fish_finder

Wow man!! Even more reason for me to get me arse up there!!

Mike, you are a fine.......FINE man!!

 

That experience will stick in their minds for a lifetime! And three generations out there to boot!

Bass and Pike in all of the above, pickeral in none.

 

Belwood lake has some picks.

 

Theres a huge festival at guelph lake this weekend, so I wouldnt recommend going there to fish......I'll be out there for the tunes and the beverages though

Easy guys...C&R regs do not apply between Tower St and Scotland St in Fergus (ie where Tightline is referring to).

 

Exactly, nor do they apply in the conservation area in Elora, and several of the bridges have kill zones for several meters upstream and downstream.

 

Not like it matters really. The most common catches in those kill zones are dinks that are stocked every year.

Yup, way too warm down there for trout. You might have luck a little further upstream towards Paris/Brantford, but that would be tough too.

 

Head up to Fergus/Elora area if you really want trout on the Grand this time of year

Definitely try and get yourself some of those 3 way swivels bud. You'll want to get a pretty decent amount of weight on there, below the spoon. Without some added weight, once you start trolling, the spoon will just rise up in the water, and probably too high.

 

Heres a good video that shows the setup kicking frog is talking about, i think.....

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUWFP2Z3ZXc

Awesome man! Carp on the fly are quite the challenge.

Nice man, I'm from guelph too and fish the speed quite a bit.

 

I'm gonna hammer it this saturday for bass. I've also found that the pike population seems to be on decline in town, but downstream of the hanlon theres some really good water if you have access to a canoe. Some beasts in there pushing 40 inches.

 

The carp on the otherhand are always around, and loads of fun on the fly!

Awesome stuff dude!

 

Theres not much that beats a day on a trout creek!

Awesome man!

 

I should be getting out for Gar and Musky on the fly real soon!

The Sex Dungeon!!!

Awesome buddy!!

 

Looks like you are getting fly fishin figured out dude!

Outstanding report Dave.

 

It's been far too long since I plodded through the cold water streams of Grey Bruce with fly rod in hand for native trout and your post reminds me of what I'm missing out on.

 

 

Its still fishing very well up there Spiel. I suspect we've got at least a couple more weeks of good fishing before the water warms up too much.

 

Git out there!

Wow. Some great posts right now....unreal. This may be th ebest of the best.

 

Wow, I have not been fishing enough.

 

Thanks Dude.

 

Most rivers are prime right now for big browns. Get out there buddy!

My 2000th post and this one is deserving of WOW great Macro shots man....thank you!!!

 

Awesome man!

Amazing shots of both fish and the bugs! Definitely learned alot from this post, never really paid much attention to the bugs before.

 

thanks for sharing with us.

 

Those bugs make up a huge part of most fishes diets bud! Especially when they are young. Once the fish get bigger its a bit of a different story. But when you have thousands of those bugs hitting the water laying eggs, all hell breaks loose and its a smorgasbord for even the biggest fish in the pool. Problem is, its all at night when the spinners fall.

Awesome stuff. Some beautiful fish ya got there. Like the shots of the bugs too.

 

Interesting that you've noticed a drop in brookies. In one of the creeks I fish a couple years ago I caught nothing but brookies, but in the last 2 they've been noticeably fewer though I've found a few browns including a couple nice ones. I was wondering about water temps but haven't been measuring them long enough to really know. Have you notice anything like this in some of the streams you fish?

 

Hard to say. I don't find that streams with browns and brookies cause either population to suffer. Water temps play a huge factor in brook trout activity though. Not so much in the way of killing the fish. They can handle a few days of warmer water, but it really affects their activity and they basically just shut right down. Their metabolism slows, and they don't move for much. The water was pretty warm by brook trout standards the first few days. Around 67 F. Then, after the storm moved through on saturday, the water temps dropped to 63 F. By that point I was pretty dedicated to chucking out streamers 3-4 inches long and targeting bigger Browns in water that wouldnt be considered ideal brookie water.

 

If you are noticing more brown trout activity, it could definitely be water temps. Browns like water a little warmer than brookies.

I had the last week off, and headed up to Grey/Bruce for my annual pilgrimage to the area. Beautiful as always!

 

I left Guelph in the sweltering heat last Tuesday. It was just as hot when I arrived. Luckily I had cold beverages in the cooler waiting for me. :cool:

 

The river was surprisingly low when I arrived. There were countless smaller fish willing to come out and play, which is fine and dandy, but I like big fish! When the water is low and clear, the big guys hunker down and hide in some pretty tight spots making it a game of lucky casts into tight cover. When I heard the forecast for Saturday, I was pretty pumped!

