skunked again on Muskie fishing with rookie Bro

[scuro]

I can't complain, it has been a good year with several personal bests and two new species...it would have been nice to a add a first muskie with my bro but that was not to be. I had previously taken out my brother and cousin Muskie fishing this time of year and we were skunked also. I have done some reading and slowly been improving the gear and tackle. We even waited until the last minute to book to make sure that weather would be ideal. We had a half day of cloudy breezy weather and a full day of mixed weather with sun and clouds. We focused strictly on muskie and unlike the last trip we picked a known muskie lake.

the weather was good.

 

It looked good at this point...we squeezed every second we could out of our time.

 

my bro around the time we had to shut it down and pack er up

 

 

Our results, not even one follow or look except for some waves that a large muskie made. We had pulled into a prime location and I stopped the motor. My brother looked over the bow, and asked what was causing those waves? From where I sat I looked over and said did they come from our boat? He said he didn't believe so. Then I asked if it could be caused by a current of some sort. Again he said he didn't believe so. We fished for a while and he then asked, if I had ever been to Marine land. I said no and he told me how much his kids liked it. About an hour later he comes out with he saw dolphin's that made the same sort of V wave patterns that he saw an hour ago

 

So keep the dream alive and tell us where we could improve

 

Conditions:

Known Muskie lake: two selected spots highly recommended.

A narrows, 59 degrees with access to deep water and big lake.

A smaller circular lake with access to deep water in the top half middle half of the lake. Water temp 56 degrees.

That Muskie we saw would indicate that she was moving slowly and cruising. With regard to water temperature what is ideal? With large pike it would have been the warmer water.

 

Depth: we generally fished in 20 ft of water but fished in water as shallow as 8 ft and as deep as 30 ft.

We mostly drift fished and threw everything from believers, to large Rapelas, to large diving cranks. We also tried large spoons, bucktails, spinners, large plastic..and smaller lures also. what didn't we try?

 

Retrieve: generally went with a slow retrieve but also did fast, medium fast, and pause and start.

[Musky or Specks]

If all you want to do is catch a muskie Im going to recommend Head Lake in Haliburton. I have never been skunked here and use it frequently to introduce beginners to Musky fishing. I have had numerous double digit days on this lake and my son caught his first musky at age 9 on his first attempt at fishing for them about 5 minutes into the trip. If you need any more specifics about the lake just PM me.

[Moosebunk]

Likely didn't do much wrong at all Chris. You do your homework. Gotta put in the time for these fish, and probably stick to a lake and really figure it out.

[Rizzo]

all a part of musky fishing. Even the best see days of being skunked...even 2 days in a row! That spinning reel in the last photo doesn't really cut it as far as targetting muskies though.

[scuro]

all a part of musky fishing. Even the best see days of being skunked...even 2 days in a row! That spinning reel in the last photo doesn't really cut it as far as targetting muskies though.

 

Ya got me there. DOH!!

I had five rods to choose from and my rookie brother was still working on his casts so that rod and reel you saw in the photo was a good choice for him. He was happy with the small rod and reel and I was happy with the resulting smaller percentage of potential hookups of his lure to my body. Over the two days he developed a unique backhanded over the shoulder cast more akin to a Vince Carter basketball shot then to actual proven methods of casting. He also tried fishing several times with seaweed on his lure. He thought it had some extra attractant properties to it!! You can fault me on this...but I felt the muskies were safe on his rod.

Edited October 16, 2007 by scuro

[Musky or Specks]

Likely didn't do much wrong at all Chris. You do your homework. Gotta put in the time for these fish, and probably stick to a lake and really figure it out.

I would agree with this statement if your talking about trophy musky and I believed it about musky fishing period when I started Musky fishing in 1990. Fortunately for me I got a tip from Rocky Crawford about Head Lake. My buddy and I went there the first chance we got. We had never musky fished before and between the two of us got 13 fish in a two day weekend all casting.Needless to say we permanantly got hooked on skis. Head lake has no monsters but tons of fish up to 36". We dont fish it anymore because ther just isnt any big fish in the lake. I keep my fishing to GB and the French now but if your looking to break in its the highest % place I can think of. Here are some typical head lake skis

 

 

 

 

[solopaddler]

Fish any well defined Kawarthas weedline with a black/orange inline bucktail spinner and you should get muskies.