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Italo and I joined Jason and Tyler for a film shoot on an Erie tributary for channel cats on Friday. This would not be a typical shoot with 4 of us in the boat all float fishing. I worked all night on midnights and got out at 8am. I headed home, made coffee, took a quick shower, grabbed my gear and left to meet the guys. We got a late start at about 11am, but we were hopeful we would tag some midday cats. I rigged up a 10.6" medium heavy steelhead rod with a baitcaster and 20lb braid and 16 gram slip float. Inline weight, bead, swivel to about 16" 20lb fluoro lead to a 5/0 octopus hook. Pretty simple and really cool way to fish cats! I started off fishing shrimp, while Italo tried shad and the local boys had a cooler of vacuum sealed sucker chunks. I fished shrimp for hours without a fish, while the guys got some on sucker. I switched up and finally got a couple. We moved around from spot to spot trying the deeper areas with undercut banks and timber. It seemed the cats were not grouped up and spread out over the river. It was pretty cool to see a float drop and tag a feisty channel cat. The guys told us that many central Erie tribs have channel cats that are available from boat and shore. Typical rigs on bottom can work, but float fishing is the preferred way to target them. Unlike the Grand River, the channel cats come in much later and the fishing is good in May and June, and sometimes into July. This year, June and July has been good. Channel cats are common 4- to 8-pounds with several over 10lbs and up to 20lbs! It was a bit slower than when the guys fished a week earlier. They believe the cats are starting to migrate back out to the lake now after spawning. We got cats up to about 13lbs. Italo had the hot hand getting 4 cats, while the rest of us got a couple each and missed a couple bites. Here are some photos of cats that we got into. I'll definitely be floatin' cats again! Good fishing! Aaron

I had the pleasure of having Greg Klatt and his son Mitch out on Lake Ontario yesterday. It was a beautiful day out to enjoy some trolling. Mitch had never caught a salmon before, so my goal was to get him into a nice king or two. We started in 50 fow and marked very little until we got into 75 fow, but not much to hold us there. We ended up in 150 fow quickly, as the picture on the sonar looked best. We got a lake trout right away down deep on a Coyote flasher and fly off the rigger 140 feet down. I believe Greg has that photo. We then got another hit shortly after. This time it was a king down deep on the same set-up and same depth and Greg got to tangle with it. It got slow after that as we got out a bit late for Lake Ontario kings, but we kept at it and got rewarded. We got several cohos up higher, but I don't think we got any or many photos of them. If we did, Greg has those as well. We marked a lot of hooks 40 to 80 feet down over the deeper water, but for some reason they had lock jaw. The bait balls were deep hugging bottom but very few hooks down deep. Even though the picture looked good, we moved shallower as we were not hitting kings. When we got into about 83 fow we marked some great bait balls, and not all hugging bottom. Shortly after trolling by this bait ball, the 300 copper reel starting singing as the in-line board got rocked back. This time an SD fly did the trick and Mitch boated his first ever king! Mitch was happy with this bad boy We got into some more cohos without photos, then we had to take a photo of Greg and this fish. It also hit the same set-up off 300 copper. I was so busy on the boat, I didn't notice it was such a nice bow until I saw the photo lol. The same copper set-up fired again with a crazy king cart-wheeling far behind the boat taking Mitch to task. It proved to get the better of him though as he did a long-line release lol. Unfortunately, we only got another coho after that to wrap it up off a 400 copper in over 100 fow. We called it a day late afternoon. We didn't tag a lot of kings, but we had some fun on the water with some cohos and a nice bow to keep our interest. I was a pleasure to have the guys out for something they don't normally get to do. Great company on the boat, and I'm sure Mitch was happy to boat the biggest king. It was a nice first king We found white and black green to be our best colours. All flashers and flies. Spoons and meat didn't fire once. The fish seem to be really scattered in the west end of the lake. Hopefully that changes soon and we light them up! Hopefully Greg has a few photos to add. Good fishing! Aaron

I got out to Lake Simcoe recently with some TonyB and friends for a good group of six of us. One of the nice things about ice fishing is the social aspect of being able to get out in larger groups, and sometimes meet new people. You can't do this in most fishing boats. We headed out slowly just as it was getting light out, making sure to check ice conditions as we went. We got to an area that looked good in 100 feet of water and set up without a soul around. Before we knew it we were completely surrounded by hundreds of anglers and our sonars had a lot of interference. The fish must have been in the area recently with the amount of anglers there. We tried all kinds of things with only a couple bites and lazy looks on sonar to show for our efforts after a couple hours of daylight. We had to move... but where? Everywhere we looked around us had quiet anglers not getting much. Without any clues as to depth or location, we had to make a big decision. We thought about two things; moving shallow or deep away from everyone. Nobody wanted to make the call in our group at first, but we eventually decided as a group to make the trek out to deeper water well away from any anglers. We moved out to 123 feet of water and looked on sonar. We immediately saw several fish on sonar at once and we spread out and set up. It didn't take long and Johnny got into a nice laker. Once we were all set up and jigging, the action was fast and furious. It was non-stop action one after another! My tip-up line with an emerald shiner and jigs were both taking shots, although jigging was by far the best approach. It is so much fun watching fish teased into biting on sonar. It never gets old! A jig and pause worked well at times, as did reeling up a foot or two and pausing, then reeling up again and pausing. They hit on the pause and you can totally read their behavior on sonar to realize which approach would work best on individual fish. We lost a few absolute beasts that pulled almost all our lines out at times making for an even more exciting time. These are the days that we live for. Pure adrenaline action-packed fun where everyone in your group is hammering fish!!! Sadly, I had to leave midday, even though the action was still hot. That was a very tough thing to walk away from, but I am a man of my word and family comes first. It was ok, I got more fish in a couple hours than many full days spent on the ice at times. I was content, and we all had an absolute blast. The heavy snow and mild weather this week will spoil the ice. We only had approximately 3.5- to 4-inches of black ice on the weekend, so it will not be safe for a while. Make sure you take all precautions when you think it is safe enough to venture out. Wearing a flotation suit and carrying ice pics is a good idea. So is a buddy system and a floating rope. Enjoy the photos These are from my phone. My wife broiled the whitefish I brought home for something different, and it was great! Much healthier than frying it in oil as well Good fishing! Aaron