porkpie

I’m done with goretex. I wear the Helly Hansen rubber suit now. The new ones are even a bit stretchy. I stay mostly dry unless water runs in somewhere (sleeve) etc. The way I look at it, if it’s wet enough for me to wear a rain suit, it’s generally cool enough to wear the rubber suit. When it’s crap out I’m usually wearing base layers, my under armour cold gear stuff and the rubber suit just seals in the flavour. Your mileage may vary.

I typed a big response and it seems to have disappeared. stormy launch is pretty good but I’ve only ever launched a 16 footer there. You can generally get a dock unless it’s super busy weekend. I believe bass, pike and walleye open same weekend in May now. Double check though because I’ve been fishing opening in the kawarthas for 30 years so I never make zone 11 until a couple weeks later. The bass thing is only a season or 2 old I believe. Plenty of smallmouth, particularly on Nip. Read zone exceptions, I haven’t been on stormy for quite some years. yes it will be buggy then. Restoule is an awesome park, we’ve really enjoyed our camping there. It would be shortlist if I where to take up camping again. I’ve camped there end of June during the week and it was reasonably quiet. Weekends will be busy like all the provincial parks! Nippissing is close with excellent fishing and is worth a day trip. Launch at the end of Lansdowne in Callander you’ll probably be able to get a big bass boat in. No problem with 18 foot deep V’s. If not, premier st launch in north bay can be a bit dicey for bigger boats depending on water level. But the marina has an excellent launch.

I have also been wearing a Striker suit for the last 5 years. I'm very happy with it, and I use it for spring salmon trolling, pickerel jigging and any late fall fishing also. Very flexible suit with good buoyancy. Don't forget your ice picks as well. They are expensive but at this point I'm not putting a price on my life.

Yep. I’d buy the refillables in a heartbeat if they where readily available. All I can find on Amazon is the little 1/4lb torch bottle. Next time I’m fishing down in the US I’ll have to check out the depot.

Oh there is a way to vent 1LB cans when refilling, it’s just sketchy @F

Good grief… no I hadn’t heard that. Life has gone weird. I don’t envy the poor b@$stard that has to enforce that.

If I need to be rescued I expect to be rescued. If I’m getting a bill, I want everyone who drives in a blizzard, smacks into a tree skiing, required an open water rescue during boating season, slips on a banana peel, or gets lost in the woods to foot the bill for their rescue. Life isn’t bubble wrapped and crap happens. And it happens in many different pursuits of happiness and it often puts emergency services in harms way. It’s certainly not restricted to ice fishermen.

Bummer about the camera. Nice pics!

Scratched my itch yesterday. Ice was wet but still decent. Here’s hoping for a flash freeze and it will be great out there! Perch tacos for lunch today!

Last battery I bought was around $200. At the time a lithium was $500-800 a piece. I agree you can probably get some AGM’s and lithiums close in price now. And I’ll definetly look at them next time. My new boat is a 2019, and the old owner was meticulous and replaced all batteries last spring. It’ll be a couple of years before I’m looking for batteries and no doubt the pricing will be comparable.

I’ve been to a couple of house fires that burnt to the ground as a result of charging batteries in the garage. None of them where lithium at the time. Any battery or charger left on constant charge has the capacity for catastrophic failure. I have used lithium for years. One of my kids and I flew model planes for a few years and we charged lithium’s for 100’s of cycles . I even charged crashed batteries that had puffed packs outside while keeping an eye on them. Never had one light up. Millions of cell phones, iPads and other lithium powered devices are charged daily across the country with no negative results. Every so often one sparks up and we get to lithium is bad. I just don’t see that as being the case. I’m sticking with lead acids or AGM’s at this point because of price and because I can still heft them. When the difference price is negligible I’ll go lithium!

Hi Cliff, Here is a link to a zoomable copy of the FMZ legal boundaries if you have not already found it. https://files.ontario.ca/mnrf-en-2_0/Fisheries-Management-Zone-10-BB13.pdf

For sure nature is cruel. It always amazes me how many people think wildlife die of old age. Mainly killed and eaten in the most unpleasant fashion imaginable by some toothy critter, or freeze to death or starve. I don’t begrudge coyotes their living, but I do thin them out a bit when I start to see them too frequently, when they become too bold, or when farmer friends complain about livestock harassment or loss!

