adolson

Nice! I'd like to catch a largemouth some day. Don't think there are any close by.

I wasn't asking which sizes taste best, I was asking because I wanted to know which ones should go back for the good of the ecosystem... Asking because I don't know... Will never know if I don't ask. The pike I mentioned that tasted like mud has no bearing on why I was asking, I was just mentioning it. Other pike of the exact same size out of the exact same lake tasted fine.

Well, don't get me wrong - I like pike enough to want to get good at cleaning them (the fact that they're plentiful and easiest to catch, it seems, helps that along). But the last one I ate must've been diseased or something because it tasted like complete garbage (unlike others I took from the same lake). But it doesn't stand up to smallmouth bass and walleye, at least according to my taste buds.. And the texture is quite different, I find. Not my favorite, but I haven't tried any fish I hate yet. You will (hopefully) love brook trout. It's a lot different than the other three I just mentioned (I think closer to salmon), but really good. If you need a good and simple recipe, Musky or Specks' way tastes great: coat in flour, dip in egg, roll in breadcrumbs, fry in fat (he suggests lard, I use coconut oil).

I think Roy's right. It's pretty much all been said. Now we're just repeating each other.

Yeah, when I got my second rod and reel on my birthday, my wife was like "so you can sell your other one now?" and I was like, uh, no...

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on the pike vs walleye. lol

This seems like one small light in a mess of darkness: http://news.ontario.ca/ene/en/2011/09/statement-from-minister-of-the-environment-john-wilkinson-regarding-highland-companies-proposed-quar.html (may have been posted in the previous thread on the subject..)

I'll hit Nip sometime, for sure, Rod Caster. But it's an awful long drive if I just want a handful of perch for a meal on some random day. I don't know why you don't like bass, I love it. Usually it's hard to tell a difference between it and walleye (for me anyhow), and I love the fight. But hey, more for me! Musky or Specks, I've seen that second video. I laugh every time the guy says he likes pike more than pickerel (I assume he means walleye, and not actual pickerel). Something is wrong with his taste buds, haha. Anyhow, I think the part I was forgetting was that slice he took off the tail pieces.. I bet ya. Maybe I'll try it again if I'm in the mood. There are so many pike around here, and they seem the easiest to catch (unless you're actually trying to catch one). The size in the first video looked like about the same as my 22" catches, so I think I'm on the right track there. I was really mostly wondering about the trouts though, because there are several put and take lakes around me, and I'm hoping to catch more of them. I guess it doesn't really matter too much for those, though.

Musky or Specks, I've never seen or caught a ling.. I've heard whitefish is great. I've only caught one in my life and it was full of worms, so I've yet to taste one, but I want to! I may try ice fishing for them at Bay Lake this winter, since it's easy to access by car and it's big (part of the Montreal River system). I'll need ice gear.. When you say dink pike, how big are you talking? Tiny guys like this? As a kid, we always head/gutted pike (bigger ones) but then you gotta dance around the bones. After having that one stuck in my throat for a day or two, I swore off eating pike. And then I changed my mind and tried again after that and did not enjoy it, and still missed some bones. I tried a few different ways of cleaning them and have yet to find one that I can actually do properly. There's always at least one surprise bone, even if I thought I got them all. I never kept a small pike, before. I mean, 22" isn't big, but it's not tiny like this one. Thanks Sinclair. Walleye slot here starts at 43cm, or 16.9" so that cuts down that range quite a bit for me. (Upper limit of the slot is 60cm, 23.6"). I have to find a good place to catch perch near me. I know there is somewhere because a few years back, an old friend's brother had a bunch and fed us an awesome lunch.

That's kinda like buying Hooked on Phonics, how are you supposed to read the instructions to get started!?

No way, he needs to trade for my Sportspal, it is portage-friendly! The oars screw into the crossbar forming a yoke... Plus it's 2 feet shorter and probably 10lbs lighter... Actually, I couldn't part with it, as much as I want a bigger Sportspal... Been in the family since '68. I guess it goes to the highest bidder? $50 from me.

Nice work, and nice fish! Looks like you guys had a great time.

