Slayingm

My guess would be its the new X-Rap Sub-walk ..... its basically a suspending type fatter guide bait that you can 'walk-the-dog' under water. Its a good lure for big Largies and smallies. I am currently testing out some other newer colours and sizes of those baits along with some other new Rapala and Storm lure design's that we be available in 2009. Some pretty exciting stuff.... especially for those who like to get out for Northern's and Musky. Here is a link for info on the Sub-walk..... http ://www.rapala.com/products/luresdetail...oth&live=1 Regards, Greg.

The weather we have enjoyed the last 3 weeks have really warmed up the water temps in all the Kawartha lakes with surface temps near the low 70's. With this the weed growth has also shot up 3ft in some places resulting in some of the best Walleye fishing action yet. The past few trips clients have been catching anywhere between 10 and as much as 23 Walleye per day. Bucktail jigs ripped on the deep weedlines/points in 7 to 14ft of water have been producing well. Plastic grubs in chartreuse, white, black and smoke have also taken dozens of fish so far this year working the same area's. Although I normally jig for 95% of my Walleye's, I'm sponsored by Normark and they have given me a number of new Rapala and Storm lure colours and design's to try that will be out in 2009 (including new X-Rap sizes and colours). They are also coming out with 2 new high-end rod series ''TS-2" and the Rapala 'R-Type. They also came out with a newly designed 9BB reel and so far my customers have not wanted to put them down.... they are extremely light, sensitive and contain features only found on high end rods.... the good news for us anglers though is they will be priced considerably less. Here is a beauti Kawartha Walleye caught on one of the new Storm Thundercrank's... this blue back/orange belley. The new yellow perch colour has also been awesome of the Walleye so far and have been responsible for boating a few Musky was well. The Musky fishing has also been great with the best action coming along the outside weedlines off some of the bigger flats and also rocky points and humps. Large jerk baits (Perch and Walleye patterns) , inline bucktail spinners and some of the new giant swim baits have all produced well. Here is a pic of a really nice and clean looking Kawartha lakes Musky that nailed one of the new perch coloured jerk baits. Both of these fish were promptly released after a quick photo. Those who wanted to took home a number of smaller Walleye in the 14 to 17" range for a fresh fish fry. Please remember that the reg's have changed for all the Kawartha lakes this year.... Sportsman licence limits have been reduced from 6 to 4 Walleye per day and only 1 fish may be greater then 18". Be safe out there!.... see you on the water.... Greg.

Wendal, Both little and Big Clam lakes have a excellent population of big northerns in the then and every year they cough up fish in the 20 lb range. They are close proximity to eachother so suggest you split the day and fish both the same day.... often when one lake has a slow bit the other is hot. Good Luck..... Greg.

I have been fishing Crappie on the Kawatha's for over 20 years and can tell you they are diffentately cyclical. I have caught them on every kawartha lake and some years they have exploded on certain lakes then stabilized (usually with lower numbers). That said Riceand Tri-lakes have consitantly produced both good numbers and large fish year after year.... sometimes you just have to move around a bit or fish deeper......especially if a cood front moves in. .....Good Fish'n .... Greg.

Interesting question....In all the Guiding Fishing Adventures I have done of the years I get as much as $100+ in tips or as little as Zero!... I always go out of my way to exceed my customers expectations and 990% of the time get tipped but never do I expect it. I think it comes down to the client experience in terms of what they learned.. how may fish they caught.. how they were treated etc. .... Greg.

Good job ecmilley..... I was fishing the Can/US Walleye tourny both days (was our 20th year fishing it) and was one of the slowest. We got our tourny limit both days and I nailed a 27" skinny spawned out female that took 'Big Fish' Award for the overall 2 days. We finished up 2nd place overall. We got lots of fish working the deep w/l points and also took some on some rock shelves in 30'. Here is a pic of the Walleye..... Greg.

