming with all sorts of fish. Based on the few bass and panfish we caught in about 45 minutes worth of fishing, the numbers and sizes seem to have diminished drastically.

Luckily for my son, he has access to a camp boat a few times a week. I sent him up with a couple rods, he got the lakefront manager hooked on fishing to the point where the guy had the camp order a 100 lb thrust trolling motor to help them fish. I also mapped out some hot spots near his camp grounds that are only accessible by boat, so he knew exactly where to go once he was on the water.

After a couple days at camp, my son called for more worms, hooks and sinkers. I obliged, and brought him about 100 of each, as well as some bass lures. He's already caught about 50 smallies, the largest up to 3 lbs. No too shabby for a 13 year old, I only dreamed of having that sort of success at that age. He's also the most popular kid in his group, when it comes to boating, everyone wants to be on his boat.

Going back to childhood fishing grounds with my kids is always a great experience. It brings back memories of what I must have felt and looked like as a kid. Though they're lucky enough to have someone to put them on the hotspots, I had the thrills of seeking them out and finding them on my own.

My biggest channel catfish

2009-07-29T09:15:00.000-07:00

I'm really getting into catfishing lately, as you may have noticed from recent posts.

It's something that I haven't done too much in the past, and as catfish grow bigger an pull harder than many other species of game fish, it's not hard to get addicted. Add in the extra benefits such as my spot being less than a 15 minute drive from my home in Montreal, free parking, small crowds with the convenient bite in the cooler evenings when things are quiet and work is done. Talk about a winning recipy for some good fishing.

I headed out to my spot alone, got set up and started fishing around 8:00 PM. I didn't bother with live minnows, as I kept and froze the leftover ones I had from last week's failed outing. I got my first hit at around 8:30, fish took off with the bait and set my baitrunner screaming, kind of the way a carp would. I engaged the reel, hooked and landed my first fish of the evening within a couple minutes, 26 inches / 10 lbs. As my buddies weren't showing until later, I had some other people fishing the are snap some shots, and released the big cat.

1/2 hour later, I got my second hit. Same story, reel starts screaming again. It seems that big catfish have an easier time picking up dead minnows than live ones. Anyway, I hooked into it, landed it after a few minutes. This one measured on 28 inches, but was extremely fat, weighed in at 14.5 lbs. Went back to the same guys, they took some pics and I offered them the fish. One of them gladly accepted, he said they were excellent eating.

My buddies showed up at about 9:30, by which time I had a couple biteoffs, probably smaller ones playing with my dead bait.

I hooked into my next one around 10:30. Once landed I realized it was quite long, measured in at 30 inches but weighed only 14 lbs, as it was thinner than the other one.

Just as I released it, my buddy hooked an eel, probably measured 30+ inches or so, must have weighed a few pounds. Another quick release, the moon hid behind the clouds and the bite died down completely. We left around 11:30 PM.

So it turns out that I beat my personal best for channel cats twice last night, once in weight (fat hawg) and once in length (lean and mean).

I'll post the pics once they are developped.

More night time catfishing

2009-07-26T12:07:00.000-07:00

Headed back for some more night fishing chasing channel cats last in the St Lawrence River (Lac St Louis) in Montreal week. First night, I took my 13 year old son Ari along, picked up some live minnows an set up shop a couple hours before dark.

Nothing much doing until 8:30 PM, when the fishing suddenly turned on. We started getting nibbles, then bite offs. My son hooked his first channel catfish a bit before 9:00 PM, ended up being a small 2.5 lbs.

About 1/2 hour later, he hooked a nice one, fought it all the way to shore, but it somehow spit the hook just as he was trying to get it up on the beach. Nice beast, was definitely a 10 lb + fish, too bad we couldn't get a picture. I got some bite offs, then the fishing died down at 10:00 PM. No bites until 11:00 PM, we headed home.

Returned the next evening with my son and a friend. Started at about 6:30. My buddy caught a nice 4 lb smallmouth bass that swallowed his minnow after about 1 hour of fishing. We waited for the catfish bite to turn on at dark, but it never did. We fished until 10:00 PM with maybe 1 nibble between 3 rods, so we called it a night and left early.

I think I'm going to wait until we have more of a moon beforetrying again, as the moon was non existent on both outings.