I love catching fish, and I love eating fish almost as much. I would like to know what sizes are best to keep for each species, so that way I don't keep fish that should go back to swim another day. If it's too small or too big, it should go back, but what I'm not clear on are the actual size ranges for most species. I know it's tough to say exactly as some fish will have a much larger girth, etc, so I'm just really looking for ballpark figures. And also, any other helpful tips, such as how to tell if a fish might be carrying eggs, or anything else I didn't think of? For bass, I've read that it's best to keep fish only between 1 and 2lbs, and since I don't use a scale I've determined the length measurements are approximately between 13" and 16.5" or so. Over the summer I've caught many bass and got reasonably good at determining when one was a good candidate to keep, it's almost second nature now. However, the other species which I'm less familiar with, but most curious about best eating size ranges, are: perch, walleye, lake trout, rainbow trout, brook trout, splake, and pike (I probably won't keep any pike, but still curious). I know that some lakes are strictly put and take for the various trouts, so it probably doesn't matter as much for those lakes. Even so, the first brook trout I caught on Sunday was 8.5" and too small to keep, just looking at it I could tell.. But it's not always so easy. I usually catch very few fish (my total for the entire year is just over 100, whereas some of you catch that many in a night or two). I have only taken my limit twice, both times were my walleye trips with Rod Caster. I have no problem throwing fish back most of the time, but sometimes I'd like to take some home to eat. I thought this thread might be handy for myself as well as others who aren't as knowledgeable, but would like to improve their selections on keeping fish. For example, I kept a rather large bass that I should have let go, but I didn't know it at the time. Only after reading about it here did I realize it probably should have gone back, and I felt bad.

Welcome! I'm guessing you saw Terry's avatar and it made you sign up?

My Spirex has this feature, and the only way it'll make a full backwards rotation when setting the hook is if I let go of the arm. So, hold on, and you'll be fine. I'd like it if they made a reel with constant anti-reverse as well as quick fire. I understand the logic of having the one set stop, but it'd be easy enough to just stop reeling in when the trigger lines up. But I had to choose, so I went with faster and easier casting.

The perch in my avatar may or may not be the biggest one I ever caught, ergo, it is a monster. TO ME.

Yeah, I was wondering if the gender made the difference in color.. It was so beautiful, I could hardly believe it... The picture didn't turn out great - in real life, it was brighter and more saturated. I have an actual anchor, as well as rocks up front, but I didn't use it... I just have a hard time choosing one spot for very long, a sort of fishing ADD, so maybe I should start forcing myself to drop anchor sometimes. I was trying to troll when the worst of it was going on, haha. Can't keep the thing straight if my life depended on it. The bucket you mentioned, I might try that sometime! Thanks for all the comments, everyone.

Excellent question. My biggest regret was not buying more worms before I left. I only had a few in my fridge, and I didn't know how many I had. I opened the lid and I saw them, looked like a lot. It wasn't. I ran out. I did stick with the bobber and hook until I had no more worms left.

That's true! And you can keep more than one! Maybe I'll just give up on auroras anyhow, and go after brookies in the stocked lakes... There is a stocked rainbow lake and a stocked splake lake near me... Might have to slam those until something bites instead of spending all that time on auroras.

Take them all with you and rig each one up differently, then you can instantly change lures, or you can just have them identical if you're using live bait. Handy if you snag and break off or whatever. I said I'd do this with my Ugly Stik, but I don't. The only thing I'll use that for now is if somehow I lose my Voltaeus in the lake... Then I'll troll over the spot with the Ugly Stik until I hook my good rod. Haha

Yep. I can tell they're good because if you look closely, the two reels say "Shimano." /fanboy