With the Walleye opener out of the way I was finally able to get up to my cabin in the Haliburton's and fish a couple of Rainbow lakes. Unlike racing around the lake in the Stratos bassboat I look forward to the tranquillity and beauty that 100's of the small trout lakes in this area offers. I took up my 14ft square stern SportsPal with electric trolling motor which is ideal for these lakes and is 'stealth' quiet so you don't spook the fish. The weather was not exactly great as it was cool and rained for 1/2 the day but I was warm and prepared for anything. With the water temps still very cold and the fronts that were moving through the past couple of days I figured the fishing would be tough... and it was. We actually hit 2 different lakes the same day and went 1 for 3 (Big fish for this lake) on the first lake and 3 for 5 on the second lake. The fish were just not active and most of the hits were a lite 'bump' from behind the lure while trolling. In a couple of cases we actually had the missed fish on for a few cranks of the reel before they came off and the ones boated were all hooked in the top corner of the mouth.... but just!. All fish were caught trolling expect for 1 that hit a #1 Blue Fox in-line spinner. The other lures that worked were a very small gang-troll and fly and a small kwik-fish. I found that most of the fish I marked on the electronics were suspending in 7 to 15' over 25 to 40' of water. Here is a pic of a 4lb beauti that is the biggest I have taken yet in the one small lake. Be safe and Good Fish'n.... Greg.

This has been one of the best last ice conditions and success I have seen the past number of years. Ice conditions were some of the best of the season when the season officially closed on Simcoe and other parts of the province on March 15th but the action remained strong for open species right through. I was out on Simcoe the last day of the season and like a number of folk experienced some awesome action. In fact we hit so many Whitefish we had a number of double headers and a triple header and limits came quick. Here is one pic of some of the fish taken on the 15th...... Also, the ice remained excellent for perch action right until the 1st week of April. Although I found the fish really scattered we were still able to have some great days catching a number of fish in the 10-13" range.... attached is a pic of a typical late season Jumbo... the interesting thing of this year is that these fish came deep (35-50') rather then the 20-30 ft I would normally fish at last ice. My last ice fishing trip this year was on Sat where I had a couple of guests out on a Haliburton lake. In approx. 4 hrs we iced 4 really nice lakers and had 5th one break us off that was just screaming the drag off until the line broke. Was a real treat to be on the ice in April and will cetainly make the spring season short before getting the bassboat back out on the water. I trust all of you enjoyed this past winter and had a safe fun time out on the ice. PS I attached one last shot of a early March trip on Simcoe.... the pic was taken with a special effects and looked really cool so though I would share....although the fishing was slow that day we did eventually get our limit of whitefish and one nice 5.5lb laker before heading in. Best of luck to all this coming summer.... Greg.

This has been one of the best last ice conditions and success I have seen the past number of years. Ice conditions were some of the best of the season when the season officially closed on Simcoe and other parts of the province on March 15th but the action remained strong for open species right through. I was out on Simcoe the last day of the season and like a number of folk experienced some awesome action. In fact we hit so many Whitefish we had a number of double headers and a triple header and limits came quick. Here is one pic of some of the fish taken on the 15th...... Also, the ice remained excellent for perch action right until the 1st week of April. Although I found the fish really scattered we were still able to have some great days catching a number of fish in the 10-13" range.... attached is a pic of a typical late season Jumbo... the interesting thing of this year is that these fish came deep (35-50') rather then the 20-30 ft I would normally fish at last ice. My last ice fishing trip this year was on Sat where I had a couple of guests out on a Haliburton lake. In approx. 4 hrs we iced 4 really nice lakers and had 5th one break us off that was just screaming the drag off until the line broke. Was a real treat to be on the ice in April and will cetainly make the spring season short before getting the bassboat back out on the water. I trust all of you enjoyed this past winter and had a safe fun time out on the ice. PS I attached one last shot of a early March trip on Simcoe.... the pic was taken with a special effects and looked really cool so though I would share....although the fishing was slow that day we did eventually get our limit of whitefish and one nice 5.5lb laker before heading in. Best of luck to all this coming summer.... Greg.

Nater and Jat... sorry the delayed reply but have been out on Simcoe nailing some nice Whities and Lakers the past few days and not been on the PC..... Yes that was one of the new Blue Fox Foxee Minnows (Humpback) jigs. That was one of two different colours I designed for them that they put into production.... the small size really nails the Jumbo Perch too!.....Greg.