Slow fishing in the Gatineau valley

2009-07-19T13:38:00.000-07:00

Just got back from another 5 day trip to the upper Gatineau region of Quebec. My buddy and I went up to try to target some Northern pike, ended up doing OK, but not nearly as well as I'd hoped for. Weather wasn't too good either.

Here is a brief day by day rundown of the trip:

Day 1 (Sunday):
After leaving town later than expected due to the rental company not having the SUV I reserved on time, I arrived at about 12:30 PM. Took out a motor boat on Giles lake for some bass fishing, as my buddy wasn't due until evening. Caught about a dozen small bass all under 2 lbs using live worms on bobber rigs, some were caught trolling a Rapala CD-5. Hit some rain and wind that brought in a major cold front. My buddy arrived around 8:00 PM with a nasty cold. We went out for an hour, not much hitting.

That night, the temp went down to about 5 degrees celcius, a little colder and it would have snowed. You wouldn't believe we were in mid July! Had to heat the cabin using the fireplace.

Day 2:

We trekk up to Lac Croche bright and early. The lake is up a terrible road, which is why I rented the SUV. Last 300 meters or so are only accessible by foot. Only 2 boats on the lake, no oars or motors, so we had to haul the electric motor and batteries through the bush along with our rods, tackle, sonar, food, drink, etc. One boat has a leak, the other was missing the boat plug. We take the leaking boat, good thing I brought along a bilge pump and fully charged battery pack.

We hit the water at about 8:00 AM, plan is to troll endlessly as the lake doesn't have much of a fishing pattern. Casting is ineffective on that lake, so as much as trolling bores me, what choice was I left with?

We hit the first pike a bit after 9:00 AM, decent 4.5 lb that jumped 4 or 5 times, as if he were a musky. We keep trolling lures that troll down to 10-12 gfeet until about 12:30 with no more hits.
I suggest switching to deeper divers, my buddy gets an instant hit trolling down in the 20 foot range, another decent 5 lbs fish. Next pass, he hooks another, that tangles in my line. As we boat it and start handlining my line, we realize we actually hit a double header and mine is still on. We handline the nice 6.5 lb fish into the boat and now were in heaven thinking we have it made.

We couldn't have been more wrong. We trolled for the next 7 hours, not one hit. We hit a major thunderstorm, and had to hide out in the woods as the lake has no shelters. We had our rainsuits and 4 layers under them, was still pretty cold. We call it a day at about 7:30 PM, I head back, clean the fish and freeze the fillets.

Day 3:

We get out on Lac Croche again, troll uselessly for another 4 hours. Then we switch to casting. I hook into a fish after about an hour, but it goes straight into the sunken tree I was fishing near, end up losing it. We troll and cast for the rest of the day, no more hits. My frustration with the lake and trolling in general has hit it's peak. 12 hours of trolling and no fish is not what I had in mind. The cold weather didn't help either. 4 layers of clothing plus a rainsuit to stay warm. We head back early.

The guy that runs the place suggests another lake that I never tried before. To get there, we cross Giles lake by boat and land it near a small river that connects to 2 smaller lakes, both containing pike and largemouth bass. After trekking through the woods for about 7 minutes, we get to the small row boats and paddle down the stream to hit tiny Lac Chat. Lake probably measures 300 meters in diameter and is round. Half the lake has shoreline structure, other half is kind of shallow shoals with the middle going down to 45 feet.

It's about 8:00 PM, I manage 3 largemouth bass on a few casts, all about 2 lbs. Time to row back, I decide to return to Lac Chat instead of Lac Croche the following day.

Day 4:

We hit Lac Chat in the morning. My buddy hooks up some small largemouth bass on Senkos, I catch a small 3 lb pike on a red and white spoon. Fishing completely shuts down around 11:00 AM, we head back thorugh the woods and cross Giles to our cabins for some time off at 2:00 PM , as the sun is shining bright and warm, I take advantage to have lunch and go for a swim. First time I'm in shorts and t shirt all trip.

We head back out around 5 PM, not much going on until around 7:00 PM, when I catch my first bass on a Senko. Biggest bass of the trip, it weighs in just over 2.5 lbs. Although Senkos are an amazing bait for bass, I hate using them, still not quite sure why. I saw this fish following my lure without hitting, so I switched to the Senko and got an immediate hit.

