Big fish. Full moon., FOG!!!

Thanks Flukes, the loons were singing all night. Saw a few boats cutting across the lake early evening, but that was it. As for releasing fish, my rule is simple. Release twice as many fish as you keep. If everyone in Canada did this, we would never run out of fish.

Great series of posts, enjoyed reading through them.

Thanks Flukes, the loons were singing all night. Saw a few boats cutting across the lake early evening, but that was it. As for releasing fish, my rule is simple. Release twice as many fish as you keep. If everyone in Canada did this, we would never run out of fish.

True. So far, I have kind of followed your rule (by "releasing" a few with my "netting issues" )

There is no threaded seams in my rubber net, and the fish and lures always come out very easy. I keep it in my car all year round. No smell either, with a quick rinse in the lake after each fish is caught.

Thank you Bob, I am glad you enjoyed it. I wish more members would post more stories, I love reading about peoples adventures. It's a great way to get motivated and get out there to do some fishing. That sure is a serious muskie in your Avatar photo. Too bad walleye don't grow that big.

hey CM, so were the Balsam walleye mostly taking your Joker Bait or were you casting a crank bait for them ?? Since I am on the park side of the lake ,in my little recreational kayak I only have a very large weedbed that I can get to ( no islands) . Was wondering about trying the weedbed at night. Wonder if they would only turn on after 2am as well in a big weedbed ?? ROOK

I think the fish only bit at night. Havn’t been having much luck at all during the day for the past month.

That sucks, sorry to hear that. I was just telling VicFish last week to try the 6 to 8 feet weed edges. Not in the weeds, right at the edge. Long casts or trolling parallel to the weed line where the drop off starts. If you want to fish deeper, then try the 10 to 12 depth, where the steep ridges drop to deep water. The walleye are still shallow but are leaning on the edges to their winter home. Four more weeks give or take a day, and they are gone to the warmer deeper water. Maybe try a bit bigger swim bait, my one friend has been using big minnows for the last few weeks. The other friend uses the 4 to 6 inch swim baits. You guys that like to use a worm harness can try this, it works. Run some spinners ahead of your worm harness. I cut one spinner off and cut off the spinner on the worm harness, just beads on the wire. Big minnow or big worm on the harness. You can also run a jig head with a plastic bait behind the spinners on a leader. You have to fish it slow while casting or trolling. The walleye are feeding right now from whatever o'clock to whatever o'clock and round the clock. Day or night the walleye and crappie are active until the lake turns over.

Walleye and crappie are feeding as much as possible now. Most of the day and night they are active. Jig head with a joker, crank baits, jerk baits, swim baits, worm harness, minnows, worms leeches. We will never know what works best at any specific time of the day we fish. But our success in the past helps us make informed choices on what to try first to last. If I was in a boat right now until the sun rises tomorrow, I would be following the shoreline at the edge of the weeds. North to south and back again and again and again where my walleye have been caught over the years. Sometimes anglers don't have a lot of time and are out for only a few hours and the fish don't cooperate, which is frustrating. I am lucky that time is not a factor when out all night on the water. I do have my favourite lures and jigs/Jokers but.......There is no secret to my catching fish at night, no magic lure or presentation. My success in fishing is simply attrition. Less people on the water at night. Walleye and crappie are more active in the dark. Add to that a bit of luck, hours of time to fish and it equals more fish caught. I almost always say "It was a lucky night" in my posts. That's because it is lucky to have time to fish for hours and hours. My only skill in fishing is almost never ever losing a fish once the hook is set. And knowing where the fish are helps too. LOL. This is the best picture I could find to show where the walleye are hiding right now. Day or night, walleye and crappie are using the very edges of the weeds to attack there prey. Find the thin aisles between the weeds and you will find the fish. Also find the humps and sharp drop-offs. Shallow water fishing in the Kawarthas is a lot more difficult than catching fish suspended in deeper water lakes. Good luck out there to everyone fishing.

Yeah, that is the kind of netting I would like to get for sure. Will wait a bit though. I have changed the frame of my net to a larger one so the netting is on the fame much tighter and no extra bags/folds in the netting - I think it should perform much better (even playing around with it at home, the bag of the net is shallower and it doesn't fold over and "stick" to itself - it just falls in the bag shape that it was made to be in this frame (if that makes any sense). Hope to be able to test it out on a WF (or few) to see if I can manage to get tangled up or lose a fish because the bag does not sit properly. Anyway, the larger frame sure makes the net wider and look much better. If it solves 50-75+% of my issues, I won't be wanting to spend more money for a net.

Yes nets are getting expensive, like everything else. My net was 35 to 40 dollars. Same net is 80 to 85 dollars now. Everything is getting out of hand at the stores. I put more money in this cart in a week, than I do in my vehicle in a month.

Yup
I replaced the net frame with a larger one so the bag is shallower, the netting is more or less stretched open, looks like it is sitting properly with no unnecessary folds in the netting and the fish sat nicely in the net and on the flat bottom whereas before it was much more curled up because of the smaller frame (I was trying to reduce the size of the net to fit in the car more easily). First whitefish and no issues at all and already I don't have some of the issues I had before (hopefully, after a few more fish, I will know for sure).