Was out on Simcoe this past w/e working some of my GPS laker/Whitefish spots and got a real surprize..... my new PB Walleye estimated at 15lb or more. My previous best was a 13.5lb fish taken from Quinte and few years back and it was definately dwarfed by this gut busting eye laiden female Walleye. 3 other anglers came over to see the fish and figured it was at least 15lbs of more as they have taken a 12lb fish before and said it was so much smaller then this one. I released her after a couple of quick pics and still can't believe I was able to pull her out of the hole!! I was working the bottom slowly with a jig in approx. 50ft of water. Take care and good luck out there..... Greg.

ccmtcanada: Yes it truly was a amazing and long fight.. the longest I have experienced by anyone on the ice. Just goes to show you that ice you use premium quality line and equipment you can land big fish if you take your time and don't force them! Oldphart: Good luck on the w/e!.... hope to see you on the ice one day before Mar 31st. Hearingfish: How are you Stan? You are correct ... that is my daughter's fish, as I mentioned in a previous post unfortunately pictures can certainly be deceiving at times and often don't do a fish justice. That said when it bottomed out my 15lb Normark scale the quick length and girth measurements I took calculated the fishes weight over 21.5lbs using the old trout/Salmon formula of 'Length x Girth x Girth / 800. The fish was approx. 44.25" and had a girth just under 20" . In contrast here is a pic of a big laker I caught last Feb 2nd in a different Haliburton Lake (My own PB on the ice).... it weighted 17lbs and yet its hard to see a 5lb difference between them. The larger one was much thicker across the back then this one.... something you really can't' see in the pic. That said I am a tall guy at over 6' 2" tall that may help to but things into some perspective. http://profishntanglingservices.com/MyPict...ker2-2-07-5.jpg Glad to see the colder weather the past couple of days.... will certainly make things safer out there. Good luck all and see ya on the ice.... Greg.

I was finally able to get both my son and daughter out for ice fishing trip while skiing and staying up at our cabin in Haliburton for a couple of days. Since Simcoe's main lake is slow to freeze again this year I have had to make a few trips that way to get into some Lake Trout. Even though we only fished for approx. 4 hours the action was pretty steady. Both kids each caught a couple of nice fish but the biggest surprize was the one my daughter caught. It was the biggest laker I have ever seen and took 30 mins to get the fish in (Ultra light with 4lb line and minnow) .....I still don't know how we got it out of the hole! Attached is a pic of me holding the fish and a couple of others ....one of my son fighting a nice laker and his prize fish of the day. That one was 1 of 3 fish we got on spoons. We got our fish in 37 to 62' using 1/4oz hammered Blue Fox flash spoons and little cleo's in Blue/Silver and white and others just on minnows. Watching the screen on the X-67 Ice Machine you could see the fish move in on the jig and nail it! My son got quite the hoot out of that.... I recall him yelling out 'come on'!... hit it .. hit it!... while jiggling and lifting his spoon ... followed by a gotem!! All the fish we got were released that day...... unlike the previous couple of trips where some of them made it onto the Bradley Smoker......mummmm....yummy. Take care and be safe out there.... Greg.

Roy... although we marked fish a few feet up from the bottom only the ones on the bottom would bite for us that day. Like Mark K. mentioned in one of his posts a slow presentation was key. We got most of our fish that way put I also triggered a couple by popping a tube then letting the line go slack so it would settle back on bottom. ccmtcanada... you got that right.... I warmed right up after I boated my first fish.... a 21" 5.5lb fish... G.

Hey Brian.... great pics and wtg in braving the cold windy day!... burrrrrr. Look at the bright side... If this the weather holds we will be out on the hardwater for some great action!

Hey Mark, Great pics and fish for sure.... .unfortunately I was in the office all day Take care pal and see you at the shows..... G.

Although my boat has been away for a month now I managed to get out with a buddy of mine on Sat. for couple of hrs to freeze our butts off and try to find some last season smallies. After not being able to launch at our 1st 2 spots (iced right up!) we finally got out at Virgina with the ferry breaking the ice there. My managed to tag a number of big fish all in the 5 - 6lb range fishing 37 to 45' with tubes and hair jigs.... here is pic of a couple typical fish we were getting.....the latest I have been on Simcoe in a boat and what a blast! Take care and good Fish'n...... Greg.

Minnow, As the lake turns over look for SM to migrate to the deeper secondary drops in the main lake. Dragging heavy tubes, drop shotting and jigg'n spoons will all work. Stick to Simcoe if your looking for a true trophy and work depths in the 25 to 40' range..... Good Luck... Greg.