Anyway, as topwaters are the most exciting bait for me, I switch to the good old Pop R again after that bass. I catch 3 more bass and a small pike on the Pop R that evening, but my buddy had enough of Lac Chat that is more like a small paddleboat pond you see in a parc than a fishing lake.

We get back that evening and the debate between hitting Giles of another lake that's full of small pike starts. I would have prefered to check it out for a day, just to see If I should bother returning next year with the kids, as I'm told that we should be able to get 25-30 pike per person even in the worst conditions. Not that I'm thrilled with "hammer handle" pike, but my kids will be when I take them there.

Anyway, my buddy is dead set against it, so we decide to hit Giles for bass the next day.

Day 5:

After getting up late and hung over, we hit the water late at about 11:00 AM. Great weather, dismal fishing. We hit less than a dozen bass between both of us, none over 1.5 lbs. Pity the propane fride was too cold, my worms froze solid. That's that for the trip, I pack up and head out the next morning.

Overall, the time away was good, the beer stayed cold, but the fishing was slow and my buddy had a cold through the whole week. Anyway, I'll be taking a short break from fishing as I have some work to catch up on, possibly head out for soem few hours of night fishing for channel cats agains over the next couple weeks.

Channel catfish night fishing

2009-07-09T12:23:00.000-07:00

Headed out to a new spot in Montreal for some evening / night fishing for big channel cats. It's not something I get to do often, but as I was busy all day and the family is away visiting the in laws, I decided to give it a shot.

We picked up some big 7 inch minnows and headed out to our spot on the shores of the Lac St Louis portion of the St Lawrence River. I set up a sliding bottom rig with a 1 OZ egg sinker and 3/0 wide gap hook, my buddy setup up a 2 OZ bell sinker under a store bough striper rig which was basically 2 big hooks tied with fluorocarbon line.

Nothing much until 9:00 when the fishing suddenly turned on. I assumed that the big cats would have no problem taking down the big shiners, but was surprised that they were more interested at nipping pieces off little by little. I hooked my first one at about 9:15, landed it within a couple minutes, weighed about 8 or 9 lbs.

Over the next hour or so, my buddy lost about 6 whole minnows, I had one that had it's rear portion bitten off, then another that lost a chunk of it's backbone. I ended up catching my second one on a dead minnow around 10:30 PM, measured 28 inches, probably weighed close to 12 lbs, definitely my personal best to date.

The baitfeeder reel really helped, I avoided getting my bait stolen or having to keep fiddling with the drag system. Coupled with my 6.5 foot Rhino rod, I'm using the same outfit that I do for big carp, and handled the big catfish with ease.

I realized that we would have been better off with 4-5 inch minnows, probably would have caught a lot more fish. Regardless, it's a relatively new species that I have't targeted much in the past, as well as a new spot, so I'm glad with the results of the outing.

I returned the following night to try again using some store bought Atlantic smelt as cutbait. In 1.5 hours, not even one bite. So much for that plan, it's back to live minnows, looks like I'l have to get there early enough so the bait shop is still open.

I'm off to another week of fishing up North, I hope to target pike most of the week on a remote lake I tried last year. Will post results and hopefully some nice pics/videos when I return.

Largemouth Bass, Northern Pike and Walleye on Rapala CD-5

2009-07-03T09:26:00.000-07:00

Headed back to my boat for some bass fishing now that the season is officially opened in Ontario. Many of the spots where they were hitting in the a few weeks ago are overgrown, so we switched tactics for the most part. My buddy alternated between topwaters and Senkos, while my son stuck with Topwaters. They combined for about 20 bass, all under 2 lbs.

I did a bit of topwater fishing, but stuck with a mini Rapala CD-5 coundown. Lure proved great in the clearer parst of the river, I managed 4 largemout bass as well as a 14 inch walleye and 3 lb pike and big bluegill on it in about 5 hours of fishing. I find find that it really matched the color and size of the shiners you see jumping on the surface when being chased.

The slop isn't thick enough to force us into using weedless Spro frogs yet, but I have a feeling that it will be withing the next 2 weeks. Also plan to hit the big smallies on calmer days on St Francis, possibly attempt some sight fishing using Senkos around the islands.

Bass opener family trip

2009-06-29T07:12:00.000-07:00

Just got back from our yearly family for the bass opener on Giles lake in Zone 10. We ended up gong with 7 adults, 2 teens and 6 children, rented 3 separate cabins for the week of June 21st to 26th.

