Sammy, Stephan, Anthony & Vic fished with me today on a local body of water for a multi species kind of day. We began trolling huge plugs for Muskie in the morning to see if we could score a big fish and it proved to be the right choice. In the first 15 minutes, the long line went off and the fire drill began. After several attempts at getting the rod out of the holder by them, without success, I had to remove it and handed the rod off to the closest person. Sammy was the lucky one and he battled this muskie to the boat. It was quite impressive for them to see a fish of that size beside the boat as I reached out to lip it with a Boga Grip knock off. I now know why the real Boga is so expensive as the fish twisted and broke this cheap Matzuo model leaving me with a bent tool, so to speak! I really wanted to get this fish in for a quick pic, but was only able to unhook it and release it while still in the water. No sense harming the fish or a potential injury to someone with all those hooks hanging out of the fish’s face. I estimated this fish to be around 18 pounds and somewhere between 41 & 44 inches in length. Not a giant, but enough to get everyone’s adrenaline pumping! There was a nice mist coming off the water with the cool morning temps of barely 50 degrees and a light wind from the SW at 5 to 10 knots making it a perfect looking day. I knew that the sun would eventually burn off all this and wanted to take advantage of it as long as it remained. We trolled for quite a while longer without another touch and decided to try for smallmouth bass instead. It took about 30 seconds in the first spot to have the first fish on and Vic soon landed one of about 3 pounds on a tube jig. Unfortunately, one other bite off afterwards was all we got in this area and I knew it was from a Muskie roaming around. We moved to another spot a little further away and let the games begin! Stephan was the first to lock up and I knew what was to follow. A huge school of smallies came in with the fish and Sammy dropped a jig in the middle and snapped a good fish off almost instantly. When this happens, you have to be quick to react and the others weren’t fast enough to take advantage of the situation. We released the hooked fish and reorganized once more. The next attempt had a double with Anthony & Stephan both locked up and again, Sammy broke off a decent fish on another hook set. With 10 feet of line in the water, a less powerful set is all that is required, not a lip ripping hook set! The school was beginning to get a little spooked and eventually disappeared to the deep water and never showed again. We now had to cast the entire area and hook one here and one there. Everyone managed to get into fish, but Sammy definitely caught more than the others, as he seemed to be with bent rod, almost constantly. When all this died off completely, we relocated once more and tried casting spinner-baits for a while. The fish seemed to be in a real negative mood and were either following them or lightly hitting the skirts like they wanted the lures out of their faces. I managed to hook one around 4 pounds on the spinner-bait when three of the others decided to take a break. Unfortunately it came off at the boat when I tried to swing it aboard! We continued fishing smallies for a while without any luck and then tried trolling for Muskie once again. At one point, all 4 guys were asleep and I hooked up on a deep rod. Stephan woke up first and he was the lucky person who got to fight the fish for about 20 or 30 seconds before the line went loose. Somehow the fish managed to get off and that was all they wrote for the trolling bite! It wasn’t the best day, but there was a good amount of action with the bass and a nice Muskie in the morning to add to this picture perfect day on the water. All in all a pretty good day!

I fished up north on a remote lake again today, but this time with Mike & his son Ryan. We had great expectations when the weather looked like it was going to be a beautiful day only to have clouds move in early in the morning and stay all day. Originally, the plans were to fish a local body of water in the Montreal area, but they forecasted really strong winds and a smaller lake was the alternative choice. Air temps reached into the 70’s with the winds out of the SW gusting at 20 knots but there were plenty of protected areas that fishing wasn’t unpleasant. Catching on the other hand, could have better! There were only about 10 bass caught up to 4 pounds and a Northern Pike of about 8 pounds caught while trolling for Muskie. A couple of other Muskie were lost on light tackle when they just bit the jigs off completely. One was seen that looked to be around 15 pounds, but the other one never showed his face and just cut the line instantly. We fished hard and with many areas covered, there definitely should have been better results. Unfortunately, that’s why they call it fishing! All in all a rather disappointing day that had to be settled on up north!