Hey Mark, good to see and chat with you again.... was a fun day out there for sure. Like you we took most of our fish deep on a combination of drop shotting and jigging various spoons. Here is a pic of your's truly with a couple from the winning bucket of 15. I 2nd your and ID's comments on the event.... the 'Rock' and Don did a great job (as usual) in organizing and hosting the event.... looking forward to getting back out there again next year....Greg.

Wow... after fishing this World-class body of water for the past 30yrs it still amazes me year after year. After winning the 2-day Fall Challenge Bass tournament on Couch a couple of weeks ago I was back out guiding on Simcoe last week and took another smallie over 6lbs.... this one came in at 6lbs 6oz on the Normark scale and was my 5th simcoe SM between 6 and 7lbs this year. My Personal best on the lake came last year during day 3 of the New Ark Open out of Barrie when I weighted in a 7.23lb SM.... I think the fish in this lake just keep on getting bigger and honestly believe a new Ontario record is in the making out there. Also hit a couple of my Cook's bay fall LM spots a couple of days ago and one of then was loaded. Most of the fish were taken on tubes in 18 to 25' of water.... here is a pic on one of the typical 4lb fish we were catching... man they are clean and pretty out there.... not a mark on them. Can't wait for the BPS Open on Oct 27th.... should be fun trying to break that 30lb (6lb average for 5 SM) on the lake. With the colder temps and lake turnover the upcoming weeks should provide some of the best big fish action of the year.... don't miss out on it... get out there and enjoy!! Good luck out there and remember to be safe...... Greg.

Thanks all.... appreciate it. Brian, yes I'm fishing the BPS Open Oct 27th... should be fun going for a 6lb average and breaking the 30lb mark..... good luck to you and see you out there. Johnnybass:...ya still lots of Pike out there.... had a few others follow that I was able to pull the bait away from before they hit....try working some spinnerbaits and jerkbaits for then off the deeper edges of the weedlines and hang on!!!!.....Greg.

First off I want to thank Brian for the excellent report and moreover congrats to him and Ryan on finishing in the top 1/2 of the pack under some extremely tough fishing conditions.... the smiles says it all...WTG!! A big congrats also to Mark Kulik for his strong 6th place finish. Mark is one of the most consistent anglers in the pro circuits and always seems to be in the money regardless of the different lakes and fishing conditions. Since Brian already detailed the weather conditions over the 2-days I don't have to mention the extremes we fished in. I would also like to appologize for the lack of reports recently but have just not had time and can barely keep ontop of e-mails.... I have been extremely busy guiding averaging about 5 days on the water per week the past 2-3 months... when I get some cycles I will post a couple of reports along with some awesome pics. I was fortunate going into the event in that George and I were able to get 4 solid days of prefishing in and on 2 of those days we both brought our boats up. That allowed us to cover a ton of water and presentations and refine patterns and spots holding better then average sized fish. Also, because I have learned over the years not to right off a good looking spot just because we did'nt get bit the first time we hit it.... I will always go back at a different time of the day and hit it a 2nd or 3rd time. Case in point I remember winning a event of Simcoe a couple years ago and when hitting one of my key spots twice in the morning without a bite we tryed it one last time after lunch and it was loaded with 4-5lb smallies.... timing is everything! The other tip I will offer is that when you are onto fish 1st thing in the morning when the bite is best... fish fast and hard. This was really key for us as both days we had our limit with 15lbs in the box by 7:45am (7:00 am was the blast off). Things really slowed down after that and so did our presentations. We also narrowed down our spots to 5 keys locations that we worked over the 2-days and did not waste anytime other then racing to the next spot and fishing right away. Our top day one weight of 18.48lbs was all taken on a combination of drop-shots, dragging and popping tube jigs and working various hard-bodied jerkbaits. Winning the Performance bonus bucks for the top day 1 weight we joked heading home it would be really cool if we could do it again tommorrow as it was a special day for me. Day 2 we dropped 2 of our spots working only 3 hard all day. With the winds down it was so much easier to cast with precision and thoroughly work the area's. We only got about 9 bites all day but they were all quality fish with our smallest (3.2lb LM) being culled out at the end of the day with a 3.5lb Smallie. Our 5 fish limit of SM came in on the scales at 18.36lbs just ounzes behind yesterday's weight giving us a decisive win and the best Birthday gift I could have asked for! Other notes.... we did not loose any big fish over the w/e... we caught 9 northerns over the 2 days including a 14 and 12lb fish and I also got a 6.5lb Walleye on the previous Tues! Couch has some nice Pike in it... here is a pic of a client holding one up the week before.... I break a smile when our day 2 weight hits the scales: A couple of the typical 3.75lb fish we had... all clones. Take care guys and good fish'n....Greg.