We arrived at about 1:00 PM on Sunday, I immediately proceeded to mount the 2 motors and sonar a brought up on a couple row boats. Mine is a 25 year old 7.5 HP Mercury I recently bought and had fixed, the other is a 40 year old Johnson / Evinrude hybrid that my brother has been using for years.

Started off cathcing a nice 3 lbs bass on my first cast, things couldn't be better. After about 1 hour, my motor goes on me, so that put a serious damper on my day, considering that it's the first time I used it since buying it and spending just as much to change the prop and water pump. The outfitter has motors for rent, I got a brand new 5 HP Mercury for $25 / day, so it wasn't the end of the world, but I was still quite frustrated at the situation.

Headed out for another outing after unloading our gear and clothing into the cabing, caught another decent 2 lb + bass.

Over the next 4 days, we ended up catching about 75 Largemouth bass, most over 2 lbs with about a dozen over 3 lbs and 3 over 4 lbs. In addition, the kids caught hundreds of sunfish as usual.

My teeneage son was guiding the boat with my dad and his friend, I took the boat with my younger two sons who's main pastime is fighting each other. I started off trying to have the cast and fish with worms on bobbers and sinker lines, but the tangles and subsequent fights were just to much. Fishing is supposed to be fun and relaxing, not stressfull.

At that point in the trip, I completely switched tactics. I started casting a Pop-R and let the kids take turns fighting the fish. It was relaxng for me, and kept them on edge with each cast waiting for those thrilling top water hits. Over the next couple days, I ended up catching about 25 or 30 bass on the Pop-R, biggest was a 3 lbs beauty that took the lures all the way down it's hatch.

The lake has a small, dwindling, pike population, some of them up to 20 lbs. We tried chasing the pike using different tactics, all we managed were some small ones under 2 lbs trolling rogues.

We couldn't have asked for better weather, sunny skies all week, the temperature stayed at about 30 but felt more like 40 with the humidity. We fished mornings and evenings, spent the rest of the days swimming, snorkeling, making BBQ's and sipping cold beer. Night were for stronger alcohol and bonfires, as well as the yearly fireworks for La fete Nationale.

Hope to head back to the region for some pike fishing in a couple weeks.

Fishing spawning carp

2009-06-19T08:57:00.000-07:00

Took out David and Mike Evnas for a guided carping trip. When we got to our spot, spawning carp swirling all around the surface, must have seen a couple hundred over the first few hours.

Though the weather and water conditions were perfect for carp fishing (light rain, stained, warming water), the bite was non existant as long as they we're swirling around the surface.

As the day moved on, the swirls died down and the fishing picked up. We managed 3 carp between 8-16 lbs, all came on boilies set up on hair rigs. Though we chummed a lot of soaked corn, the hook baited corn lines remained untouched, another vary rare occurence.

View some footage from the outing by clicking:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jnXsCXiyUhg

Fishing shorelines

2009-06-11T18:03:00.000-07:00

Went out for a few hours on Wednesday. Trolling was extremely slow, so we decided to hit the shorlines with a variety of lures. Best producers for the day were the Rapala J-11 and Zara spook. All we caught were largemouth bass up to 2.5 lbs.

After a while I decided to trekk out to a distant spot on St Francis where we had success with big pike last year at this time. Still not one in sight once we got there, spent time trolling and casting a variety of lures uselessly.

Slow day northern pike fishing

2009-06-08T19:09:00.000-07:00

Headed out with my dad and 6 year old Levi for an afternoon of pike / panfish. I after hooking up some bass on the troll, I headed to my usual hot spots which are starting to get overgrown with weeds. Did manage a small pike, and Levi caught his first crappie, a nice 10 incher. The Largemouth bass really slowed down since last week, so did the Jumbo Bluegills.

Later that afternoon, I hit some of my mid summer hot spots as the lilies are now big enough to provide cover. Started off throwing a Spro frog. As I noticed follows 3 times in a row through the lilies, I followed up with a new CD-5 Rapala Countdown. As I cast it to the outer edge of the pads, I got an instant hit. The pike took off in a fury with the lure in it's throat. It somewhow didn't managed to cut my line, even though I hade no leader. I needed jaw spreaders to retrieve my lure, by which time the pike was bleeding out all over the boat from it's gills. Another one for the livewell, weighed in at 4.5 lbs, perfect eating size.

