BassAsin

do you secretly want to go to europe so you can wear a witches hat to fish Randy? lol those are some dandy lookin fish.

hey, when you asked how i caught those fish the other day i lied, i don't use a size 2 hook i checked and they are super sharp, gamakatsu pink 1/0 octopus hooks in pink do yourself a favour and try not to hook your minnows in the tail, trout are a predator fish and hit quite hard for the most part and take their prey head first (so fins slide down the throat better) here's how i hook my minnows resulting in much more sucessful hooksets. a pic of minnow and hook for size refererance. step one, hold minnow firm but not enough to crush it,( i killed this one to make photography easier) lol step two, slide hook through skin (not spine) from the back towards the belly. in this photo you can see how the hook is off center missing the spine and catching just the skin. step 3, turn your hook facing the head and slide the hook point (from belly up) through the skin on the opposite side of the spine from which your hook went into the minnow here you can see that the hook shaft is only through the skin of the minnow causing it no fatal harm. A final look at how your hook should look after going through the minnow. Note that the hook goes in on the minnows left side and comes out on the right, this makes the trout or your hookset have to break the minnows spine for it to come off the hook. a minnow hooked liked this can actually be taken off at the end of the day and put back in the minnow bag to live another day. and just a tip, if you miss a trout on a set line, and it did not take your minnow, dont worry about a new minnow, drop the dead minnow back down the hole they are often waiting for it to come back. they will hang around for you to drop it back in and give you a second chance. Matt.

lake open year round means they're are NOT trying to protect it, so why implement the slot on it. I argued that one here at work and got nowhere with the bio's. if i happen to be up that way at all in the next month or so i'll pop by the cottage and see if you're there if not i'll leave a note.

I have to agree on the back lakes Wayne, as for the gold not so much i always go with the silver hahah.

terry and helen's sounds tasty but as for fishing temagami area BOOO i would have only been able to keep one of these fish, not a single fish we caught this day were under the 12.2 inches. hope to see ya up temagami way once feb 15th rolls around i plan oin trying my luck at some temagami lakers this year.

same time again? wonder if they moved out of that spot. thanks Blue, it would have been awesome, my dad's biggest speck is 5 10 so i think thios one would have beat his. been trying for 6 years to beat his hog. yea its a beauty fish, helped me forget about having missed a monster. the rainbow bite has been good around here lately from what a few buds have been tellin me. best of luck.

comes down to personal preferance if you ask me, as for tail hooking i say not too but thats personal, dace i agree with as being a number one minnow type, i use 12 lb not light line it all depends on the fish that day. be sure to do yourself a favout though and bring a couple tough garbage bags. one to cut open to lay down on and look down the hole and one to put over your head to block out sunlight. spend a bit of time looking down the hole. often specks will be around but wont be in a feeding mood. try any depth between 2-8 fow in general. sometimes as deep as 15 but rarely, set your lines near down trees if possible, all teh paintings you see of those beauty specks in amongst the sticks isnt for nothing. best of luck out there. Matt.

i was having similar issues with a " smart " charger but turns out my battery was on the fritz.

Thanks, Roy, no i always carry a hatchet and an 18" bucksaw with me

So I awoke this morning at the annoying sound of my alarm at the late time of 5 45 am. turned on the coffee and called my fishing "partner" no reply, 2 text messages no reply at 6 30 the 3rd text said ya got 15 minutes last call. still no reply. after not sleeping very well and not gettin any shut eye until 2 am i considered headingback to bed, it was -14 out and too cold to take the pup as well. it was a coin toss morning, there i stood in my kitchen in a pair of white long johns with coffee in hand, wondering if i should go. i considered the fact that it is a favourite speck lake full of beuty naturals and although a long sled ride and hike in it has always been worth it. but on the other hand would i be kicking myself in the butt when i got home wondering if i should have just gone back to bed. all it took was the ambition to get my socks on and then the rest of the outdoor apparel followed. in a matter of minutes i was tucking the pup under the blankets in the comfort of my bed and headed out the door. by this time it was nearly 7 am, 45 minutes later than i was originally planning on. so off the road i go and unload the sled, break trail for half hour and start hiking, made it in good, drilling my first hole at 8 55. I had chosen to go with the largest dace i had to try to fend off some of the smaller ones i often catch. by 9 30 i had a pair of nice specks a male and a female both about 14 inches. after having missed 3 fish i was getting down a bit. i had one small tap and went over and couldnt help but see the bugger down the hole, about a pound specky when in came a nice 3-4 pounder and continued to smack the minnow with his nose, never actually biting it, then all of a sudden another fish came in and pounded the minnow, this fish making the 3-4 pounder look small, i would HAVE put this fish around 6 lbs. as i was laying on my stomach looking down the hole i made a poor hookset on this monster and only got a couple pulls on it. man was i upset, so after a couple smokes by the fire i got another hit just a small tap, the bite seemed light, i went over to my line and seen a 3 punder swallow my dace, fish on. just a few pulls later (4 fow) a nice 3 lb 4oz speck layed at my feet. after seeing a few fish around 2-4 lbs swimming around my bait i was getting discouraged with jigging a spoon, i put on the biggest lure i had trying to get any kind of hit out of aggression and still nothing. my next two fish i caught looking down the hole but the trick was to stir the bottom up heavily with the sinker hitting the mud then pulling the dace just to the top of the stirred mud. and BAM, they hammered it this time, i released my limit fish 3 times and finally kept one at the end of the day before packing up, my days total was 8 specks most between 1-1/2 to 1-3/4 lbs to the exception of the 3-1/4. wish i had of taken the tripod in but left it in the truck for weight reasons for my walk group photo back at home. my set line minnow size compared to a AA battery my first 3 of the day Matt!

