Lake Trout Today

[tjsa]

Left town at 7:15, longish drive, snowmobiled in, and got to the spot we had decided to fish. Found 4 holes with 1 inch of ice on them. Chopped them out, put on a tube jig, and started jigging at 9:39. At 9:45 had my first fish on the ice on a 3 inch white tube not tipped with anything.

 

A smallish 17 Incher, but a nice eater, and since this is a marginal lake trout lake(the deepest it gets is 36-40 ft.)we were not expecting any too much larger.

 

 

Almost an hour later, my bud hooks one, and it is going nuts under the ice. We were fishing in only 26 ft. of water, so getting them up near the ice doesn't take long.

After 45 seconds of headshakes, its off,

Shortly thereafter, a couple other guys show up. They have a camp on a nearby perch lake. He put the trail in just over a week ago, took him over an hour on the portage trail, 4.5 minutes for us today to traverse, and these were the holes he used yesterday. I cheesily said "why, thank you very much for your efforts, easy ride in, and got right to fishing without the auger"

He chuckled at that, and they went to another point on the lake.

Shortly thereafter, I had a hit, no hookup, jigged a couple more times, then whap, fish on. Took it a little easier to tire it out, but the same thing happened. It went nuts near the hole, and got off.

I had drilled 8 more holes, and we decided to jig in all of them before deciding to move. No more fish for 45 min., so off we went to a different point.

Drilled 16 more holes, and started jigging again. Slow for a while, then my bud hooks one, and he feels some heft. After a 5 min. fight, gets it head in the hole, I jam my hand down into the water, and up comes a chunky laker about 5 lbs., with the hook under its chin. It definately hit, but somehow the hook got dislodged and ended up outside the mouth. Ahh well, he put it back, and my camera was in the sleigh 60 ft. away.

20 min. later, I hook a decent fish, bud runs over to help, fish again goes nuts under the ice, he sees it and says its a nice fish, then my jig is in the hole without a fish on the end of it

Drop it back down, 5 min. later get a hit, set the hook, and my bail is not completely closed. Looked at it briefly, and dropped it, grabbed the line, felt weight, and set the hook. Got it 3 ft. up...............and gone, again

So my bud brings his vexilar to this hole, and we can see something just up off of bottom, jigged a bit more, but nothing. He goes back to his hut, and I decide to put a set line down with a 6" sucker minnow(first time we actually used a set line this day). It took 45 minutes, and my bud was out of his hut trying other holes, I looked over at my gad, and something just didn't look right. The stick unloaded, and stayed unloaded for 10 seconds. Then, a twitch, and it slowly started to bend over much like a walleye bite.

OK, open the bail, drop the jigging rod, and run over to my other line. The fish, just held it 3/4 down without removing the line from the stick. Grabbed it, set the hook, and the fight was on. Felt like another smallish fish, as I got it up near the surface fairly quickly, then it dug in, and stripped all 25 ft. and more of line through my hands.

It then just bulldoged, no headshakes, just resisted being brought up. Took my time, about 4 minutes, and got it in the hole, with help from my bud to get it out.

Thought I had a fish in the 6 lb. range, but no, a 24", probably 3 lb'r. Man, they really fight hard on this lake.

Anyway, I could not remember for sure what sized laker Limeyangler had entered into the tourney. Thought it was a 22" fish, but I got a same sized fish we already have entered from a NGL lake, a 24"r.

 

 

Took this pic in case I had surpassed Simon's entry.

 

 

Oh well, I had a nice day fishing, caught what I was targeting, landed my limit, tried to increase our inches for team 3, but in the end, got 2 nice eater trout. Not too bad for almost 6 hrs. of fishing. Total cost gas wise was 32 bucks, minnows were leftover from last weekend.

 

 

p.s.....I think my laker is purdier than Simon's,

Edited February 22, 2009 by tjsa

[limeyangler]

p.s.....I think my laker is purdier than Simon's,

 

 

Maybe....but my tape measure is better quality

 

 

 

Good stuff TJSA, i know exactly how ya feel about those ones that got off...i had a session not too long ago where around 5 in a row got off!!!!

 

 

Geat report man, i'm sure our team will upgrade that 24" soon....its gonna happen!

Edited February 22, 2009 by limeyangler

[nautifish]

Great report and beautiful fish......

[Greencoachdog]

Real nice read on the report and great pics Tom!!!

 

Glad to see you're getting out and catching fish Bubba!

 

I think your fish is a little purdier than Simon's too!... maybe you should submit it to your captain anyway!

[ehg]

Very healthy looking lakers there! Good to see you getting out and enjoying the great white north.

Thanks for the report and pictures.

[Leecher]

Great report and pics tjsa

 

Good looking lakers you guys caught.... congratulations

and thanks for sharing

Leechman