Way north bass guy

Holy smokes, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a word of that calibre on here before! Of course, you are a moderator, I guess that’s how you get that job on here, being able to use words like vociferous so freely ?

I have one in my arsenal of many rods that if it breaks is gonna be a sad day. Not even an expensive one either but it’s by far my favourite for the job. It’s a Berkley Lightning Hank Parker signature series rod that’s about 20 years old. MH I believe, 7’ long and is in my opinion the best rod I’ve ever tied a big double willow spinnerbait to for big smallmouth. Perfect backbone, bit of tip flex and right length to cast a mile in gin clear water.

Pretty rare around our house that someone is up past 10:00, unless it’s a weekend and we’re watching a movie or something like that. We’re up about 6:20 every day, with an earlier wake up in the summer on weekends to fish sometimes, and a “sleep in” on lazy weekend days ( especially in the dead of winter) to maybe 7:30 or so. About 99% of the time, when my head hits the pillow, I’m dead to the world in about 5min. Might get up once t for the bathroom, but right back to sleep till the alarm goes off. In the summer months, I’m pretty much going steady at some sort of project around the house until I can’t see outside, guess that’s why I’m usually asleep so quick. Carrying a bunch of stone around all day at work probably helps with getting a good nights sleep as well I guess?.

I’m often deer hunting in November, but I have in the past, and plan to this year keep the boat going for longer, as long as the weather isn’t too bad. I’ve had “warmer” late November days where I’ve had an epic shallow bite on a jerkbait. Like 50 bass a day in 3’ of water, and the temps were around 43 or so. I’ve also hit massive deeper schools on Georgian Bay when the water was in the mid to low 40s, fish on every single drop with a drop shot.

Got a few neat pics from one of my trail cameras today. This buck must’ve been darn near scratching his head on my camera.

I have literally hundreds of lakes and rivers within an hour of me that I can fish, and most of the ones I usually hit are within 20 min of the house. Used to travel 2-3 hours for tournaments, but I’m done with that nonsense nowadays. The furthest I drive now to fish is about 3.5 hours, but that’s to my parents place in Elliot Lake in northern Ontario, where we usually go for several days minimum so the drive isn’t too bad ( heading there in a couple weeks for a day or three to catch some fall super sized smallmouth).

Oh, I know all about bats. I’ve chased my share of them out of chimneys and fireplaces over the years, not to mention squirrels, raccoons, starlings, wood ducks and mergansers. Found quite a few “barbecued” and mummified critters over the years too

That pic looks quite a bit like my day to day, except where’s the bucket of mortar and your trowel??

As someone that always wanted their own little pond to fish in since childhood, it’s certainly fun to own about a 1/2 mile section of a river ??

Not a huge collector of too many things, but I do have a little of everything. I guess you could say I have a pretty good sized rock collection, but that’s mainly cause I’m a stonemason ?.

I haven’t taken too many bass pics this year, and this little guy is a long ways from being the largest one I’ve caught so far this year, but it’s a lovely copper colour, and the fact that I caught it from the river that runs through the middle of my property is “beautiful”, to me. In about 30 seconds, I can walk across my field, and be catching a mix of largemouth and smallmouth within sight of my house, and not ever see another human unless I’ve invited them to be there. That alone is worth the mortgage ?.

Thursday morning here we had light frost on the truck roof. Not enough to kill any veggies or flowers, and it’s supposed to warm back up again for a while, but it’s definitely the start of “the slide”.