Managed a few more bass on topwater lures, uncluding the Spro Frog, Weedless Jitterbug, Zara Spook and Heddon Baby Torpedo.

Hope to attempt some bigger pike over the next 2 weeks.

Fishing Montreal shad run

2009-05-28T08:31:00.001-07:00

Strong winds and rain in the forecast, we decided to hit the Pie IX dam hoping that the crowd wouldn't be too big. Of course, the rain never came, the sun actually squeaked out. The wall next to the dam was elbow to elbow all the way across. I ended up right next to the dam, which I quickly figured out was the urinal, as it stank pretty bad.

The guys in the middle were catching shad on every few casts, but they were so tight that they almost had to fish sideways. I refused to join under such fishing conditions, so I tried staying at the ends hoping to get a good drift. Had one old guy that must have been half blind next to me, he kept catching my line.

I did notice that most of the guys fishing shad from the wall seem to be doing it for the food rather than for the sport. They might as well, from what I hear shad are good to eat, and they are extremely abundant. I guess that's why they don't mind the sickening fishing conditions they have to put up with to get their fish. Everybody kept all the fish, guys had buckets, stringers and garbage bags full.

Though I didn't have waders, I attempted to fish the shoreline as the dam's wall was pure frustration, not enjoyable in the least bit. Didn't do any better, not did most of the guys in waders. At least they had room to breathe.

Anyway, I very highly doubt I'll be heading back there without waders, I can't take fishing under crowded conditions with the constant tangles which are almost inevitable. And, as my waders have a slow leak, looks like it will likely be the end of that idea for this season.

Pike and walleye fishing in Montreal

2009-05-28T08:27:00.001-07:00

Headed out for a few hours on Tuesday, decided to stay local. Shore fished lac St Louis from the Pointe Claire shoreline. Action was slow, but we managed a pike in the 4 lb range, as well as a nice 14-15 inch walleye. We had the same results on a similar outing to the same spot last season, walleye even hit the same lure, a blue xr-10 x-rap.

Fishing Parc Jean Drapeau

2009-05-19T13:49:00.001-07:00

Decided to go out to fish Parc Jean Drapeau in downtown Montreal for a few hours, hoping to hit some more walleye. We really had a very limited schedule, got there at about 11:00 AM. Walleye were nowhere to be found, though I did catch 6 smallmouth bass. Incredibly, they hit on the 3/4 OZ and 1 OZ jigs I was retriving, despite being in the 12 to 14 inch range. All were live released in good health, bass season is still closed for another month.

Fishing walleye downtown Montreal

2009-05-14T11:20:00.000-07:00

A friend took me out to a new spot near downtown Montreal. The idea of catching lots of walleye within a few minutes drive sounded great. Unfortunately, I came unprepared to deal with the strong current at the spot we were fishing. Jigging was all that worked, but the largest jigs I had were 1/4 ounce. As they fluttered in the current, my buddy was slamming them with 1 OZ jigs. He ended up cathcing about a dozen walleye and saugers.

I tried casting a wally diver, managed a nice smallmouth bass in the 3 lb range. When I switched to a heavy sinker and worm setup, I manged to hook a couple sturgeons, landed a small one in the 7 lb range, my first ever.

Place started getting crowded around noon. What really pissed me off was the inconsiderate people that came to fish right next to me. When fishing a spot with current, it is ridiculous to try fishing next to others, especially when trying to still fish. Constant tangles are inevitable and ruin everyone's day.

I realize I don't own any particular spot, but I personally think it's extremely rude and against fishing etiquette to try and hog someone else's spot if they were there first.

The day left me with mixed feelings about the area. On the one hand, fishing is great. On the other, you have tons of inconsedirate idiots.

To make matters worse, jigging 1 OZ jigs in current with a rock bottom gets expensive. With jig heads at $1 a piece and power grubs at about $.50 each, losing 15 to 20 jigs makes for an expensive outing. Then again, it beats burning extra $$$ in gas.

Pike and walleye opener in Ontario

2009-05-14T11:09:00.000-07:00

Haven't blogged to much about my trips lately, been too busy fishing and entertaining my in laws that came to visit for a week. Got the boat launched in time for the opener.

