Rice Lake Report

[Guest Johnny Bass]

My partner cancels on me last minute. I make a few calls and and remember I got Greg's(GRILW) number. I told him I wanted to target some rock bottom lakes for smallies. I also mention Rice is ok. He says he doesn't like tube jigging and picks Rice. I said fine.I wanted to go to Keene for Smallies, he wanted to go to Bewdley for LM bass. Last minute going up hwy 28 I say Bewdley it is. I figure there are crappie and pickeral to be had in the weeds.

 

We get there and the water is really murky. Could hardly see a foot under water. Right off the bat I hit a rock. Dinged up the propeller a bit. Right there I knew it was going to be a slow day. After it was hard to focus. I was just thinking what kind of damage my boat took.....We decided to pitch some docks. Picked up a few LM but they were small.

 

Here is a decent one.Arms extrended.lol

 

 

 

We decided we were going to come to the docks when the sun came up. We decided to pitch to wood. I picked up this decent bass.

 

 

We covered alot of Islands and had only a small fish or 2 to show. We worked slop but the fish are not in there yet. I picked up only a puny one and had one explode on my fluke but no hook up.

 

We decide to try deep water. Nothing.

 

I have only fished Rice a few times and never really liked Rice. First time I went (A LONGGG time ago) , I went with worms and all I caught was perch.Second time, I think I caught bass and my friend a Pickeral on a tube and that was it. Yet from shore I used to smash one huge LM after another. Go figure....3rd time went to keene and only caught a few bass.4rd time I went to the keen side and did quite well on LM bass. 5th time caught a mixed bag of average sized fish.

 

Basically I have a few spots near Keene for fish but none near Bewdly and I really want to learn Rice. In case I give tournaments a try. It looks like its going to take a bit of time but I am starting to figure out some patterns in Bewdley.

 

Anyways, we decided to fly half way over the lake to a smallie spot I know. Greg picks up a smallie and that was it. Here is a pic.

 

 

I also have no confidence lures for Rice. I dont know what colours work and what crankbaits to use. I was trying all kinds of crankbaits with no luck.

 

We also tried trolling for pickeral with no luck.

 

We then decide to fly up the Otonobee. We see a nice weedline in 8 FOW. I was working the slop and Greg weanted to work the outerside with a crank bait. I told Greg to wait till I moved out to the edge of the weedline. He casts out and I cast in. Well Greg has a fish on. Its a pickeral. This camera definately makes the fish look smaller.....

 

 

We wanted to explore up the Otonobee but we had already wasted a tank of gas and were on our second.... We did alot of driving around to figure the lake out.

 

We decided to fish soome skinny water again. I picked up a dink and that was about it. We switched to another shoreline and on the first cast Greg nails this nice LM.

 

 

Then we drifted into 2 FOW. Me and Greg are like, TOPWATER time. I put on a buzzbait.I'm working the 2FOW and finally I say the fish haven't come in shallow yet, lets get outta here and right on cue? WHAM! Picked up this decent Largie.Gave me an OK fight but it was quickly in the boat. This camera doesn't do this bass justice. Even with the arm extended out.lol

 

 

Here is anotheer one for Greg.

 

Well I caught about 7-8 LM bass with only a few decent ones. Greg caught a smallie, a pickeral and a few LM bass. All in all it was the slowest day this year but I did learn a few things and figured out a few patterns. All in all, other than me hitting the rock, I had fun.

 

Thanks for coming out Greg!

Edited July 23, 2007 by Johnny Bass

[danbouck]

Nice looking fish!

[Greencoachdog]

Great report and pics!!!

 

Looks like the fish got a little bigger when you took yer shirt off.

[ehg]

Looks like a good day's fishing. The Otonabee is worth checking out

many launches along it's length.

 

cheers,

 

ehg

[redfin]

Looks like a fun day ! Love the topwater bassing! Sorry about your prop tho.

[ccmtcanada]

Great report! Sorry to hear about the prop...hopefully the damage wasn't too bad. Dont all cameras make your fish smaller??? LOL. Thanks for the report...very well written!

[OhioFisherman]

Great pictures and report. LOL a good day of learning, if you fish tournaments they don`t always go the way you plan. Hope the damage wasn`t bad.

[Photoz]

Looks like some decent bass there . . . . did you find the weeds any worse than usual? Rice is obviously part of the Kawarthas . . . . but this is about the only lake in that vicinity that doesn't appear to have had a carp die-off? See and live, or dead carp?