OK, so I wanted to go to Liberty Lake this weekend and try for an aurora for the fifth time, but nobody could make it and I figured it'd be better chances to have two lines in than one. So, I planned to go after brook trout on Saturday morning. So I wake up, and get ready to go, and long story short, I angrily stay home to work on my bathroom renovations. After many hours and a sore back, I finished putting up the walls of the new tub surround, and I figured that was good enough for the day and headed out for the afternoon for a quick fish by myself. This is the second time I've taken my canoe out by myself, Rod Caster style with rocks up front for company... I went to a lake that is very close to my place, about 5-10 minutes away at the most. I have seen people fishing off the shore there, and I have tried myself but only ended up with a tiny perch and a tiny rock bass for my efforts. Aside from that, the lake is supposed to have pike and that's about it. I trolled around and then I came upon a place that looked very much like a haven for smallies, so I figured it was worth a shot. I put on a tube jig, and bam, first cast I pulled in an 11" smallmouth bass! I was super happy, because I didn't think there were bass in this lake. I made some more casts as I worked my way along the shore, and I got a 1lber or so (15"), and took it home for dinner. The rest of the night I caught nothing, even though at least a hundred fish jumped in the lake right near the boat. I tried different spoons and lures and nothing... I don't know what these fish are, but it's crazy. I could see them from the road a few days before, just going to town, so that's what prompted me to try my hand in the lake in the first place. I didn't take my camera with me, so the only pic is of this one, and the background you get is my kitchen sink: Several other people were fishing off the shore when I was out there, and I packed it in and went home with no further luck. I did have some more bites through the trip, but no hooks. The sun set. I called it a night. Sunday morning I spent finishing off the bathroom, caulking the seams on the tub surround. It's done! We can finally stop bathing at other peoples' houses and/or in our sink. I put this off for far too long, but that's me, procrastinator extraordinaire. I also put off brook trout fishing for far too long, and so, off I went, again by myself. It was windy, but not cold today. The canoe was blowing ALL over the freaking lake. It was frustrating because my canoe does not have any keel, and so the slightest wind blowing or current will push me all over and turn me, etc. I wish I could just slap one on with krazy glue or something. Anyhow, I first tried some trolling, and then some casting, no luck. Then I started seeing them jump, and so I went to one end of the lake where the wind didn't seem to hit the water as much, and I did a few casts with a 2/5oz silver/blue Little Cleo with the treble replaced by a Kamakazi #4 single (smallest I have) and a piece of worm. A few casts in, and I had a bite! I failed to hook it, but that was a good sign - it means there's actually fish in there. I troll around a bit, try different things like Panther Martin spinners and even tried a kernel of corn on a hook, but could not get them to bite. The wind was blowing my canoe into the exposed portions of downed trees, and I thought, "yeah, great, that's not gonna spook them at all..." I started thinking to myself that I was gonna do one more round and then pack it in, and literally as I resigned to leaving, I hook into one! But then it was off... No wait, it's still on! I reel it up and wow, my first brook trout of the year. I only have vague memories of catching any trout in the past at all as a kid, so this was almost as good as my first time. It was beautiful. I wet my hand and took out the hook and snapped a quick pic, admiring it. I did measure it real quick with the Rod Rule, and it was about 8.5". This lake is stocked (also it's open year-round), but I don't know how big they should be for you to keep them and eat them. It seemed too small to me, though, so back he went. As I watched it swim away, I was fueled for another few hours of fishing the little lake. I didn't know it, but my SD card was crapping out on me. That's why there's a gray bar along the bottom there. This pic was nearly lost!! At this point, I want to thank all of you who took any time to offer me advice for brook trout fishing. I'd also like to call out Musky or Specks, as he really helped fan the flames of my interest via PM for the past number of weeks, and he is the one who put me onto this lake in the first place. Thanks to all of you, again! I go back up to the calmer end of the lake, and I cast a bit between gusts of wind. At one point I saw a fish attacking the lure, but it wasn't taking it. Then it spotted me I guess, and it took off. I did a bit more casting anyhow, and I hook into another one, and this time I land it and it was a bit bigger, and freaking gorgeous! What a pretty fish... Same setup for this one, Little Cleo. I'm super pumped now, but time ticks on and nothing bites so I change lures, and nothing works. I had a couple bites here and there, but nothing. Then, a vehicle (second one of the entire day to pass the lake) pulls up, two people and two dogs get out. I hear them calling my name, so I motor over to them and chat a while. It was my friends, Dan and his wife Rachel! They were out to hunt and/or fish, and they recognized my car parked at this particular lake. Crazy. They left and wished me luck. The luck panned out, because shortly after, the wind stopped for the rest of the afternoon/evening. It was peaceful. A huge tree fell down near the lake. A bear or moose or something else fairly big was lurking near my car at one point, but I could only hear it. A beaver slapped his tail on the water. Two beautiful fish, and a beautiful night. I wasn't done. They were jumping all around me. Not crazy like at the lake from Saturday, but often enough, as if to say, "Dana, don't leave yet! You can get me if you try!" Some of them seemed big, too. Others were small. I did some more casting and had nothing, so in desperation I put on a good ol' red/white bobber, tiny Eagle Claw hook and worm and a split shot. Tossed it out near a tree. Less than a minute in, I hook into a fish, but I lose it. I did see it at the surface, though! But it doesn't count. As I was losing this one, another jumped to my left. I made my next cast near it. Within ten seconds, bobber bobs, I set the hook and land the fish! Not quite as brilliant as the second fish, but pretty just the same! I love the look of these fish. I did a bit more trolling and a bit more casting, and then decided, despite the jumping going on, I was simply too tired, cold, and completely satisfied, and packed it in for the night. I did take one more opportunity to admire the scenery so that hopefully it lasts until the next time I journey down that rough and rocky road.

You shoulda tried catching bass, that's when I get all my pike!

lol... Odd how I am permanently linked to the aurora now, even though I never caught one and everyone else has.

Being still newly returning to fishing, and very green on trout fishing, I admit I am ignorant - I don't even know if there's any salmon close to my location, but there's definitely trout. I woulda never known this. Well, not never. I would have learned it some day, that day just happened to be today. Thanks.