nlpaintballer

I don't know about that Rich, but I've been out on Pigeon and Balsam in 30km plus winds surfing the waves. Fun but dangerous. Muskie opener a couple years ago was fun, 20km plus and my first time out on a larger lake. Only had an electric at the time, so I got a lot of looks from people wondering what the hell I was doing on Balsam with just a trolling motor in high winds. Little did they know it was a 74lb thrust. Lost my first good ski at boat side because I didn't have a net. Went and bought one the same day so I wouldn't have a repeat of this. The fish hit the first bucktail I had ever made, so it was especially awesome and gratifying. WARNING Video contains a little bit of swearing My link

I think the ministry should focus a little attention on the pike issue in the Kawarthas. They opened the season year round, but if you catch more than 6 you get to release them. Whats the point then? Balsam is the high point in the Trent/Severn and now that it's full of pike, it's easy for them to spread east to meet up with the ones appearing in Rice these days. IMHO if a species is not native to certain waters, and has the potential to upset the balance, than declare open season on that species, especially if it was our interference that caused the issue. Also is the proposed change for non-residents as well, or just residents? If it's the former than over harvesting might become an issue, but if it's the latter, I don't thing we have anywhere near enough the population up there to have much of an impact.

I saw a cougar when I was in 4th grade, on our farm near Guelph. I was teased like you wouldn't believe, and no one believed me, not even my parents. That changed the following winter when our neighbor was walking through the bush and came across some big cat tacks in the snow. He followed them for a while to see if he could get a visual on the cat that was making them. After following them for a good half hour or so he ended up back on his original trail, with fresh tracks on top of his. He realized what was going on, turned around and headed home as fast as he could while looking over his shoulder. Also we lost a few sheep that year with no trace found, which rarely happens with coyote/coydog kills. A couple years later the livestock losses were so high in the area that the ministry sent 5 trappers to our farm, 3 of them were from the U.S. They had several traps broken by large predators, but managed to trap and kill just over 80 coyotes/coydogs in a 9 mile radius around our farm. Steve French is alive and well in Ontario, has been for years IMHO

If this winter is like last year, open water happened the first week of march in the kawarthas. Nice bling Hammercarp, here's my sweet set up........goes anywhere I want and no need to get caught in the ramp madness that happens sometimes. catches more fish than 30,000 AND 60,000 dollar bass boats:whistling: although 25km/h and up winds are a pain and a 60,000.00 bass boat would be nice to get places faster than 8km/h:wallbash:

I don't have much money to spend on fishing, so I try to put it where it counts. St. Croix premier's for my rods, stradic/ci4's for spincast, revo toro's for muskie and currado for baitcast. Not top of the line, but gear I know will last, and will handle early spring to late fall/early winter conditions. I make my own leaders, spinnerbaits, bucktails, and even carve my own lures to keep costs down. I won't spend over 10.00 on a lure unless it's for muskie, and for years I only bought my spinnerbaits at the fishing show where you could get deals on them. I own a crap load of Rapala's but I don't think I will ever buy a live target lure, especially their frogs. Don't get me wrong, it is still a sickness because all I fish is pike, muskie, and a little bit of bass, but I still carry 18 large trays stuffed with lures in an XL bass pro bag.....not including my muskie lures. I carry a lot of doubles/triples because it sucks if you are nailing fish with a certain pattern and have no backup if that one gets lost or damaged. Spending the time on water with someone willing to teach you the techniques is also key, or else you have to do a lot of research followed by trial and error.

I use vice-grips to clamp on the loop and a good pair of needlenose pliers to spin the tail end around the shaft. You don't need a large tail end either, just enough to wrap around the shaft a couple of times.

My homemade 1/4 oz. hatchet blade spinnerbaits and Rapala original floating in yellow perch.

My ultimate setup is a St. Croix 7' XHF and a CI4 4000 spooled with 40 pound PP. I use it 95% of the time while fishing for pike, bass and muskie. Great for multi species fishing where you might run into some big fish and don't want to wear out the fish or be broken off.

Here is a musky from Balsam that I lost next to the boat, but my buddy managed a few pics and video of it. High 40's maybe a 50 completely out of water was awesome to watch.

I've fished it a few times, my biggest pike was 32" and a fiend of mine caught a 37". Be prepared for a lot of weed growth, and people on the water. I have caught a lot of pike there, but very few over 24" Again be prepared for weeds and stumps.

Nice pike Mercman, good to hear spinner baits are working for you. You should try to find some hatchet/tomahawk blade spinnerbaits, they work awesome for pike, bass, walleye, and muskie.