Nothing that 50 grains from the triple deuce can't solve. You've reminded me to dust off my winter whites. I had more than I care to see on the cams this fall. If no one else does, the deer will thank me!

Precision trolling is an art. Sometimes the trolling motor is the best option, sometimes bags, sometimes a bucket. Sometimes your reverse gear. On the Great Lakes usually the best option is the main guided by the TM. Sustained speed for multiple hours at 2mph or over is best achieved with the main or kicker. Anything under that is TM country. Depends what and where you are fishing, also depends on wind and wave conditions. I troll almost exclusively on my bow mount on Nippissing for pickerel, 90 percent of my fish are caught under 1.5mph. On Erie I use the main and the bowmount. as autopilot and to fine tune speed. 90 percent of my Erie fish are caught at 2.7-3.2mph. On Nipp, I’m working bottom, on Erie mainly suspended. OP, it seems you’ve got a bigger boat now. I’d definitely budget for a kicker on an 18. You’ll find a world of difference if your intent is to spend a lot of time trolling. When I stepped down to a big 16 last year, first thing I did was slap a 6hp kicker on it as the vast majority of my fishing is trolling. Worth every penny!

On certain lakes for certain species of fish with particular feeding habits the camera can be very useful. Especially if you’re looking for your target species main food sources favoured habitat. My sonar won’t be that specific, and I’m too cheap to spring for live scope.

I had one, as others have mentioned, I would put it down just to find rocks and gobies. I find them to be more of a nuisance than anything and I sold mine last winter.

Yeah, they work good. I have 2 of em on my big boat, but I find depending on the size of your boat, the bucket is easier and cheaper. They don't store quite as well though.

How's 2 hours and 15 minutes from Barrie. Nanmark's Lighthouse resort will hopefully have some day huts out starting next week on Callander bay. Fishing has traditionally been pretty good the first few weeks of the season. Give Ryan a call and see if he has availability 1-877-220-7358. I can't guarantee how the fishing will be, but you won't find a better operator!

Yes it will work if that’s what you have to work with. On my tinner, I just toss a pail on a rope over the side at the bow of the boat to slow me down. Pail works good for putting my stringer of fish in between spots as well because tinner doesn’t have a livewell.

I believe it’s a Salvage!

Stew tomorrow! Haven’t seen a Jack in a long time back at home. I used to hunt over in King township as a kid for jack rabbit and pheasant. Still hunt deer there, plenty of those around. No jackrabbits, definitely no pheasants! Good deal on the cam!

I have 3 Campark minis on the trails at our family camp. I really like them and have been overall pretty impressed. I love the small profile and they hide well. This is a bonus for finding out which neighbour likes to trespass LOL. The one issue I have is that I find the batteries don’t last as long as it’s only a 4 AA camera but otherwise your right they are awesome little cameras. I did have one crap the bed just recently but it’s one of my ones down south on some farm property and it’s been running hard year round for almost 4 seasons so what do you want for a $40 camera! Are these the same ones your using? I pulled them in last night for new batteries, pull cards and put them in new spots today. The rabbits are in trouble… my kids are loading the .22s as I post this. Poor buggers are all white and no snow in the bush….

I’ve been very happy with the Tactacam reveal. Not so happy with Spypoint, although I have had a couple of spypoint cell links that did way better than expected! That said, I have one tactacam out of 4 that has been eating batteries lately, so I’m not sure what that’s all about. Could be I ran into a bad box of Costco cells? I’ve never used them before , but I’ve heard very positive reviews about the bushnell cellular cameras. If your already happy with the products, it might be something to look into? What I’ve heard the most positives about is Tactacam and bushnell. My experience with Tactacam has been mostly all good. My experience with spypoint has been varied and I hear a lot of negative chatter and have a couple buddies that have run into some troubles with them as well. I think it’s a bit of a crapshoot.

Lots of fun pulling cards! To be honest most of my cameras are cell now, so instant gratification lol. But I still have a few up at the family camp that are just card cams and I always love seeing what turns up! Really like getting the lynx on cam! I still have a couple cams turning in some pics, but they are sporadic at the moment. I’m suffering from dead batteries and technical difficulties at the moment I think. I’m gong to have to go out soon to do a battery run and trouble shooting! Keep the pics coming when you can!