The Lure Of Warm Water

[Weedman]

It was a great day to be on the big Lake O, and as most of you can attest is almost unheard of this time of year. My fishing buddy Greg and I decided to get up and out for what may be our last kick at open water. We were gonna get out to Quinte, but opted to work another area of Lake Ontario. Light north winds, moderate temps and some thick snow flurries greeted us as we cruised out to our fishing spot. We started out flat lining silver/black and chartreuse/holographic husky jerks just as light started coming through some of the thick cloud cover and snow flurries. The port rod jumped first, after just 10 minutes of trolling. Managed to boat our first fish of the morning, a chunky little 3 lb. brown. After that, two quick whacks at the same rod, then all quiet for an hour or so. Then, sliver/black goes off again with another scrappy brown about 5 lbs. This one was a little beat up from being in one of the local tribs, so a quick release and off he goes. All is quiet for an hour and a half, just a couple taps on each rod. Sensing a need to change tactics and maybe location, we start to work our way west towards the launch and about halfway there, a screamer takes off with the bait on starboard rod which we switched to the same silver husky jerk that was doing the damage on the port side. Man, it pays to have duplicates of hot lures in the boat. My buddy Greg is all smiles as he's working this fish, there were some strong runs and lots of thrashin' with this one. Get it to boat side and in the net, a beautiful silver brown with tons of spots.....about 7 lbs. After that, my buddy hooks a strong fish that buckles the 8 1/2 ft. boat rod right over, Greg hands it over......man, I'm thinking strong sideways runs runs and lots of resistance.....that usually means....a roll at the surface and that familiar green with white spots.....what a surprise, it's a nice pike....it was 7 or 8 lbs for sure, and a thick gut full of bait fish. What a great fight that fish put up. Managed to get the net around it, snapped a couple quick photos and a nice release. That feels good I thought. We troll the same area, then wham, the rod buckles over and a fish is off running. Clicker on the reel is hummin'. After a minute or so, we can see the fish cruising along the surface, then it kinda starts coming in like dead weight. As Greg gets the fish closer, we both started laughing, 'cause it's a dang' carp hooked just under the chin. Poor Greg just took his turn on a foul hooked carp about 10 lbs. Greg looks at the fish as I'm taking the hooks out and says "stupid thing, if wanted to see something red with big lips, I coulda stayed home"....(Greg's wife has red hair, I'll stop there). Things went quiet again for awhile so time for another quick change of tactics. This time back to the east for some drifting with the shiner minnows we picked up. There were another couple of boats in tight, who were there quite awhile so we figured they must be getting the odd fish. We pulled in tight to the channel, rigged up and started drifting with our first minnows, tap, tap.....and I set the hook into a nice fish, it's running.....then slack....fish gone! Crap, I thought. Well, same drift, another hookset and a pocket rocket leaps out of the water, another brownie about 3 lbs. This fish is all around the boat but after a spirited tussle, we get that one to the net. The next drift, a couple taps but then, "Greg, we got another one". This fish is stronger, exhibiting some strength and nice jump too! We see it roll near the boat, and another good brown, about 5 lbs. Greg is not so amused at this point as he mutters "oh, let me put my rod down so I can get the net. It's good to be ahead I'm thinking. Greg managed a sheephead after that last brown, we finished with some casting of minnow baits but it was time to go. We were really hoping to complete the smorgasboard morning with a walleye, but we weren't complaining. Managed to boat 5 browns, 2 sheepies, a pike, a carp, and a sucker. It was a great way for us to (likely) end the open water season. And, how can fishing open water in middle of January be a bad thing!!

 

Tight lines!

 

PS - Sorry about no pics guys. We did get a couple of the large pike and big brown, but I gotta figure out how to lower the resolution yet....

[dave kaeon]

hey, that was an awesome report and story even without the pics... i just thinks it's amazing you found feeding brownies by flatlining in january! hehe... sure got my imagination going! sounded almost like you were fishing on a nice spring day with the number of species you hit, but alas i look out the window and see a heavy coating of some funny lookin white stuff and cola slurpee roads.

 

about the pics, i'm sure i'm just about as nuts as anybody here with photos... love to ogle fish pics and try to live vicariously through others' fishin stories! so... upload the dang photos to photobucket! it'll auto re-size them i'm sure.

 

great story.

[Gerritt]

Nice report!!

 

and yes photobucket will resize the pics... just click the right setting

 

Gerritt.

[Terry]

great report