Garfisher

Best question is where it was caught (obviously not the actual location, but maybe a county name), spotted's do not occur in Ontario, the only Micropterus species that occur are in fact salmoides (Largies) and dolomieu (Smallies). Hybrid isn't out of the question either. I just think it really is a largemouth (most of the fish screams largemouth, only the mouth/head throws a wrench into that thought)

It's still a largemouth (larger markings concentrated along the middle of the side of the fish), I'm guessing it's just an odd ball that has a smaller mouth, probably just genetic variability. I'm sure we've all caught a smallie or two that has a pretty big maw on it for one of that species. I remember my friend from southern Maryland showing me a pic of a red-eyed largemouth someone managed to catch, no smallmouths around the area (too far onto the coastal plains for smallie habitat).

Ha ha ha well done, at least its a 1st and it got the skunk out of the boat

3 dominant black spots makes it a juvenile white sucker. Congrats, you have a good pike/musky bait source

Look for aquacultures/fish stockers who have bluegills. I know there's one in Kinmount that has bluegills and pumpkinseeds and other fun stuff, but that would probably be waaaaay to out of range for you.

Seeing your username reminds me I'd like to catch a gar. I see them in many of the waters I fish, they just don't seem to like musky lures at all.

Toss a skitter walk (maybe try fishing it with the bottom hooks of the trebles removed, doesnt seem to be a disadvantage with hooking them) or a Rapala F-11 and you will surely get some, smaller lures work too as long as they float and there isn't a large gap between trebles

I caught my first 2 this year in nova scotia, they're really aggressive and even though they were only about 10 inches they fought amazingly well.

Those are actually Chain Pickerel (Esox niger), they reach much larger sizes, up to 30" i believe and there have been reports of 6lbers in around Halifax county. I have caught one of those before, just a 15"er, would definitely like to get into more . Also they are now found around Kingston and in the St.Lawrence River, shouldn't make much of an impact compared to out in Nova Scotia though.

Must be annoying getting big bass while chasing those muskies rofl. Very nice largie.

Interesting that you'd say grass pickerel. There are so few people that would know one if they caught one. An adult would never be much more than 12 inches long so most of these fish would be shaken off at boatside mistaken for a baby pike. Interesting choice.

They seem like a neat little species, plus I'm pretty sure I've had one take a swing at a lure a couple years ago around bass opener on twenty mile creek which makes me want to catch one even more.

Peacock Bass

Inconnu

Giant Brookies

Aurora Trout

Grass Pickerel

Atlantic Salmon

Bonefish

I have a St.Croix Avid 7' UL matched with a Shimano Sedona (750 i think) and 4lb mono. Works very nicely for panfish (not bad at keeping them out of the pads, even able to control 2lb largies pretty well), I use UL though for fishing very small/light jigs most of the time (less than 1/32oz usually), not sure how it would feel casting stuff around 1/8-3/16oz though if you plan on casting small lures a lot of the time.

The only thing I can think of was one time I was gar fishing with Aaron Shirley and we fished a bay that had a clay bottom, so it was murky, but the gar were everywhere. Well, one managed to run into the back of my leg, and left a nice mark on my ankle for a week and a half (must have scraped my ankle turning). Had a camera on me too because we were filming a show, I'm sure some of you who have been here for a while may remember it when Aaron posted the episode:

Check out the waters just out from swimming beaches (wade away from the plain sandy parts into rocks/weeds), should be some around as long as it isn't too windy

Any relatively sheltered flats with either rocks or weeds will have gar cruising about on nice sunny days. As mentioned before you will see them gulp air if they are around. Try to keep your flies near the surface too, they don't hit lures near bottom (probably to keep the beak in one piece lol)

Kinda like how the Potomac has really taken a beating from them

Probably Craspedacusta sowerbii, these have been seen before in Kashagawigamong, and apparently aren't that uncommon at the Gravenhurst docks. They won't harm anything in the ecosystem (except unsuspecting daphnia and copepods), they just go along their business very quietly.

This one was from September 2009, my sister's boyfriend walked over (they were swimming) and took this picture as I battled that gar:

These were from last week while I guided my friend for some more gar (he got his 1st two ever, which are featured here), his girlfriend took some good shots

Sounds like a big ol' bullfrog

never knew they were called Fallfish, always called em suckers. Learned something new everyday! In AP i have caught them in the 3+ lbs range. They do put up a really good fight for a sucker

They are closely related to Creek Chubs, not a sucker at all

Bowfin's have a gular plate (which is handy for holding on to them), snakeheads don't.

Maybe I did mean 0.19

I wonder how that "better spot" worked out for that family haha.

 

Great catch and a good read. Thanks

They got what they were looking for, plenty of sunfish to entertain them for the evening

While we're on the subject of invasives, anybody tried gobies? Maybe deep-fried in beer batter?

I wouldn't eat them, they have a ton of contaminants in them because they eat the zebra mussels which filter a lot of that stuff.

Very nice catch aplumma

So I decided this evening to try a spot on the Scugog River that I hadn't fished yet this summer for some bass (some nice bluegills in there in the spring). Considering I hadn't caught any bass bigger than 1.3lbs (and that's the biggest I've gotten on the river, still figuring things out), I figured this would be the spot to improve that mark. Decided to take my "muskie" combo (7' heavy action spinning combo with 30lb fireline braid) since the water I was fishing was going to be weedy and had some pads, and anything lighter would be begging for trouble with the pads. Got there around 6:20ish after a short bike ride, and started fishing. Nothing immediately, although when I was trying to pull off some line because the line was sitting funny on the reel, a plant managed to create quite the mess of a tangle with the slack line, which took about 15 minutes of patience to get undone . Fished one part of the spot and it was fruitless, so I decided to fish closer to the actual river channel. About an hour of nothing and a family walked by, with one of the little girls remarking "we're gonna fish a better spot" after her younger brother wondered if they were going to fish where I was. The nerve, I should show them where the better spot actually is .

About 30 minutes after that, while fishing a weedless spoon, something goes at my bait but misses, looked like a bass. About 5 minutes later, it made a big wake at the bait. Muskie? It didn't hit after that, so I switched to a BBZ Shad (floating). About 3 casts after the switch while twitching it along, it goes after it again and misses. YOU GOTTA BE KIDDING ME!!!! It didn't chase the bait a 2nd time, so I switched to a Skitter Pop in the largest size. A couple casts in, when I was starting to think it wasn't around, *slurp*. I set the hook and there's some decent weight on the line, however I'm worried about the lily pads between me and it. I kept it's head up long enough and got it in. This thing is BIG!!! Approximately 20.5" long, 5.3lbs, new PB (old was the reciprocal of that), 4 times bigger than the previous biggest of the year.

I will probably be fishing Baby Brush Hogs, hopefully the toad bite heats up further into the evening though. Before 8am on Georgian Bay last year was a great toad bite (Chigger Toads in case anyone wondered) in a little bay I fished, reeled in just fast enough to get the legs going at a decent kick, never got one under a pound.

Somewhere on the Scugog River in Lindsay after work, it'll be nice using gulp leeches for multi-species later next week