TyeeTanic

I'm pretty sure when you are here you can get the license at a Canadian Tire (non-residents permit) or day fishing license or something like that - and you have it right away. Best thing to do is to look online for a Canadian tire close to where you are going and call them to find out if they have the non-resident or day fishing licenses for sale. Better yet - call MNR, they are very helpful.

Hawg Wild Spin Doctor with Hawg Wild Fly.

Ya, as said above, it is to be able to quicly change out flies. When you see one color is working, then I normally pull the other lines in and change to similar colors on the back of the attractors using the quick release swivels.

Well, it happened this summer. Me and my 9 year old son were out fishing on Lake O (Canadian side) for Kings. We get a hit, he takes the rod as I steer the boat. Too big for him, so he hands me the rod. I start pulling the fish in and he grabs the net to land it. The second rod fires, so I ask him to drop the net and grab the other rod. He drops the net alright, into Lake Ontario. So here I am trying to keep the blood from blowing up my head, while I watch my only net sink to the bottom. He's now figured he's done something stupid and starts crying his head off. Third rod fires. Tighten up the drag and let it be in the holster. My son's going nuts now and not steering the fish. I get my fish in and pick it up with my hands and release. I grab the third rod, and it is tangled with my son's rod!! Spend next 30 mins untangling lines (one wire, one mono). One fish broke off, other fish landed around 22 lbs. After we both cooled off, we had a huge laugh about it. Went out and bought a much better net... just needed a good excuse.

I have one unit with both GPS and fishfinding. I operate on split screen all the time, and find that it works well. The only thing I wish is the screen was bigger on the GPS side so that I can better track my planned routes or courses that I know I strike fish better on. This is where 2 units will come in handy - you get two full screens dedicated to each task. The other thing is with combo units sometimes you lose functionality - like my Lowrance Elite 5 Gold cannot tell me trip distance. A dedicated GPS unit will likely give you some of that very good information. Lastly, you want a unit that is DSC compliant - so you can connect the GPS to a DSC Radio. A stand alone GPS again will be easier to find with that functionality than a combo unit.

I switch between fluoro and ultra green. The ultra green is tough as nails. Man if I had to guess I'd say the 8 lb is as tough as a 12 lb floro. The only thing about the ultra green that I've noticed is that it has a tough time sinking down. It's basically the reason and only reason I have switched to fluorocarbon. In fast water I find the ultra green doesn get down fast enough. But really a great line.

Spin Doctors with A-tom-mic flies have produced the most fish for me this year. I start with selecting the fly color and then choose a spin doctor to match up. Colors that have produced: -bloody death -hawg wild -green crinkle glow Mark

Happy Thanksgiving to all our friends in the USA! From Canada.

I like Lowrance, but pay careful attention to the features. I have a Lowrance Elite 5 Gold - it has everything except a critical feature, and that is a trip tacometer. There's no way for me to extract the distance travelled on a trip. This feature obviously would help me determine some interesting parameters like fuel consumption. There are obviously other features you will want - good charts, number of radar sensers and angle of beam, strength, variability of beam strength, etc. Also, would be good to have a GPS, and it would be even better if the unit is compatible with your DSC VHF/MHF radio so you have auto position indication. I'm not sure if some units will also have interfaces for down speed and down temperature indication. Other than that, I think it generates a lot of accurate information, and the automatic tuning is great. However, I wouldn't be suprised if there isn't a better unit out there.

I wouldn't say mono is useless on dipsy's. I use 2 rods on wire and 2 on mono. Yes, the mono is a pain in the backside when trying to pop the dipsy, but you can produce fish on the mono. Wire is definitely much better.

I have Rapala RSC's 10 foot dipsy wire rods with beauty rollers!! The big thing with rollers is to get a rod that has tight clearance between the roller and the guide frame, so the wire doesn't get stuck inbetween the two as a fish pulls from left to right and vice versa. Like I said, I am very happy with my Rapalas. And I agree, hoop + twilly does not compare to a good roller guide rod.

Wire is the easiest with dipsy's but I also have two on mono. The problem with mono is it stretches and once you have more than 100 feet out, it stretches too much to get the dipsey to pop open when you have a hit from a smaller fish. With wire you just pull and it pops. I have all kinds of dipsey sizes, but find the No.1 is the most versatile, so I would just stick with this size. I have a few different colors that I match up with my Spin Doctor, but I don't think it matters all that much. I used to use a snubber, but found it got tangled around the dipsy too much and prevented the dipsy from popping, not good with a big fish on. I no longer use a snubber and find that my landing success has improved.

..... and that is another reason why it was a good move for me to replace the braid with mono on my chute rods. I have 2 wire rods on the outside to get me depth and fish higher in the column with the mono lines. Anyhow - who can't save $40 after 10 years to buy new braid line????????? How much do you spend on coffee a week? Mortigan - love you man.

Guys - are you serious?!?!? Mortigan, when did I do that before???? That is about the most retarded comment I've ever seen here... I'm sure all of your Canadian mates on Spoonpullers will be ecstatic about your comment... Of course I know he said 500 YARDS = 1500 feet. Tbro - it doesn't matter if you have 500000000 yards on your reels, I was saying he needs to get at least 1000 feet on HIS reel. He didn't say anything about what reel he has in his starting post (go back and check above!). So I was telling him to make sure whatever he does to get at least that amount on the reel, and that he shouldn't be afraid of using 30 lb power pro if for instance he found he could not fit enough of the 50 lb line on. And I still stick to what I say, 50 lb is not necessary for king salmon in lake ontario. What lead strength do you use ... I'm guessing 20 lb right? That is your weakest link - so even if you have 30 lb or 40 lb braid as backing, you are good enough. Why should he spend the extra money on 50 lb if 30 lb test is good enough???? Guys, just because people have been on this site for less than a year doesn't mean they know nothing about fishing. I've been fishing for about 25 years - from Bass to Pike to Rainbow to Salmon to King Macheral to Tarpon to Shark to Snook, to Sea Trout, etc. etc. I think I know a thing or two about what I'm doing here. Don't automatically think because you don't know us that we are automatically all idiots.

