I made a tip back to
Canada
to hit the mouth of the St. Lawrence and the
Ottawa River
again. Both could easily produce the next world record musky. Just casting a
lure into waters like that sends a chill down my spine. I blanked at my parents
who live in
Kingston Canada,
near the Mouth of the St. Lawrence on
Lake Ontario.
I had three kids with me and basically could only get out for a couple hours
each morning while they were still sleeping. Even still, I was in the right
place, just maybe not the right time of year?
Then on to the
Ottawa River in a section of
the River referred to by Jim Saric from the Muksy Hunter as 'the last bastion of pure musky fishing
left in the world'! The Ottawa River Musky Factory has been filling my facebook
pages the last few weeks of countless 50 inch fish. In July they scored over 50
fish in a single month! With multiple big fish outings usually occurring around
the major moon phases. I was hitting the river for three days in-between a
major moon phase. But how could I lose? I put my cousin on his first two musky
last year.
As soon as we got to the lodge I unpacked the car, had to drop the boat in
the water and park the car and trailer outside of the island. I ran out on my
own for literally ten minutes hoping for action. But I had three kids on their
own, Jake at 17 years old, Gabe at 15 now 16 and Ryan at 7 years. We decided to
fish off the dock and literally on the first cast with a spinner bait I hook up
with a good fish. It had a dark color to it with a good girth and some length.
Could it be? First cast! Ryan instantly wanted the rod but I was reluctant to
give it up when it could be my first Canadian Musky! It fought well and was in
the weeds. I worked it through and it jumped a few times revealing a trophy
smallmouth. I let Ryan reel in the rest. Nice bass. Just not quite what I
thought it was. This was on the 1/2oz double
Colorado blade black spinner bait with the
elongated skirt. The same lure that score the two musky on last year. Is
usually my best bass lure here in
Canada too. Ryan even missed a
bowfin on it at my parents earlier in the week. I saw the fish track down the
lure, hit it and hang around the boat for a while. Anyway, here's the
smallmouth. Not bad. But where are all the little fish that usually hang around
the dock? Was this guy eating them all? The place is usually polluted with
small yellow perch and sunfish.
With no little fish at the dock we hit the water. Just as a strong storm was
brewing. The barometer must have been dropping and the skies were turning ugly.
After a perfect blue bird day. The weather recently had been outstanding. I
take Ryan and Jake fishing just around the corner in a known musky hot spot
where I've had action before but inevitably lost the fish. A big fish too near
50" maybe. We get out there and I'm kind of psyching up the whole outing.
I was talking about how happy I was to finally be throwing huge lures in the
land of giants. There's just something about that feeling. I think all the
drama was getting to Ryan. He doesn't like it when I start to get excited
because of a large predatory fish. He gets a little spooked. Well, he was so
spooked that during the heavy wind and angry looking skies, a fly lands on his
hand. This scared him so much he threw his rod in the water! I kid you not. I
had to lunge forward and grab the bobber slowly sinking out of sight. I can't
believe I caught it. But I also yelled at Ryan which totally turned him off.
Too bad too because he was throwing that spinner bait like a pro.
We later drop Ryan off and Jake and I hit the water at sunset. This is the
first evening. Not shortly after we see a massive surface explosion over deep
water right smack in the middle of the river. This kind of surface explosion
was no question a fish feeding on another fish. There were multiple blow ups
occurring repetitively as if a fish was jumping away trying to escape and a
much larger fish was on the chase. So we leave the weed edge in 15 feet of
water to try the deep stuff where the fish had just surfaced. It was now near
80 feet deep but the sonar was lit up with fish from top to bottom but mostly
near the bottom. Probably a school of mooneye getting hammered by musky. But
musky are not supposed to school? It didn't take long and Jake yells, stops
reeling and just points at the water, "There he is, THERE HE IS!" I
tried to tell him to do a figure 8. Just keep the lure moving. Even if you
don't see a fish but especially when you see one. Well, that was his first
legit follow and first encounter. Missed opportunity. But wow was that
exciting. We head back in to get ready for bed. I had been up since 5 and was
exhausted.
The next morning I'm up well before sunrise without an alarm. Musky will do
that to you. Or maybe it's just me. I hit the spot with the blow up with zero
action. Then make it to a mouth of a large bay an hour or so after sunrise. I'm
working a spook and not really paying attention. Then it happens. The fish went
completely air born like they often do attacking a top water lure.
I was in about 6 feet of water on a weed edge
but for some reason decided to cast to deeper water and that is when the fish
hit.
This fish was the type of fish this
place was famous for.
Easily pushing
that legendary 50” mark.
A true giant,
probably older than I am with more than a few musky fishermen’s hearts on its
wall of fame.
Would you believe it, in
bright sun, the fish completely missed the f…ing lure! This was a walk the dog
spook magnum, same lure that caught my last large musky on the last super moon
in early July back home.
The same lure
that several fish have missed also.
Something about that walk the dog retrieve.
The side to side motion, although almost
irresistible to musky, must also be difficult to calculate the exact
position.
When the fish came completely
out of the water, showing off all its glory within spitting distance of the
boat, it then landed horizontally in a huge splash.