Thanks for the kind words Johnny Bass..... I have actually been asked by a couple of magazines to consider writing for them and hope to get a couple of articles out this fall/winter. Young One: Congrats on your 5.3lb Simcoe SM.... thats a great fish for sure. Keep doing whatever your doing and you will break that 6lb mark soon!....Good luck!...Greg.

Sorry for the delay since my last update but I have been averaging 6 days/week on the water and double booked some days so have just not had spare time at all. The past few weeks I have had the opportunity to fish various Kawartha lakes and Simcoe a number of times and wanted to share some productive patterns and pics with you. As I mentioned in my last update this year has been some of the best Walleye fishing I have seen in the Kawartha Lakes over the past 20 years or more. More big fish caught this year and still seeing lots of different year-class sizes of fish caught. As the water continued to get really warm over the past few weeks the week growth has really taken off with well defined deep weedlines established. Although we have taken a few fish with jerkbaits and crankbaits 95% of the fish are being caught using jigs. 1/4 oz jig heads in white/yellow/black/orange and chartreuse with various 3 and 4" twisters and 4" finesse minnow's (eg: Lunker City's finesse fish) have produced 100's of Walleye. With the water temps so warm now ripping 3/8 oz. bucktail jigs along the deep weedlines has also been extremely effective... especially in triggering fish to bite during mid day when they are inactive. Weedlines in the 10-15' range has been the best for me. Weed/sand or Weed/rock area's are key locations as are inside turns or points along the weedline. Another pattern that has taken some big fish has been dragging jigs slowly over some of the deeper rock humps/points in the lakes. Here is a nice fish I caught using a Storm swim shad and pic of client's with a nice fish taken using a bucktail jig for the 1st time: On the opening weekend of bass season I tryed to repeat our win last year of over 26.5lbs for 5 smallies but found the fishing tougher this year. We still did OK picking up a paycheque with 22.40lbs (1.8lbs behind the winner). We had to work different area's this year and found the fish shallower then last with most of our bigger fish coming in the 4 to 7' range. In-line spinners, jerkbaits and tube jigs all produced fish. Here is a pic of a couple of nice ones I'm holding up on stage: Since that time the fish have started to move into deeper water relating to near-shore humps and rock breaklines in the 10-16' ranges. Some of the smallmouth we have been catching are huge with a number over 5lbs including 3 fish over 6lbs!! Here are a couple of samples with some happy folks: This little guy helped his dad reel in this 5.5lb pig.... Here is one of the fish that just broke the 6lb mark that I took working a jerkbait over a large rock flat: This guest has fished tournaments in the US but has never seen a smallmouth over 4lbs in his life.... well.... his son caught 3 over 4lbs dragging tubes behind the boat the Dad nailed this 6lb monster on a tube working the tip of deep point.... was really windy that day...you can see the drift sock on the lower-left to slow us down as the fish were holding on a small spot on the point....talk about excited..these guys just could not believe their eyes and must have taken a 100 pics to show the boys back home. All of these bass above were released in the same area they were caught after a quick picture. White/chartreuse spinnerbaits, tube jigs in light shad/smelt colours and darker shades of green have been working well as have various 4 and 5" jerkbaits like the X-Raps and Husky Jerk's. If you planning a trip out on lake Simcoe make sure you check the weather conditions before heading out. The lake can really blow up and get extremely rough within minutes.... remember to be safe out there and good luck!....Greg.

Ecmilley: Trust you got into them on Sturgeon and had a great day.... I was on Tri-lakes and did very with some other big fish in the 2 to 5lb class..... I'm sure we will run into each other out there one day... if you see a 19' blue Stratos with a 175HP Evinrude on it slide over and say hi!... Kennyman: Sharing fishing information with others is what its all about.... enjoy doing it... after all its my business! Fishindevil: Your right.... releasing those 'Prime' spawning females is a absolute must!.... the Kawartha's need all the help they can get! Smokey: Agree with ya 100%.... reduced limits and only 1 fish over 18" would be a good thing. The slot size and reduced limits certainly turned Balsam lake around the past few years. Take care and Good Fish'n all.....Greg.