On Friday Bill and I hit a few of his favorite speckled trout streams and rivers all within an hour or so of his house.
In the first 90 minutes I caught and released 13 speckled trout and kept 3 for lunch. Here's a shot of the boil-up (or as it is called in Upper Canada, a "shore lunch"):
Note the innovative use of a beer can to level the frying pan.
We hit three more rivers over the course of the day with some success but nothing like the morning.
Tomorrow morning, it's a hunt for brown trout on The Grand
The fish were taking a shutout into the late innings when:
The picture isn't great (cell phone) but you can get the gist. Hooked another that got away and landed one more around the same size.
It was a funny opener... the river looked in great shape, not flooded out like so many openers, but there were no trout in the lower sections of the river. The first trout I saw was just below Fergus. In Fergus, the only fish I came across were the three noted above and I witnessed another being caught.
Still, it was nice to get on the river. I have some speckled fishing to do on Friday. Saturday is Derby day so I'm going to be tied up for the afternoon and evening. Sunday is recovery day.
Trout Season is practically upon us and I'm looking forward to trying out some new gear. I snapped my 5wt rod in a boat -dock incident at the end of the season and I picked up a 5wt OrvisClearwater II for a great price. I tried it out for the closing weekend and it was a lot of rod for the money. For Christmas I received a Ross Worldwide Essence FW 3wt from the father-in-law. Now that should be a laugh. I've matched it up with a new Orvis BBS III and I can't wait to give it a shot. This video shows a 3wt catching a big old carp, though I'm planning on using it for trout and crappies:
Speaking of carp.... This blog, Carp on the Fly has me dreaming of hooking a few carp. Last year I hooked a smallish carp by accident and it ran like crazy. I'm going to put a lot more effort into carp fishing on both The Grand & The Conestogo this summer.
This year I will try to be more faithful in providing pictures and commentary on my efforts. Last year I hardly had a flick. Work was simply too busy. I'm not going to make that mistake again. I will be heading North for the opening of Pickerel season. Historically, the opening weekend has produced plenty of fish.I'm also planning a trip to Newfoundland for a few flicks on The Gander River and the Humber River.
I have no pictures, but I did a bit of fishing in the past week. Last weekend I was up around North Bay and had a great weekend of fishing. After having a run at the Pickerel, we started Crappie fishing and ended up catching a couple of dozen which we mostly released. We also caught a couple of fairly large Pike which are always a laugh. Nice start to to the cabin season.
Then yesterday morning I hit the River and caught a few trout before work. The best fish was the smallest, not for the fight, but for the take... it took a dry fly on the way up and came completely out of the water, flashing in the sun. It was a beautiful take.
I've occasionally fished The Grand River over the past couple of years with limited success. Success in fishing often comes from being able to find the fish and being new to the river, I was kind of fishing blind. My wife got sick of hearing my fishing stories, which had little to do with catching trout and more to do with finding a pool that held trout, so for my birthday she hired me a guide to take me around and show me where to fish. It worked. I caught plenty of trout on drys and nymphs, a big pike on a woolly bugger and had a refusal from a bass. I also learned a lot about nymph fishing. It was a great gift.