The pike haven't showed up at my usual hot spots in Zone 20, the wind and waves have kept us mainly in the Raisin River. I've managed a few small pike and a nice walleye in the 3.5 lb range. Incidentally, we've also managed about 100 bass, both largemouth and smallmouth, in 3 outings, many over 3 lbs. I guess that will happen whenever you're targeting pike early in May.

Best producing lure for me so far this season is a floating Rapala J-9.

Fishing perch near Montreal

2009-04-22T18:05:00.000-07:00

Went out for another half day, prepared for different types of fishing. Took along my waders, some light spinning tackle, as well as some terminal tackle and a small bag of worms I picked the previous night.

Started off at Pointe Des Cascades. The pier and boat ramp had some significant traffic again, my buddy and I put on our waders and headed out below the spillway for the first time, in an attempt to look for some "lost" trout.

No luck, noting biting, water was very cold, figured anything in there or anywhere would be lethargic.

After about an hour, we headed off to drive along the Soulanges Canal, ended up in Les Coteaux. Fished the "digue" area unsuccessfuly for a while using small minnow baits and live worms, nothing doing there either. I did find a place that rents boats, I'll be back there to give it a try once the pike season opens.

Stopped at the Soulanges canal for a few casts on the way back, and with nothing happening there either, we hit a spot I know near Dorion. Again, nithing doing there either, so we ended up at the 32nd St pier on Ile Perrot.

Caught about 6 or 7 perch one after the other. As nothing else interesting was biting, we called it a day and headed home.

My new carp record

2009-04-20T13:43:00.001-07:00

Went out for my first carping trip of the season, as most species are still closed. I wasn't expecting to catch too many with the sunny skies in the forecast and the water temp barely over 40 degrees, but was hoping to land at least one or two decent fish.

Fishing was very slow. After having some dough balls eaten off by panfish, I switched to corn nibblets that I was using for chum, set up as hook bait.

After about 3 hours of nothing, I finally got a hit about 15 minutes before we were scheduled to leave for another spot. I let the fish run with it, then set the hook after about 20 seconds of so. The carp ran straight out then seemed to stop in it's tracks. I saw it surface from afar and it seemed like a decent fish. It was tangled in the line for a couple minutes, but eventually came untangled and started running as expected.

As it ran by me near the shore, I finally got a glimpse and realized it was by far the biggest carp I had ever hooked. I estimated it to weigh about 30 lbs and yelled for my buddy to get the net and camcorder. As soon as it saw him approaching it ran like crazy. Luckily, I had a good hookset and after a few more runs we had it in the net.

Though it was truly a giant, it didn't fight as hard or fast as a smaller 12 or 15 pound fish would. It simply decided where it felt like going and just did so at will, though it didn't seem to be in any hurry to do so. Kind of like comparing horsepower to torque.

It was definitely my biggest carp so far, so after after freeing it from the net, we snapped some shots. When I finally weighed it, it showed between 39 and 40 lbs on my hand held scale. I realized that I just broke the official Ontario carp record which still stands at 38 lbs, although I know people that have caught carp over 40 lbs in the same waters of the St Lawrence River and never bothered registering them.

I was determined to register the fish, but wasn't about to ruin my buddie's upholstery by hauling it to the nearest certified scale in his car. I decided to leave it with him, and headed down the road to Ingleside to get advice from Mark Jarvis who runs Carpins (http://www.carpins.ca/), a family owned tackle shop near the Long Sault national park. When I got there, I mentioned what happened, and how I was considering submitting the fish as a record, as I have no clue how to proceed. He immediately agreed to come out to my spot with a real scale.

He got there shortly after I did, the fish was still alive and well. He set up a tripod with a sling to weight it in, and set the tare to zero. The "moment for truth"... The fish weighed in at a mere 32.5 lbs. A great big fish yes, but nowhere near the record.

Though I was a bit let down by the handheld scale, I was was still very happy with the trophy. I decided to attempt reviving it, and to my surprise, it was fully revived within a couple minutes, and swam off like so many other carp I've released. I guess carp are pretty tough suckers.

Ok, I didn't beat the official record, but I I topped my P.B. by a whopping 6.5 lbs. Exact measurements we 40 x 25 inches, 32.5 lbs.

I will post the pics once they are developped.