I've been hitting Mitchell/Balsam every week since the 2nd week of march with a buddy. It's been hit and miss with the water temp. changing so much, but we've pulled 15 pike out so far. Mitchell has always produced for me, especially in the summer with most people staying away because of the shallow/weed/deadhead infested water. It holds big fish year round, but people get turned of by the thick weeds. The best day so far this year was 7 pike, but that was with a west wind on a warm front. Last year I would hit between 10-15 pike a trip at least once the weather warmed up. As for the lake being off in the hot weather, I start fishing before daybreak to get them when the water is cooler.

Excellent news SBK, now you've kicked one BIG , these other teams should be a breeze.

I'm hitting the kawarthas for some pike tomorrow with a buddy. Nice of the weather to co-operate, for a change.

Rizzo, the muskie spawned last week when the water hit 50 the sunday before. 10 days ago the muskie were heavily into the spawn as well as the pike and water temps hit 60.

lol, I try not to take pictures of 20" snot rockets, I would run out of memory. Sadly enough, I did take pictures of the one halfway through the filleting because it had eggs and I thought the guy's doing the studies of the pike invasion in the Kawarthas would maybe be interested in a 20" pike with eggs. I didn't post it since some people might not like seeing a half filleted pike. Don't worry though, as of sunday, every fish gets a picture with the OFC 2012 tourney paper next to it.

Hit the kawarthas with my buddy for some pike last sunday. This time I ended up with 2 while he got 1. Lot's of follows and water temp was 50-52 degrees, down from those sunny days last week, but still warm enough for the pike. Spinnerbaits were getting follows, but husky jerks caught all the fish. Saw one muskie who chased a spinnerbait, but no fish in the shallows, so I guess it was a really fast spawn for the pike and muskie.

Fishing Scugog for the first time on the Ceasarea side, trolling when I notice a boat approaching. Assumed it was MNR but it turns out to be a boat full of guys looking for some help. They asked me if I knew where their launch was. I asked them if they launched from Ceasarea. They said no, but that they had launched at the marina. They couldn't even tell me what side of the lake they launched at, Port Perry or Ceasarea side.

58 degrees is hard to believe but it's a small shallow lake with a dark mud bottom where there aren't weed beds. Some muskie we saw looked like they had just finished spawn, while others were just getting heavily into it. Johnny, 30 isn't that big, but larger than the average, and if it was a male then it's a pretty good size.

Went fishing with a buddy yesterday on mitchell lake, I got skunked other than a few follows and a 10 second hook-up with a muskie which made me feel like I was using a fisher girl setup. My buddy ended up with a couple pike, an 18" and a 26" so the day wasn't a loss. Saw lot's of pike shallow as well as muskie. Water was already 58 degrees and the muskie seem to be spawning with the pike. Saw one 3' plus muskie with 5 pike around her, one of which was at least 30" long. Can't wait to see the size of the tigers a pair like that would produce. Amazing July weather yesterday.

I agree:thumbsup_anim: That's why I use the XL bass pro bag......I can fit 18 large(3700) trays in it, with room for other things.

My homemade hatchet blade spinnerbaits and a good selection of Rapala floating, jointed, and husky jerks. Yellow perch and firetiger are the producers for me. If I had to pick just one it would be my 1/4oz. spinnerbait, I can fish pretty much any water with that for bass, pike, muskie, and incidental walleye.

Yeah GBW, I don't understand why they don't make an exception for those three lakes and you to take as many a you can. It made no sense to me to call it an invasive species, but put a limit on how many you are allowed to take. I've even tried to give away pike to other boaters/people on shore and nobody wanted them, I don't know why....they're delicious. They changed the regs this year and removed it from the invasive species list, and there are no warnings either online or in the regs. Maybe it's an oversight on their part or they are just giving up the fight, either way people need to know about the issue.

It almost came to that GBW, I was suprised that the channel was open since all the spots with a fast current were still frozen solid. It all depends on where you're fishing Roy. Canal, Mitchell and parts of Balsam are full of pike now. Last year I was catching 10+ pike and taking my limit almost every time I fished Balsam/Mitchell. I don't like hitting the muskies, but if I get a couple pre-spwan female pike, I decrease the pike population by thousands, IMHO thats a good trade.

..........................on a boat! Went up yesterday with a friend to see if we could shore fish some pike, took the boat just in case and lucky for us the channel was wide open. We were able to troll and cast the whole channel but unfortunately we didn't hook up with any pike. I did happen to hook 2 small muskie, one of which was a tiger, both were released as quickly as possible. It was nice being out on the water again, even surrounded by ice.