MY FISHING OUTINGS SINCE JANUARY 3rd

[vishuscirquel 59]

Hi all,

Here's a little compilation of my 3 fishing outings since January 3rd.

SATURDAY 3RD JANUARY

I was kinda planning Friday evening to get out early Saturday for some Lake Trout, would have to be early as I needed to get some sleep in the afternoon as I was on night shift Saturday night. A local buddy of mine had wanted to go for Walleye in the day, but I was not to keen on that idea as the walleye bite aint particularly great at noon in my experience....and the bite has been tough even at sun-up and sunset recently.

I was sat browsing one of the boards…on one of the forums I frequent, when I read a reply to one of my posts from a guy local to me, basically an invite to go to a lake about an hour away for both of us on Saturday morning,,,done deal!!! In fact, the guy was Brkygetr, whom i first stumbled into on this forum.

Headed out about 5:45 am, found Dale where he said he'd be, did some brief intro stuff...lol...we were both pretty eager to get on the ice, and took the short walk to the lake.

Turns out Dale is a top bloke......and it was not long before we got into some lakers. We both got around 4 fish, but released most as we were trying to see if we could hook a really big guy. We did end up keeping one of the smaller ones as it was bleeding from the gills and would not have survived.

Action went exactly according to Dale's prediction...i.e. bite from 8:30am -10am....then again around midday.

Dale was using white tube jigs tipped with a big dace minnow, I was using a homemade dropper rig and the other rod was a 1/2oz white ball jig(long shank hook...great for sucker minnows) with dace minnows and sucker minnows I brought with me.

The lake was pretty slushy, well ...very slushy, and we stayed at the first main point as the lake opens out. We were no more than 30 feet away from shore but still in 25 - 49 FOW. All the trout (and Pike) hitting half way up the water column around the 25 -15 fow range. We did try briefly for whitefish, had something take a look on sonar , but no takers.

On the subject of sonar, the interference between Dale's flasher and my Lowrance was terrible, we did not use them much at all in the end.

The first trout nearly dragged the rod down the hole, only Dale's keen eye and my rod rest lock saved it.

Then it was pretty consistent for both of us until we left around 1pm.

It was great to meet up with one of the faceless names on the forum and even better to find that the guy was down to earth and addicted to fishing.....my kind of people...lol, we shared some stories/jokes/banter etc...caught lots of trout, if not the big guys we were looking for, but not a bad size in my opinion.

Great day, great company.

I tried playing around with the Windows Moviemaker as it compresses the clips automatically allowing faster uploads....so don’t judge to harshly on vid quality...lol...I aint Steven Spielberg

VIDEO RECAP OF THE DAY

MONDAY 5TH JANUARY

Well, guess I’m an addict....lol...went back for trout again.

my buddy Matt called me at work last night and asked the dumbest question...."do you wanna go fishing tomorrow?"....lol...duh! are there bubbles when a duck f@rts?

My wife was at work so no worries there, got the snowblowing and chores done that afternoon...so tomorrow was good to go!

After a bit of a slow start in the morning we eventually set off to Thunder lake again, arriving at around 10am.

We set up the shack, Matt was loving the new shack and heater.....as the last time we went to thunder Lake together nearly a year ago to the day, it was -25 Celsius like today...but last year there was a strong 20kmh wind...I got frost nip on my fingers that day...WE FROZE, not today...nice and warm.

We found the spot I was at the other day despite the snow dump of the past few days(next years toy is a GPS) and were greeted by a sonar screen showing a 10 foot deep band of smelt.....PERFECT!

LOTS OF BAITFISH UNDER US

We did not get any bites for almost an hour. We had two lines each, jigging inside the hut with static lines outside within view from inside....did I mention it was freezing cold out there today?...lol

I was getting a little impatient...guess I’ve been spoiled the last couple of days, and started to get a little bored so tried for some whities...with one hit, but in hindsight probably a ling. After an hour Matt got into a little one, and I followed quickly after that with a nice keeper, we were both using jigs with 6" sucker minnows. Matt also got a hit on his other line but it got off at the hole.

MATT GOT THE FIRST ONE

I FOLLOWED WITH A GOOD SIZE ONE FOR THUNDER LAKE

After the one that got away for Matt, I went on a missed bite/one that got away spree like never before....I just had to laugh...it was ridiculous, Matt also lost a couple in the next half hour, but up to 1 pm we did land a couple more...all pretty small and we set them loose to fatten up.

DONT THINK I"VE EVER HAD SO MANY FISH GET OFF IN A ROW!

It went pretty quiet for about an hour and then picked right up again. We were seeing lots of trout, chasing our baits up and down the water column on the graph, we were trying to rob the fish off each other on the screen which was a real hoot. We'd see a fish chasing the others bait, then lower your own bait to the fish and try and distract it from the others line...lol...got pretty competitive...great fun.

We also got into a few Ling too, not really big enough to keep so they went back, they were hugging the bottom but were not shy once you got their interest and would come up to 20 foot off bottom to nail the bait.

GOT SOME LING

WE GOT LOTS OF TROUT, MOSTLY LITTLE, BUT WE KEPT 3 NICE ONES....IVE HAD TROUT FOR SUPPER TWICE IN 3 OR $ DAYS...I"M GOOD FOR A WHILE NOW...lol

SATURDAY 10TH JANUARY

Got out with Dale again, same lake as last week, but we managed to get to the other rock point just across from where we fished before.

It was great to see that a few snowmobiles had used the trail since the dump of snow we got during the week, but we still had a whole load of slush to contend with out on the lake.

We were set up by 8:30am......and waited and waited, lots of baitfish schools swimming through on sonar......but zip...nada....nuffink...biting. I tried for whitefish again...but nope...nothing.

It was a nice drop off where we were, going from 0-55' FOW 50yards from shore, with a nice shelf about 20ft from shore at the 25ft depth, this is where our few fish came out.

We built a fire and snacked on smokies, always nice to build a fire.

We did catch 3, the first one went back...a bit small, the second one had shoulders and is the best one I’ve iced so far, the next 2 got off, and Dale landed a good one near the end. All in all a very slow day, not the slowest either of us had had....but slow. Great weather, although we were in the shade most of the day, but no wind and not cold.

Here’s the piccy/video of the day's action.

2ND FISH OF THE DAY WAS DEFINITELY A KEEPER

ONE GOT OFF....ONE DIDN'T

[Bear 77]

Great report as always. I take it you are in the Dryden area?

Bear

[Guest Nick C]

WOW. What an awesome report. Thanks for sharing.

Nick C

[vishuscirquel 59]

Yeah Bear, I'm in Dryden.

[Some Old Guy 968]

Awesome report!

Ummmm if I'm ever up that way ummmm can I get an invite?

Roger

[vishuscirquel 59]

Awesome report!

Ummmm if I'm ever up that way ummmm can I get an invite?

Roger

Goes without saying.....just lemme know your on your way

[Buck 120 32]

Love those reports. While I was born in Dryden, I did not live there very long. Thunder Lake brings back so many memories, mostly summer though. My grandparents had a camp on that lake. Spent many a summer there as a kid!

Thanks.

[Phil 26]

Awesome video! Do you ever fish Blue lake? I think thats what it was called, I fished it many years ago when my Dad was working at the mill in Dryden.

[vishuscirquel 59]

Awesome video! Do you ever fish Blue lake? I think thats what it was called, I fished it many years ago when my Dad was working at the mill in Dryden.

Not yet Phil....i was gonna try last year...thanks for reminding me...maybe this year.