Tbro - I wansn't saying you were guessing. I was saying that what I am saying has been succesful for me. Not trying to offend anyone here. Also, I have lots of experience with braid in other applications. I do a lot of fishing down in Florida and braid is the way to go for snook, reds, and tarpon. Tarpon is the killer here. They will typically run 500 to 700 feet of line before they get tired, so you need minimum 1000 feet to have a chance landing these fish. The point is, he should have at least 800 - 1000 feet of line on the reel - DON'T YOU AGREE?? If his reel won't fit that much 50lb line on, then what? Do you go with less length of a stronger line, or the right length of a lighter line? I think 30 lb to 40 lb is definitely enough. I haven't had any breaks yet on my 30 lb test, and I have landed a lot of fish this summer. Anyhow - seems his reels are big enough for the 50 lb PP, so go for that. However, I agree it will be painful/impossible to use when the fleas come out - so as long as you are okay doing without these reels for the 3 or so weeks that Fleas are around, you will be happy with braid - it is a nice line to work with. Mark

I only use salt and sugar. 1) Rinse eggs in distilled/spring water or better yet, fill a 2L coke bottle with river water. Chlorine in tap water can make eggs go fowl. 2) Put eggs into a plastic container and then add more distilled/spring water to just cover them. 3) Add 1 teaspoon sugar and 1 teaspoon salt to the batch and mix thoroughly. Leave for a couple of hours. 4) Drain in strainer 5) Keep in fridge overnight. 6) Proportion eggs into batches you will use on a weeken (I fill a medicine bottle up) and then pour into seran wrap. Twist the seran wrap closed so you end up with a portioned sache of eggs. 7) Store in a cardboard box filled with shredded paper to protect from the frost and then freeze. When you want to make sacs, take one seran sache out of the box and let it defrost naturally in the fridge for several hours. 9) Tie your nice hard eggs into sacs. 10) Put on hook, drop in water, and catch fish. Mark

695 votes and counting now.

Firstly you should put 900 - 1000 ft of line on the reel. You may find yourself trolling with 250 ft of line out if you want to achieve depths of 70 ft or so. A screamer will easily take 300 ft or more of line. Do you want to lose all your tackle and line when this happens. So the question becomes how much line will fit on your reel. I use 30 lb power pro, it is good enough. More than this is an overkill. If you have a very large reel, maybe I'd stretch it to 40 lb test, not more than this. A reel with the drag set properly can easily pull any salmon out of the water with 30 lb test. I am catching very lively salmon in the rivers right now. Fish are 30 lbs, line is 8 lb test. Drag is the key. This is not a guess, this is what I practice, and I lose maybe only 5% of my fish, normally due to other reasons.

The other thing about this is that you can try and fish for salmon when the run is fresh. There's not too much fun about pulling a salmon that's out of energy from the water. Kind of like pulling out deadwood. But, if you can hook into some fresh lake run silver salmon, man they can give you a fight to talk about, highlighted with nice jumps and all. It then takes a bit of skill to succesfuly land the salmon. So, there is some fun to be had catching these fish, but yes catch and release is my golden rule this time of the year. I would rather put them back to have a chance of spawning then waste them. Ministry of Natural Resources Ontario does not recommend eating fish over 14" long due to mercury and PCB levels which have accumulated in older fish. There's a report out called "Up to the Gills" - read it for more info. So, I don't eat 4 year old salmon, I only keep the shakers from the lake (5-6 lbs).

Well, I've given away silver salmon to just about every neighbor on my street, fresh out of the lake caugth June - August and they all have said it was the best tasting fish EVER! I caught a few lakers and they are just flabby, why is that?? I don't think they have anywhere near the same texture as a salmon and I wouldn't even consider eating them. As for river run chinook - forget that too, those things are nasty when they start turning dark.

How did you manage to haul that fish into your boat?? You must have had a crane on board!!

Supposed to be good weather this weekend. Maybe a run to the blue zone will work, but be careful! I'm finding me a queit spot on the tribs and river fishing tomorrow!!

They are predicting 12 foot high waves out in front of Rochester and Sodus Bay on Saturday through Sunday!!! See this link: http://www.crh.noaa.gov/greatlakes/?c=map&l=lo&p=a&m=wh Be very careful - in fact stay at home, everyone!!! It'll probably take several days to get all of that wave energy out of the lake - the big rollers will stay for some time.

I am a Canadian. Have heard a lot about the atlantic program and hear both arguments .... it's a failure, it's a success. Go figure. Anyhow - I disregard all that stuff and look at the facts. A lot of us Canadians fishing on the lake have hooked into at least 1 Atlantic this year. I caught about a 10 lb atlantic in front of Shell Pier in Oakville in late June 2011. Adult atlantics were found in the credit river after an electro-fishing excercise to harvest chinook eggs. This is the first time on record that this has happened. So, I can't say that the Atlantics have fully taken and considered self sustainable (but what fish is anyhow), but I can say that things seem to be way better than they use to in the not so distant past!

Fleas stick to braid because of its texture. It absorbs them a lot more then wire or mono. Wire is a much better choice than braid for many reasons. Get 7 strand torpedo wire 30# break strength. [ Post made via BlackBerry ]