Thanks for havin me out Chad, was a good time and got to see some nice fish

good work Jaques, waking up to the bear i see. some nice coloured fish too.

I'd personally say in the top 10 nicest i've seen, but you're right, it is a beauty.

Thanks, I use dace minnows that i trap, anywhere from 2-4 inches, hooking them with a gamakatsu pink octopus hook i think size 2. i slide the hook down through the mid back section of the minnow just catching skin and not spine, then come back up through the skin with the hook pointed towards the head, about 90% hookset like this i have a fdew friends that hook them through the tail and on some days are about a 40% hookset as for jigging i use a 3/8 oz buckshot spoon with a dace minnow hooked through the back of the head most times, i also use mr champs and sweedish pimple style jigging spoons. if the bite is very agressive i use a 5 inch williams whitefish that i have melted lead on the belly of, with a trailer hook and a minnow, seems to work quite well at pissing off the fish and getting them to hit out of aggression. usually fishing them between 2-8 fow sometimes getting as deep as 12-15 but usually in shallow, yesterday all of our fish came out of less than 5 fow.

it's a beauty place to be Harrison, as for quiet yes, although it seems no matter where you go to fish around these neck of the woods now a days theres a skidder makinhg noise on a nearby logging road, or a highway withinn hearing in the distance. and when she picks up a scent, well thats noise i can handle, she goes about 300 yds and comes back within a couple minutes, even at 4 months she sounds like a full grown hound.

Jet, easy , i've been on the ice since early december too just hiding in the shadows though. lol Congrats on some beuty fish and figuring out the bows. scenery, fish and all other pics aside, my fav is the one of Weston holding that bull on the stick, the smile on his face is enough to bring back some memories of my dad and i that define who i am today, Thanks for gettin another outdoorsman hooked on fishing, it is awesome to see. Matt.

that may be because i dont mention all of them, many of that size around the bay actually, but you have to wanna walk/snowshoe a long piece. best of luck on the splake and bow hunt JT For sure RC, 4 lbs is a beauty, it was a stock fish 100% clipped fin. Merci beaucoup Jaques, cetais une belle journee aussi, - 5 probablement et pas beaucoup de vent, pas de soleil, j'espere le meilleur dans le nouveau annee pour toi, sur les lacs et chaque jour. Je m'excuse mon francais, ce n'est pas comme c'etait quand j'etais jeune. Matt.

Hey Gang, Well it has been a great new year thus far for myself. New years eve two of my buddies and I went out to a small splake lake where I managed one small guy about a pound, and jeff missed a pair on the hookset. New years day the 3 of us headed into a speckie lake where we have caught some large ones last year. we were off to the races at 5:30 am and had our first lines set at 7:00. 4 quick ones by 8 bells all around 12-14" and a miss was it for the day. at noon we said that enough and made our way into a laker lake where i caught 2 small ones each a little over a pound. on the second myself and a friend went into a small stocked lake for specks once again, where i hooked into 2 small specks only about 11 iches. on the 3rd i had to go to the Crater city of sudbury for some tools at princess auto and sled parts at royal, so fishing was out of the question. the 4th was a work on the sled day and today was another early start with a 5 30 wake up call and drilling holes about 7 30. the bite was on. I had 4 and jeff had 1 by 8 30. while jefff missed a large, (2-3 pounder) in the hole jiggin and another smaller one at the hole on the set line i continued to catch and release, he ended the day with 4 and I had caught eleven, but none the less he managed to catch a PB speckie weighing in at 4lbs. Fair share of snow in the bay, Jan 2nd 2012 My new best friend, Sprocket a 4 month old Black and Tan hound, and yes she already run deer. Jeff with his 4 pounder this is how we decorate christmas trees in the north lol Thanks, Matt.

i save my time and avoid nip, Roy. except for one little spot for about a week is all.

I'll have to flip you a pic of me hand bombing through 30 inches here in north bay come march. not as tough as one may think.

From what i have heard, if you purchased a 2012 fishing license in the year 2011 it was 27.76 if purchased in 2012 the price is 51.77. what a crock of the brown stuff. a heads up on the changes would have been nice, myself and my father included both work for the MNR and didn't even have a heads up on the new system change or the price change, thankfully i was able to purchase a license in 2011 while the system was up and running. even funnier, if a store owner has issues with the system they have an assistance line they can call, heres the funny part, they get to talk to somebody in tennesse. about an ON, fishing license.

when the bite slows down i ften pull my lines and start walking the lake (if its a small trout lake) and make 100 jigs in each hole every 50 yds or so. catch a lot of my trout in the first 10 jigs after drillin a hole.

not the case up here bill. Trax has the potential of catching a 3 lb speckie where hes headed. the splake this time of year can be anywhere from 3' to 30 ' depending on what characteristic they take. speck or laker. but 5-10 fow should be fine for the splake up there this time of year. as for telling the difference make sure to take a good look at the tail. dominant square tail on the speck (also likely has a clipped fin) and the laker has a huge fork tail, most of the splake will have a slight v in the tail and should have all fins as they quit clipping the fins on the splake in the north bay area quite a few years ago. hope this helps.

I'm not one to discrimiate and he does have a nice bass on, but a pink rod? c'mon lol. Happy holidays everyone

That was going to be my suggestion trax. a bunch of good lakes up there with good fishin. i have done quite well for all 4 trout species stocked in those lakes. there are also a few wallie lakes close by. ice should not be an issue up there by boxing day.