So we bought our little 25 acre slice of heaven last June. Worked on mostly the inside of the house last year (painting, a new bathroom, built in bookshelves etc.), and this summer we had plans to transform the outside. Since about mid May, we’ve -Built a huge raised garden, fenced in for the many hungry deer we have here -Built a new driveway to the existing barn so I can properly store all my construction equipment/tools etc. -Painted the exterior of the barn, and 25’ utility shed that’s behind the barn so everything matches and is close in colour to the house -My brother brush hogged all the fields this summer, they haven’t been done in several years so they were getting pretty overgrown -Built a 30’x16’ lean to off the side of the barn to store the boat in year round -Just finished our new year round greenhouse, with granite veneer on the front, as well as on the front of the barn to match Needless to say, the boat collected a bit more dust this year than I wanted it to, but now that everything is pretty much wrapped up, I’m hoping to get some fish slime on it the next couple months before winter, and definitely gonna be out more next spring. It’s been a hard working summer between my regular work and stuff around the house, but when I look out the window, it sure was worth it. Here’s a pic from last fall and today. The greenhouse

I’ve always been known as the guy that has two hollow legs. I can literally eat three times the food that most people can eat, and I’ve not gained a pound since high school (25 years ago). I love just about anything I’ve tried, but if I had to choose one, it’d be a great big ole roasted turkey dinner with all the trimmings, and two, or maybe even three slices of my wife’s homemade pumpkin pie for dessert with some whip cream on top. Those are the kinds of meals where the belt comes off and the pants button comes undone, and your lying on the floor cause you can’t do anything else for a few hours except “digest”, and it’s pure bliss?.

Someone does not look happy!

A bunch of different lettuces and salad greens, peas, radishes, chives and a few other things. Our last greenhouse we built, we’d plant about this time, and be harvesting from early December all through till spring. Then we start all our outdoor plants from seed around late Feb/early March. It’s pretty nice to step in there from -30 outside in January, and it’s 80 deg inside and sunny, and you can smell the fresh dirt and veggies. I’m gonna park a couple lawn chairs in there and have a nice cold beer and close my eyes, pretend it’s July ?.

I haven’t wet the boat in a couple weekends now, been working on our new greenhouse. Got all the outside sealed up today, as well as the three receptacles wired up inside, and all the insulation done inside. Now I just have to build the raised beds inside out of concrete blocks, fill it with soil and it’s pretty much ready to go. Hopefully I’ll have it wrapped up by next weekend, just in time for some cooler fall temps to get the boat out again ( it’s still crazy hot here for this time of year).

Yeah, but can they stack em plumb ?

I have a bit of darn near everything that’s been made. I don’t care what the name says on the side, if it works, it works. That said, I don’t have anything from some of the newest company’s as far as reels go, mostly just cause I haven’t bought any new reels in a few years now.

Hang in there, hope everything goes well for you guys ??.

Man that’s just terrible, so sorry for what you guys are having to deal with. Like everyone else here, just know that we’re all here thinking about you guys, and although we can’t do much else, remember that at the very least we’re hear to listen, and talk with you if/whenever you want or need to.

Same here. Since I got a pair of Costas in glass lens, thats how I’ve treated them. I have a couple pairs, one stays in the boat all the time and one is in the truck or on my face. Always gets a rinse and very light dish soap that doesn’t have any harsh chemicals in it, and I’ve been over two years without a single scratch, and trust me, being a stonemason, I know a thing or two about dust!

You’re right, I just compared it to the lake I’m on, and I consider our lake to be quite small compared to so many others within an hour of me. I can darn near cover my whole shoreline in a full day if I never picked up the trolling motor and just kept fishing along. That lake must’ve been like a Walmart on a busy weekend when it was in its heyday! Oh yeah, happy labour ( proper Canadian spelling ?) day to everyone!

Meh, you carpenters are all the same, breaking your backs over some light weight wood! Try building these guys every day. I’ve been doing this full time for over 25 years now. (I’m kidding, any construction is hard on the body ).

Took a “Me morning”, and headed out for a few hours solo. Figured it’d be the best chance I get this weekend, and be on and off the water before the long weekend crowd shows up. Tried to get some largemouth on a frog, but it was mostly a pike morning. They were still fun when they hammered the frog, and I did manage to get this chunky guy to explode on it as well.