Chatted with Mark Jarvis for a while. The guy's a carp fishing legend and runs the only fishing store I know of in Canada that specializes in carp fishing gear. He's been fishing the Long Sault area for over 40 years, and has been targeting exclusively carp for the past 12 years. Anyone with that sort of experience makes for an interesting carpers conversation, not to mention that he's an all around great guy. I thank him again for taking the time to come out to weigh the fish.

Footnotes to this story:

1) I checked my scale against some dumbell weights at home and it's accurate to within 1/2 a lb for 35 lbs of weight. I also checked some length x girth online fish calculators that show my fish with an approximate weight of 28 - 33 lbs, which concur with the reading on Mark's scale. How my scale showed between 39-40 lbs will remain a mystery (possibly the fish flapping or it not being set properly at the time)...

2) Being the total moron that I sometimes am, I loaded the camcorder clips onto my home PC, but forgot to save them when I was distracted by the kids aroung dinner / homework time. Later, I deleted them from the camcorder, and when I came back to edit them on the PC, I realized my error. Anyway, the footage was really bad, the only decent shot I got was of the "official" weigh in, so I'm not too mad at myself.

Passover fishing

2009-04-07T13:06:00.000-07:00

That time of the year again, Pesach is the Jewish passover being celebrated from sunset on April 8th 2009 until Nightfall April 16th 2009. Observant Jews thouroughly clean their homes, cars and other areas belonging to them trying to rid them of any "Chametz" - leavened items such as bread, cookies, cakes and crumbs.

Here are some personal insights I compiled as an observant Jew, bear in mind that I am not a Rabbi, so you might want to confirm any of the following thoughts with your local Rabbi.

Fishing is not allowed on days of Yom Tov, April 9th through 11 and again on April 15 and 16. Fishing is permitted on Chol Hamoed (April 12-14).

It is a great activity for the kids as they are likely to be off from school. A good time to score points with the wife by taking them all and letting her have the day off after all the cleaning and cooking she's done.

I suggest cleaning your tacklebox by emptying it, vacuuming it, then windexing it. This will get rid of any crumbs or other Chametz, the windex will nullify anything you miss. Also a good time to re-organize it for the upcoming season.

Beer is Chametz, so are most hard alcohols. As drinking is often part of an enjoyable fishing trip, I suggest wine. If you need something stronger, some of the liquor stores / SAQ / LCBO outlets carry Arak, 777, and Slivovitz this time of the year. Make sure they have proper passover certification.

Although most fish are closed, a few species are open. If you plan to keep any, it is preferable to use a new knife to fillet them, although this is not mandatory. You may use your standard knife, simply rinse it well before, then rinse the cleaned fish properly when done. Throughout the process, be sure that the knife and fish remain cold.

For those of you that enjoy carping (one of the only open species around here) :

Doughballs are definitely Chametz and may NOT be used, or possessed on Pesach. If you have a stash like I do, put it away where you won't see it, together with the other chametz you own. These can be "sold" for passover, contact me if you need any additional info about selling your chametz at phil@freshwaterphil.com .

Matzah balls (gebrokts!) may be an alternative if you can find those classic hard / golf ball like ones, otherwise you'll have a really hard time baiting them. Probably work best with hair rigs.

Corn can be used as bait, even though it may not be eaten by Ashkenazic Jews on Pesach as it is considered Kitniyot. We can still derive benefit from it, feed it to animals, use it for bait, etc. Be sure the niblets don't have any chametz additives, they usually don't.

In general, fishing is halachically permitted by all authorities when at least some of the fish are being kept for food, their skin or any other useful purposes. Some authorities permit fishing for sport only (catch and release), reasoning that the pleasure one derives is enough of a reason to justify the suffering and stress caused to the fish when fighting it, others forbid it. Again, check with your local Rabbi if this is of concern to you.

New fishing season in Quebec

2009-04-07T12:07:00.000-07:00

April is here, fishing for most species is closed, time for those last minute preparations before the season re-opens in May. Made the mandatory trip to pick up my new license, turns out Quebec decided to gouge us this time around by hiking the fee up to $19.25. Still not too bad considering the amount of days I put in...

I also picked up a small 7.5 HP Mercury outboard for those trips up North, where I have been renting them for a few years. Paid $350 from a private owner, it runs nicely and seems to be in good condition, guy threw in the mount/stand and the gas tank. I'm hoping it pays itself off after 2 trips or so (10 fishing days).

