Whitemikeca

skrillaguerilla, if you like trolling then Pigeon lake was the right choice. I ussually start my trolling run on South west tip of Big Island and I troll up along the island and then up and over to the to Bobcaygeon river entrance. Get a map of the lake and look for the big drop off west of the northern tip of the island. It drops to 30+ feet deep and there is usually fish suspended there this time of year. Belivers and ernies have always worked well for me on Pigeon.

If you are casting then you should look for the shoals in the north end of the lake (be careful a few of them are not very well marked) and throw jerkbaits at them.

Good luck

Pigeon was about 66 and buckhorn was 69 today.

I will be Fishing Buckhorn and Pigeon on Saturday and Sunday. Like most people I am going to start with large spinnerbaits and topwaters on the outside weed edges of shallow bays and flats. Last weekend I spotted a few muskie in these areas while fishing for morning walleye. In the afternoon I will likely head over to Pigeon lake and slow troll small 6-8" inch lures in the upper 10 feet of the water column over the edges of the main lake basin. If all else fails I will throw at some shoals that have produced for me in the past.

For those asking about water temps, on Sunday they ranged from 60-63 degrees on Buckhorn. Good luck to everyone!!

Nice catch! I can't wait until bass season opens here dammit. The bass in my avitar was 7.4 pounds on my digital scale. I didn't measure the lenght but it looks about similar to yours. I am 6 foot about 250lbs. Yours looks a little bit skinner so I would say 6.5lbs or so.

I stand corrected. And to think I had a really good day of fishing the southern bays of Buckhorn last week. I am going to have to try the northern bays this weekend!

You dont need to add weight as the spinner/worm combo has enough weight of its own. I like to fish it so that it is running on the tops of the weeds which in most shallow bays in the kawarthas is about 1-2 feet below the surface.

I agree with Stoty that a lot fish will be in 8+ feet of water, however don't be afriad to try shallow(3-6 feet) bays this time of year, especially in the morning and evening. The water is still very cold in the kawarthas and many fish will stay in the shallow bays, specifically on the south ends of lakes where the water tends to be the warmest. One of my fav lures for spring is a #3 or 4 blue fox spinner. I replace the trebble hook with a regular hook and I tie another hook onto the lure with about 4 inches of line. I then hook a powerbait worm onto both hooks similar to how you would rig a regular worm spinner(one hook at each end of the worm). Use a medium to slow speed retrieve. Good luck.

FisherMike - The Cumara is about $30 cheaper then the Legend Tournament but I am not concerned with price difference. Whats another $30?

BenBeattie - The Cumara is the new top of the line Shimano series of rods. Its an IM-10 blank and I was told that its the lightest bass rod on the market at 3 oz. I was talking about the legend tournament. Do the tournament and the Elite use the same blank with just different guides, handles or it is an entirely different series of rod?

I bought a Calais DC from JB's at the sportsman show and now I am looking for new rod pair it with. I plan to use this rig as my spinnerbait and large crankbait setup. I thinking 7 foot MH. I think I have narrowed it down to two choices, the St. Croix Legend or Shimano Cumara. Both of them are light and seem like that have good backbones. Do any you guys have either of these rods and would you recommend them? Are there any other Rods in high end category that might be better? I am leaning toward the St. Croix because I love my Medium Avid and I know St. Croix has an overall better reputation when it comes to rods, but at the same time the Cumara is really slick rod. Any help/advice would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Mike

Thanks guys. I wasn't able to get out as much as I wanted to last season because I was busy with work, but I did manage to a catch a few good ones when I did get on the water. I should have much more free time this summer so I am hoping to get out at least once per week.

Hello everyone. I am not really new to the forum but I don't post very often. I had posted a couple of reports on the old forum, but I was too busy with work last year to post any. I am on team 8 for the tourney this year so I figured I would post some of my pics from last year as a sort of introduction. I am looking forward to soft water and I will try and post weekly reports this summer. Most of the these fish were caught in buckhorn/pigeon/chemong. The Cod was caught in PEI and the Kingfish and Jack Cravalle were caught in Panama. I have about 150 more pics from last season so if I have time I will post some more.

So far I would say 9 out of 10. I bought a boat this year and docked it up on Buckhorn Lake. I was really busy with work so I didn't get out as much as I wanted but I was able catch 4 muskies, 5 LM bass > 5lbs with a personal best 7lber and a personal best 8lb walleye. I have been meaning to post my pics of the season but again I am super busy with work. I will hopefully post them soon. My season is not over yet. I have a trip booked to Panama over xmas and I am planning on hooking into some Peacocks and hopefully a Marlin. A Marlin would def push my rank up to 10 out of 10.

I also posted this on the hookups board but I am not sure if anyone reads it so I am posting it here as well.

I am planning on heading up to Buckhorn early tomorrow morning for some muskie fishing and my usual partners have bailed on me. I have a small boat docked on Upper Buck. If anyone in the GTA area is interested in some serious muskie fishing and want to join me then please leave me a PM with your number before say 8pm this evening. Please only respond if you are serious about muskie fishing and have all your own quality muskie gear and tackle. I will drive up and ask that you pitch in for gas.

