craigdritchie

My waterfront retirement location is south of North Bay, but it isn't in Canada.

Sea lamprey. Common sight in Great Lakes tributaries at this time of year.

Re capacity plate - exceed it, and your insurance is null and void.

Been there. Fishing is absolutely spectacular, particularly for giant brook trout at the north end of the lake. Downside is, yes, it's generally pretty expensive. If you want that kind of fishing, then that's what it costs. Everything there, from the buildings to the food to the toilet paper, comes in a long way by truck so it isn't cheap. That said, you get what you pay for when it comes to fishing quality. Some other options beside Osprey Lodge include Cree Tourism and Mistassini Lodge. If it's trophy brookies you want, Mabec Outfitters is another option. They're in a different part of Quebec (St. Lawrence north shore, near Sept Iles). Again, it isn't cheap since it's fly-in only. But if you want to catch a dozen or so brookies over 5 pounds each day, then you'll love it. Been there twice, best brookie so far was a shade over 8 pounds. It's heaven on earth.

Lip it like a bass. No problem.

I hate to break it to you cowboy, but the government that doesn't care about your information is Dalton McGuinty's Liberals. This is a provincial matter and this decision was made by a Liberal government. Same one that's been in power for the past nine years. So .... you were saying that you were upset?

He wasn't that tiny. I'd guess 6-foot-6 and pushing 300 pounds. Wonderful man, but not an elegant sight in waders, let me tell you.

In his book The Art Of Angling, Tiny Bennett writes about a guy using a live mouse to catch a huge resident brown from a fairly small river in southern Ontario. Fish allegedly weighed 14 pounds. In the far north it's quite common for brook trout to eat mice, moles, and lemmings. Basically anything that falls in the water is food. Personally, I draw the line at putting small mammals on a hook. But I would imagine a live mouse would work quite well.

I'll play! Freshwater: 1. Rainbow trout (freshwater and sea run) 2. Brown trout 3. Cutthroat trout (freshwater and sea run) 4. Brook trout (freshwater and sea run) 5. Lake trout 6. Splake 7. Arctic char 8. Dolly Varden char / Bull trout 9. Atlantic salmon (freshwater and sea run) 10. Chinook salmon (freshwater and sea run) 11 Coho salmon (freshwater and sea run) 12. Pink salmon (freshwater and sea run) 13. Chum salmon 14. Sockeye salmon 15. Lake whitefish 16. Largemouth bass 17. Smallmouth bass 18. Spotted bass 19. Rock bass 20. Black crappie 21. Punkinseed 22. Bluegill 23. Yellow perch 24. Sauger 25. Walleye 26. Northern pike 27. Muskie 28. Carp 29. Northern Quillback 30. White sucker 31. Hog sucker 32. Northern redhorse 33. White perch 34. White bass 35. Striped bass 36. Channel catfish 37. Black bullhead 38. Bowfin 39. Ling cod 40. Freshwater drum 41. Mooneye 42. Rainbow smelt 43. Round goby 44. Creek chub 45. Spotted gar Saltwater: 46. Halibut 47. Ling (different fish from freshwater ling) 48. Rock cod 49. Atlantic cod 50. Blue runner 51. Atlantic mackerel 52. Snook 53. Ladyfish 54. Tarpon 55. Summer flounder 56. Pompano 57. Pinfish 58. Red grouper 59. Redfish 60. Dolphin (Dorado, not the mammal) 61. Blacktip reef shark 62. Sheepshead Goals for this year: White crappie (never caught one)

Larger Ping a T's are pretty good lures for pike. They stand up to a lot of chewing.

Part of the reason for the delay could be your choice of a 75 Yamaha. Since Yamaha introduced their new 70 hp four-stroke two years ago, it has pretty much replaced the 75. You might want to ask about availability on the 70 - they sell a ton of them, so it might be faster than the older 75.

Buy a quality pump and you'll never have a problem again. Rule, Jabsco, and Latham Marine are three very good brands.