 

Tha Riva

 

 

Tha Riva - Almost as misty as my mind on the first morning at dawn

 

 

Lets start with the bugs....

 

 

 

There were at least 5 species of mayflies out and about. Hatches were pretty consistent throughout the days with sulphurs, grey foxes, green drakes and more coming off. Most evenings had decent spinnerfall events happen between dusk and about an hour after dark. A couple nights it just got too cold and the bugs, as well as the fish, disappeared.

 

Grey Fox Duns

 

 

 

 

 

 

Grey Fox Spinners - These made up the heavy spinnerfalls. Thousands of bugs in the air. I wasn't able to get any decent shots of the clouds of bugs unfortunately.

 

 

 

 

 

Then my favourites. Giant Green Drakes. These massive mayflies are a key indicator of a healthy stream. They've been on decline in many streams in southern Ontario for a long time now. Fortunately Grey/Bruce still has a very healthy population in most rivers making for some awesome surface action!

 

Green Drake Duns

 

 

 

 

Green Drake Spinners. When these flies molt into their spinner stage a couple of days after hatching, they look entirely different. The change they go through rivals any other mayfly species in my opinion.

 

 

 

I did manage a few shots of these guys flying around. They're hard to miss!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Aside from the mayflies, there were plenty of stones, caddis, cranes, dragon and damsel flies as well.

 

Mottled Stonefly

 

Damsel

 

Cranes doin tha deed!

 

 

 

The fish were plentiful. As I mentioned, the conditions were hot, bright and tough to start, so we'll start small I suppose.

 

 

 

 

 

 

They might be small, but they were loving mouse flies when there were no bugs on the water

 

 

 

I'm not sure why, but the brookies were not as plentiful as other years. Pressure on the stream may be on the rise, not sure though. Its pretty secluded water, and I don't see many people in here. I blame the slightly warmer water temps this year.

 

 

 

Bigger flies were producing bigger fish. During the low light of dawn and dusk I was tossing some pretty big streamers. Zoo Cougars, Matuka Leeches and a couple of Sculpin patterns were what produced larger fish...

 

Once the storm hit on Saturday, the river rose a good 6 or 8 inches, and muddied up a bit. Always a good thing when you are near big browns.

 

 

 

 

 

Getting at the bigger fish requires a very loud, violent retrieve of the streamer alot of the time. I spent a couple of days filming and fishing with Ken Chandler a couple of weeks back. The knowledge I gained from those couple of days chasing brookies and huge browns paid off on this trip. I've been fishing streamers far too slowly and too deep the last few years. These fish all came up off bottom to hit the fly about 6-8 inches below the surface.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oddly enough, this fish nailed a streamer in some fast, broken water at noon on one of the brightest days.

 

 

Its actually kind of a funny story. I had my cousin and his kids up for a night. The kids are all fly fishing maniacs. Thing is though, they're not quite at the point that they can cast big streamers yet. We keep them on dries, nymphs and buggers when they come out.

 

 

 

So when I pulled out a giant streamer, Shaylin looks at it and she says "what is this, some kind of joke?" Me and Justin had a good chuckle about that, but the first cast brought the big guy up to her amazement and she wanted to try it. We gave her a mouse to use though.

 

This one was a beast. Crappy shot as the fight wasn't very long and he was still full of energy and wanted to get back to where he came from. I was lucky to get this picture actually, he flopped and disappeared as I bent down to lift him up and move him back into the water.

 

 

I gotta stop there though....its painful being back in the city. I'll be back up soon though! Chasing big fat browns, and Musky within the next couple of weeks.

i think Wayne was refering to leeches, as in 'blood sucking leaches'

 

 

Nah, I think he means polyticks. 'Poly' as in many, and 'ticks' as in blood sucking parasites.....

awesome dude!!!

 

its amazing how light gear and such small fish simply make the day!

 

I can't get enough of those little guys.

 

Irish..get out and do it man! You know you wanna!

Well, they just dumped thousands of stockers into the river....you should be alright!

great pics... keep em coming

 

There will be more very soon buddy! The rain and T-storms expected this weekend should put the streams in great condition for next week with the hopes for some epic hendrickson hatches!

Can't beat that....looks like a great day. In that first pic....are you just messing with us, or did you really tie a panther martin onto your flyrod?

 

Looks like a fly still stuck in the hook keeper.

 

The rod is probably there for size comparison

Good stuff JJ! The season has only just begun!

Thanks Bud. I hate those bloody swirls too. If people would just set up their shots so they don't include any 'evidence' it would be much better!