Muskoka River Report

[skdds]

Well, I spent the last week fishing the mouth of the Muskoka River near Bracebridge. I've fished Lake Muskoka and other shield lakes before-actually I fish mostly shield lakes, but this was my first time at that spot. To my surprise, not a lot of rock (that I could find close by and I fish out of a kayak so can't run the whole lake looking for rocks) but lots of big weedlines. The fishing, for me, was only consistent between 8-9 pm. For whatever reason I got skunked at all other times of the day no matter the lure, for any species other than rock bass! Why? I don't know but always open to suggestions from you guys.??

 

The upside to the trip was some of my best pike and an awesome walleye. Unfortunately, I had to wait until early evening and dusk each night to catch these! Here are a few pics, all fish caught on a good ole white spinnerbait.

This bass, btw, was from Gull Lake, caught a few weeks back by casting a short (12 inch) worm harness lindy rigged to the shoreline -which I learned about from this forum a few days before I went up. The pic does not do it justice as it was a real pig. Thanks for the tech tip!

 

 

-skdds

[OhioFisherman]

" The fishing, for me, was only consistent between 8-9 pm. For whatever reason I got skunked at all other times of the day no matter the lure, for any species other than rock bass! Why? I don't know but always open to suggestions from you guys.?? "

 

I have seen some areas on lakes shut down pretty good once the boat traffic started, on others they seemed to stay shallow to take advantage of the waves created by boat traffic scattering baitfish and crawfish to feed.

 

Hard to say, some lakes here seem to have no night bite at all, on others that is the time to be there. Years on going north, and only 1 northern pike after dark, was it me or the water?

[buick14]

I love fishing that area. It's a really hard fish , especially in the river itself. There r some bigguns around there...but waking them up can be hard. Nice walleye!

[skdds]

Thanks!, Hopefully I'll be making a return trip, although shorter, perhaps in the fall when the cottage traffic slows...

[porkpie]

If you are finding weeds, you can try rigging right along the edge with a single leech on a lindy rig, bare hook or bead. 3 foot leader from the sinker. If the weeds are only halfway to the surface, they're very fishable, and you can troll a shallow running crank over top, or run a worm harness with a 1/4 ounce bell sinker as weight just over top of the bed. I regularly fish just south of this area, and this is how we relatively consitently catch fish after 9am, even in bright sunlight. I pick up a lot of pike on the harnesses as well. And by fish, I mean pickerel. As for bass, toss a senko at a weed bed or rock pile, repeat that often enough and you'll catch them. We catch them to 3 pounds off our dock on worms at all hours of the day. I've never found them to be a very sporty fish, but they are dumb and plentiful! Looks like a nice week!

[skdds]

I'll give those suggestions a try on a future trip. Seems that I'm always getting snags trying to run cranks or harnessess around weeds, so I like skimming with spinnerbaits. I love the senkos for bass. Biggest problem I had this time was current and wind. I casted the senkos wacky style and texas rigged but had a hard time getting them down to where the fish were. I've found the senkos work really well in other muskoka lakes too.