Art raises a good point. We live in a world run by lawyers and insurance companies, so as soon as you include the terms "operate heavy equipment" and "failed drug test" in the same discussion, you know where it's going to wind up. Health claims, in particular, are an enormous expense for any employer/insurer, so they will be scrutinized even more closely in the future. No problem if someone's legitimately injured and can't work. But come on, if you're off on sick leave and out bombing around on your bike, or re-doing the siding on your house, then you're basically asking for it. I know a guy who had a "bad back" and went on long term disability. Then the insurance investigator took some video of him out on his jet ski. Guess what happened next? To this day he says the company screwed him, but let's be honest - who was screwing who? Spiel - I have no idea what company you're talking about, and maybe it is run by a bunch of dicks. But this kind of employee scrutiny is becoming more commonplace in every industry. Even good companies run by great people are introducing "zero tolerance" policies. I think it's got to a point they can't afford not to.

Sorry if they're friends of yours, but I would have fired them too.

That's because the Rav4 isn't a truck - it's built on the same basic platform as the Camry.

Beauty brown, congrats! That's a real horse! Marks on the rainbow look like they were made by a frog spear, or possibly even part of a pitchfork. I've seen native guys spear pike with a frog spear up north and the dual holes from the barbed spear look exactly like the marks on that 'bow.

That is one fine slab!

Brewer Brothers in Hamilton sell just about anything you could ever want for your boat. Their selection (and advice) are both excellent.

I wouldn't consider a Rav4 for towing anything bigger than a 14 foot tinny.

Cambria is made of quartz, so it's just about the hardest, toughest, most maintenance-free counter on the market. The stuff is expensive, to be sure, but worth the extra if you want truly zero maintenance and higher resale value when you eventually sell the house. Corian is a nice counter, but it's a comparatively soft material and will scratch fairly easily. The good news is you can fix minor blemishes with fine sandpaper. The bad news is, you'll wind up having to do exactly that every now and then. In spite of what Dupont says, it isn't even close to being maintenance free. Granite, like all natural stone, is porous so it needs to be sealed at least once or twice a year. Even then, mold can still be a problem. Marble is even worse - it stains like crazy, and it's soft enough that scratches and wear are a real problem. It's fine in the bathroom, but don't even think about putting it in the kitchen. I would disagree that laminate counters are total junk. They used to be, but they've come a long, long way in recent years. Modern laminates are tough and inexpensive, so they're a pretty good value for the money.

LMAO!!!!!!

This is precisely why bass boat sales have been declining for years. Market (in southern Canada and northeast US, at least) is definitely swinging to aluminum 16- 18 foot with 70hp - 115hp engines.

Okay, since no one else has, I'll bite. To the OP ....... why do you need to go faster? And, exactly how fast do you need to go?

Apart from the yacht club at Montebello , the closest launch I know of Roy is the one in Papineauville, right at the end of the main drag. Forget the name of the street but it was named after some Quebec politician. Henri Bourassa? It would be nice to have a new ramp closer to CM.

Little history lesson here. The Van Staal does have a bail, guys. It's the roller your line goes over. That design is called a manual bail, because you have to manually grab the line with your finger and thread it over the roller. Many decades ago (40s and 50s) the majority of spinning reels were built this way, including ultra-lights. You could still get manual bails on some of the earliest Mitchell 300 reels, and some of the DAM Quick models that were sold into the early 1970s. As with the Van Staal, they're still used in heavy duty salt water applications where the ultimate strength is required. You've seen the bail on the Van Staal. Here's another photo of a manual bail on a Mitchell reel. Around the same time (50s) some manufacturers offered what was called a semi-automatic bail. Imagine a normal spinning reel bail from today, but cut the bail arm in half and only keep the half that's attached to the line roller. The idea was to automatically pick up the line and thread it under the roller for you, so you didn't have to touch it. Here's a picture of a semi-auto bail, also on a Mitchell. And here's a drawing from a 1950s ad. These worked okay, but sometimes in windy weather the bail would miss the line. They were soon replaced by the full wire bails we all know today. Here it is for comparison, once again on a Mitchell. Finally, there is no comparison between a Shimano Stella and a Van Staal. I like the Shimano, and it is a smooth reel. But comparing it to a Van Staal is like comparing a cardboard box to a tank. They're two different animals, for two different purposes.