This was to be a day off, but I thought I would head out anyway with Mike & my wife, Christiane. We decided to make it a mixed day and Mike was going to try & get Christiane into her first Muskie, while I promised him some big bass. The weather had taken a turn for the worse with last night’s cold front and we weren’t too sure what was going to happen. Temperatures were in the 60’s most of the day with a cold N/W wind of 15 knots. We were in cloud cover for the entire day until the last 30 minutes when we were ready to leave. The water temperature had dropped a couple of degrees and was as low as 68.5 in some areas. By the time we finally got fishing it was after 10:00 AM and we trolled giant pieces of lumber to see about a muskie bite for a few hours before going for smallies, without a touch. The bass weren’t much better with only 3 fish actually taking tubes and senkos, almost 4 pounds apiece. We did however see plenty of giants in the area with a few looking like they were in the high fives or even 6 pounds. After total frustration, we hit a couple of other areas without any success and went back to trolling for muskie. It took about 5 minutes into the troll and one of the rods fired hooking up with a small muskie. Christiane finally landed her first ever skie! It may have been small, but it was what she wanted and she could finally say she caught one. We were sure that another larger fish would be taken and trolled for about 2 or 3 hours more without a touch and called it a day. Not the best fishing day, but a productive, pleasure fishing trip nonetheless!!

I had the pleasure of fishing with Bruce, Pat & Buzz today on Lake St-Francis for big smallmouth bass. The weather wasn’t too bad, but the winds were quite strong! They started out blowing from the S/W at 15 to 20 knots and switched to the W, blowing even harder at 20 to 30 knots in the afternoon. It was warm, but the temperatures fell towards the end of the day with a cold front moving in for the evening. Water temps were above 72 degrees in most areas and the air temps were in the 80’s most of the day. Buzz drew first blood on a spinnerbait with a snakelike northern of about 4 or 5 pounds. Not what I really wanted to see and quite disappointing too! Bruce managed to hook into a few smallmouth on a jerk-bait a little while later and things were looking up. Pat eventually got into a really nice bass on a spinnerbait, only to have it come unpinned at the boat in the 3 footers. On his very next cast, he hooked into what was to be the largest bass of the day and it did make it into the net. This fish wasn’t only long; it was fat too, going an honest 5 pounds minimum. We threw it into the livewell for photos later and continued fishing. A few more fish were gotten into on tubes and spinnerbaits and several others lost when they just ripped line from the reels and never got on. This line ripping happened a few times during the day to Pat and was really starting to become frustrating. Eventually, one of those line rippers actually got the hooks and Pat fought another 4 pounder. These fish are really strong and nothing like the bass he was accustomed to landing. They really beat him up! After a few more missed smallies and some mishaps with equipment failure, we were nearing the end of the day. I really wanted Buzz to hook into one of these fish on steroids and not just have them follow his baits like they did all day. Right at the end, he finally got a chance and slammed the hooks to one, on a senko. It damn near broke his wrist as the fish never even moved! It did however go airborne and throw the bait back at us almost instantly. I believe that one was in the high fives if not six pounds! It would have been a nice way to end the day, but instead we only got to see what could have been. Oh well, that’s fishing! Overall, it was a tough day, but there were many chances at big bass and several decent sized ones caught. Pat would have had the top honours with the 5 pounder he had taken earlier in the day. Way to go Pat!

I headed up north today with Warren & Mike to try a smaller lake for smallies & muskie. It proved to be a good choice as there were some huge bass taken, mostly on tubes. The weather looked a little dismal with overcast skies, but the temps were way up there! Water temps were about the same as all the other lakes I had been on lately with the highest going just over 70 degrees. A little wind from the SW increased in the afternoon and eventually started blowing around 10 to 20 knots. Thankfully, it felt great as the air temperatures climbed into the 90’s with some sunshine causing it to be another scorcher! In all, there were about 15 bass caught with most of them being 4 pounds or better and a couple over 5 pounds too. There were only 2 small muskie caught up to 36 inches, but a couple of others were also hooked into and lost as well. Points and deep weeds were where most of the bass came from and by casting way out to deep water; we were able to take advantage of the big biters. In about 7 hours of actual fishing, we fended quite well on a new lake. All in all a great day on the water!