Kemper,

I fish upper buck a couple times a month and this time of year the big bass usually move a little deeper. I generally fish in the shallow, weedy bays(less than 5 feet of water) for most of the summer but this time of year all I catch there are a few 1 pounders. A pattern that might work for you would be to find deep weed lines and slow fish with a senko or jerkbait. I also like a spinnerbait around islands and shoals in deeper water areas(west of Nichol Island). Good luck!

Dan,

I fish upper buckhorn a lot, mainly for bass and muskie. Look for weedy bays that are not too choked up with weeds (south end of the lake or bays on Fox Island). I use a white spinnerbait or chatterbait and I start working from the start of the bay all the way into the apex of the bay. I usually go for maximum speed on the retrieve (the point a which the blade is bulging the water) this will usually produce good numbers of LM and a few good ones. You will catch the odd small muskie this way as well.

Walleye are tough this time of year on buckhorn. I agree with ranger520vx that you best shot is to fish the deep weedlines (Try Scotsman point or Red Rock Island) with a jig and bucktail or grub. Try trolling along the weedline at the slowest possible speed while jigging every 5 seconds or so. If you are out on the water before 7 am then you may be able to catch the odd walleye in the shallow bays.

Good luck and I look forward to seeing the pictures

I am heading up to Buckhorn this weekend and I plan on starting with Topwater if the water is calm. I recently bought a Lucky Craft Sammy topwater and given its $20 price tag it better catch a few. I will probably move on to a Slop Master after that and I might throw a few tubes and senkos as well.

Nice kawartha ski! Congrats. You don't it yet but you are about to have a lot less disposable cash. Once the muskie bug hits you will wonder how you just dropped $400 on lures.

I was in the west arm in early October last year. We were only there for a weekend and we hit a nasty cold front. The waves were brutal and we only managed to get about 6 or 7 hours of fishing in the whole weekend which resulted in only 3 mid size pike and 1 LM bass. Because of the wind and the waves we fished mostly in sheltered bays. I am sure we would have more success if it had not been for the weather. Good luck.

I just got a new Muskie jerkbait rod myself. Its a 6' 10" Okuma extra heavy rod with my old Abu Garcia 5500 C3. I can't wait to try it out this Sunday. It only cost me $80 at JB's. I will let you know if I can recommend it after Sunday. My main Muskie setup is a 7' 2" heavy Shimano Compre with a 300TE Calcutta reel and it was just a little bit too short and had too much flex for jerkbaiting.

Thanks for the help guys. I will probably bring both trout and walleye gear then.

Hi guys. I have to go to Quebec City for the next two weeks for work. I was wondering if any of you have fished that area of the St. Lawrence. I have heard that St. Lawrence is great for Muskie but unfortunately after looking online I don’t think Muskie season opens there until June 15. The MNRF website does say that Pike and Walleye are open all year round on the St. Lawrence though. Do any of you know if the Quebec City area of the St. Lawrence holds good numbers of pike and walleye?

Thanks

Thanks guys. I am planning on going back up to buckhorn/pigeon for 1 or 2 days over the long weekend so hopefully I will have more to report then.

Today - Buckhorn lake:

During the winter I bought a used 14' fiberglass fishing boat so today my uncle and I moved it up to Emerald Isle Marina on Buckhorn Lake where I am going to dock it for the season. We didn't get there until 7pm but we decided to head out for an hour or so of fishing before it got dark. When we got out onto the water we realized that my tackle box was filled with nothing but pike lures(spoons, mepps, husky jerks and spinnerbaits) and one jig. I had forgotten that I had emptied it out of all small cranbaits and jigs when I went to T.O. Islands on Friday(see second report below). So I gave my uncle my one jig and I used a spinnerbait. After about 15 mins my uncle landed this lunker to christen the boat:

I was worried I was going to get skunked but just as we were about to leave I watched this slab of a walleye nail my spinner right at the side of the boat. It harder and faster than I have ever seen a walleye hit. I originally thought it was a small muskie but once it started trashing I could see it was a walleye and I almost pooped my pants.

We didn't have a tape measure or a scale with us but the fish was approx 7-8 pounds(keep in mind that I am 6 foot 250 pounds). Overall it was a pretty good first hour of fishing for my new boat. Now i can't wait to get back out there this long weekend. Hopefully I can get some eating size walleyes to keep next time.

Friday - T.O. Islands:

Me and my friend Auni decided that the weather was looking too good on friday to be stuck in our cubicles so we headed out to the Islands to try and catch some pike instead. We started out on Wards Island and I lost a 30+ incher. He fought for 5 or 6 seconds and then I thought he spit the hook. However on my next few casts I noticed that my spoon didn't look the same and on closer inspection the "O" ring was bent open and the hook was missing(I would have attached a photo of the spoon but this 250k file limit is tough to work with). We continued fishing Wards for an hour or so with no luck. Once we got to centre Island I caught this hammer handle:

Unfortunatly that is all we caught for the day, but it was a great day to be outside.

Its funny that you say that Golfisher because right now I am logged into my office VPN trying to get some work done. Luckily for me I am in the audit division and not tax so while I am still busy, I am not 80+ hours per week busy.