It then proceeded to just lay motionless at
the surface for a few seconds.
Enough
time for me to start jerking my lure again.
But with zero interest and the fish just sunk slowly out of sight.
Vanishing from my dreams.
As you can imagine, I tried about a dozen
other lures in the general vicinity to no avail.
I couldn’t believe it.
Time to tuck my tail between my legs and head
on home.
It was time to make my son
breakfast like I did every morning this week.
After a full musky effort skunk fest each morning of course.
We all played in the pool and returned after some poutine (cheese fries smothered in gravy, aka Canadian Crack) from
Montebello.
This time we had a full boat with Gabe, Ryan,
Jake and I.
I couldn’t tell Gabe or Ryan
that we were going fishing for this musky or else they wouldn’t have liked to
come.
But Gabe was cool with giving us a
few minutes effort and Ryan had on a worm for some panfish.
As soon as we arrived we see a huge essox
surface not far from where I had the morning encounter.
Jake soon starts screaming and pointing
again.
He got another follow!
And did the exact same thing except this time
I think he got in half a figure 8.
If he
would have just kept his mouth shut, not pointed or gotten overly excited and kept moving his rod, he
might have hooked that fish.
But landing
it with the rod he had is another story.
Was it a pike?
Or was it Mr. Big
from earlier? He did say it was much larger than the fish from the night before.
Who knows, I never saw
it.
Not soon after did we get hit with a
scary looking storm and had to leave with rain pelting us the entire run
home.
The remainder of the week pretty
much saw me beating that spot to death.
Jake and I got out together every evening after dinner just at sunset. Prime time.
On that first evening we encountered another
boat both specifically working this area, both using huge lures and
following through EVERY cast with a thorough figure 8 or three.
These guys knew what they were doing. I later found out this was the Ottawa River Musky Factory, with a GLoomis pro on board. I also came to find out they boated 10 muskies those three days, the same three days I was on the water and we ran into each other three or 4 times too. Unbelievable.
On the last evening Jake and I hit the water.
I was still muskyless.
Jake had not even caught a perch off the dock
although he hadn’t tried too much.
Ryan
had beat those fish to death.
He even
helped teach three other kids from the lodge how to fish, unhook a fish and how
to set the hook. That made me proud.
But
Jake was fishless. We hit near where we first saw a nice fish and Jake hooks up
on the figure 8!
It’s a nice musky, not
huge but a musky no less and as soon as I grab the net the hook pulls.
This time Jake saw the fish, dropped the rod
into a figure 8 and sure enough the fish struck on the first turn.
We both saw the whole thing. Now that's exciting musky fishing.
Cool!
But
still no fish in the boat.
The musky hit
the spinner bait.
With the final minutes of our trip nearing an end we returned to the giant’s
lair.
I beat that spot to death the last
few days and never did have another encounter.
Jake is casting a musky prop bait right into the weeds fowling in from
time to time.
Then a huge surface strike
and fish on!
It’s a nice pike near 6
pounds maybe.
Not soon afterwards he
gets another pike on the spinner bait but still no musky. I once heard from a very experienced musky angler that where there's pike, there won't be musky and where there are musky, there won't be any pike. Maybe there's some truth to that. Maybe the Ottawa River Musky Factory Guys landed my fish and she's since left the area.
We finished off the evening with a glorious
sunset but an ominous storm threatening to cut our trip short.
Jake had a follow from a gar. That was it, the last evening but at least I
saw one of the most beautiful sunsets that was that much more special with that
ever present feeling that at any given second the largest predatory freshwater
fish in North America could come knocking.
One more morning.
The night before I
could barely sleep. I kept thinking that I only had one more morning and that I
should get good nights sleep because I was the only driver the following day. The kids had to be back for some band practice on a Friday! Plus it was Gabe's BDay. But why come home to go to work on a Friday when I've taken the rest of the week off???
We had
played monopoly till past midnight the night before with Ryan taking top
honors.
Later that night the dang bat returned and was
flying around my room at 3am.
I think it
woke me as it crawled on the ceiling making these menacing sounds as its claws
scratched the old log columns. What was I going to do?
If Ryan woke up he’d be frightened and I’ve
have to due something about for sure then.
So I hid
under the covers.
Only peaking from time
to time to wait for my chance to lock it out of the room.
Well, that worked but not till 4
something.
At this point I might as well
go fishing.
I was on the water well,
well before sunrise.
I hit some of my
favorite spots where I previously had a follow from some essox and a couple other locations and of course beat the same spot as before and struck out, big time.
I’m Canadian Musky cursed.
At least looking at the pictures from the trip of everyone Else's smiles sooths me to some degree. But I have the musky bug bad. And there is only one cure. Only one thing left to do now…. Start planning redemption.
My mother with a bass on Lake Ontario. The small little bay in front of the their house is always a hot spot. In the spring it fills with giant smallies and provides excellent wade/fly fishing for trophy smallmouth.
The kids at the bar having breakfast.
Ryan beating up on some smallmouth right next to the pool. We even live lined a few fish on quick strike rigs while I sunbathed. It's 70 feet of water within a cast from shore here.
Jake Jones with a nice top water pike.
Smaller fish but nice all the same.
Toofs