Getting ready to launch the boat early, though fishing for most spcies including perch are closed on St Fancis until May, so is the Raisin River. Maybe a crappie / catfish outing...

Kids are off school next week, hope to take them out for their first outing of the season to the other side of the Cornwall dam, where perch and carp are now open.

2009 Ice fishing season ends

2009-03-30T18:02:00.001-07:00

Ice fishing season finally ends tomorrow. After the dismal season I had this year, I say good riddance. Not that I was ever a big ice fisherman to begin with, but I had bigger plans for this season.

From catching big pike, to targeting trapped carp, I hoped to finally get some big boys through the ice. Instead, the best I did all season was a 9 inch perch.

Yes, I only went out 4 or 5 times, and most of those outing were 1/2 days only, and no, there aren't too many monster pike swimming around the Island, but many of my fishing buddies experienced less than desirable results, at least when it came to catching pike.

I'll be happy to start wetting my lines for real, hopefully sooner than later. With the warmer than usual weather we've been having, I imagine I'll be able to get out by mid April if were lucky. Last season, I went out on March 31st and the ice was close to 3 feet thick (ended up catching a decent pike too). My yard still had about 3 feet of snow in it as well.

This season, the ice is covered in a good 12 inches of water, and the plants in the yard are already sprouting, worms slithering on the ground on rainy nights.

Might even get the boat launched early this year, as Ontario zones 18 and 20 have opened perch year round. Finally have a valid excuse to be out on a boat in April.

With the kids off school for 2 week, I hope to get out for a trip or 2 once the ice melts, they've been itching to get out since last October.

Ice fishing Montreal in spring 2009

2009-03-25T19:58:00.000-07:00

Gorgeous day in the forecast had me taking off a full day to head out for what is probably my last ice fishing outing this season, as it ends next week.

I headed out to the St Lawrence River near Montreal with 3 friends in search of some pre spawn pike on the feed, as we had some success at that spot around this time last year.

We started off fishing in shallow near some feeder creeks, not much biting after a couple hours except for 1 missed pike that pecked at one of my frozen sardines.

We moved a bit further out, to a point where the water drops from 1 to 6 feet, set up about 20 lines there. Live minnows finally roduced, as we managed a couple pike, although they were very small.

We also hooked into some perch, and although they were less numerous than expected, on topped 11 inches so I guess it qualifies as a "jumbo", especially as it had that big telltale hump on it's back.

I shot some footage and compiled a couple videos for Youtube.

Pike: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2dTowfSCYU

Perch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ouUxJ27Oa4

Spring cleaning the tacklebox

2009-03-16T09:28:00.000-07:00

With some above freezing weather and the snow mostly melted, spring is in the air, a few more days and it will be official. Not sure if I'll attempt another shot at ice fishing this season, maybe an outing for some Northern pike.

Either way, my tacklebox is squeaky clean and loaded with my favorite lures, all sharpened to perfection with mean intentions. My tacklebox is set up for "all purpose" fishing, as I'm fishing waters that contain most freshwater species. As I have way too many lures to git into a tackle box, I narrowed it down to my spring favorites.

Here is a quick rundown:

Dardevle and Williams Wabbler spoons ranging from 2 to 5 inches.
Mepps and other in line spinners ranging from size 1 to 15.
A few Rapala X rap, shad rap, countdown and jointed floating.
Bomber Long A shallow and deep diver.
Smithwick rogues, 4 and 5 inches.
Storm Thunderstick, straight and jointed floating.
Some Arbogast Jitterbugs, frog, weedless and musky size.
Zara Spook.
Storm Chug Bug.
Rebel Pop R.
Brush Baby deep diver.
A couple Cotton Cordell wally divers.
Cotton Cordell Red fin, floating jointed.
Little joe worm harnesses.
Earie Deary.

The regular terminal tackle, hooks ranging from #14 to 3/0, split shot, egg and bell sinkers, jigs ranging from 1/32 oz to 3/4 oz, steel leaders, flouro carbon trolling leaders, snap swivels, pre-tied live bait rigs , bobber, popping corks, etc.

The the mandatory blade, knife, measuring tape, scale sunscreen, bugspray, camera and video recorder and were about ready to go.