Way north bass guy

Sorry to hear about that, make sure to hold onto those memories with him.

As a fisherman from the “great white North”, I can tell you with all certainty that if I was able to catch DD bass on a buzz bait at Christmas, without having to fly somewhere to do it, I would NEVER miss ice fishing! Spent the day in the woods in a mix of snow and rain today. Was definitely not a topwater day, but we did bring home two deer for the freezer though ??

“Always eat only yellow snow”. Or is it”don’t eat yellow snow”. I can’t remember, maybe just drink beer instead ?

Simcoe if your looking for smallmouth over 5, although I’ve seen some monstrous bags of smallies come from both Rice and Scugog as well. For largemouth, they all seem to have some good ones, just have to find them. I haven’t fished the Kawarthas in almost 20 years, but used to fish tournaments there all the time back in the day. I’ve seen some big largemouth come from all of them, but if I had to pick a couple lakes, it’d be either Sturgeon or Buckhorn. My tournament partner and I got fish to 6lbs on each of them over the years, but honestly you could get one on any of the lakes. We always had our best luck in the thickest, nastiest slop you could find.

Me too! I’ve given one a shot several times over the last two years, and all I manage to catch is pike. I figured they’d be gangbusters here in Georgian Bay’s gin clear waters, and I’m sure they are for some people, but not me. I can go through an area with one and haul water, and turn right around and hit the same area with a big spinnerbait and hammer the smallmouth. Guess I’ll just keep crushing them with the good ole spinnerbait instead.

Those are fabulous. Looks like a great way to spend a couple days.

Such a great loss to the world. He was definitely one of my favourite bass guys, and seemed like a truly wonderful person. I know it doesn’t likely do a bit of good right now to his family, but I hope one day they can appreciate the love he got from so many other people from all over the world, and the things he taught everyone while he was here ( not just fishing lessons either).

Yup, used to be a maple on our property that did that exact thing. It was totally grown right back together with about a ten foot gap between. Pretty cool to see, and I’ll bet it’s very rare.

Yeah, it can get a bit frosty up here some years! Lots of lakes up here get enough ice to drive a truck on. I remember quite a few years ago I was working on an island cottage build in the winter. It was a huge cottage, there were about 30 guys working there most of the winter. Roads plowed in all different directions across the lake that year, we had about 36” of ice. I remember when everyone got out to the island, we just parked on the ice beside the cottage, and it looked like a Walmart parking lot out there ?.

30-30 Winchester model 94. Been a wonderful little rifle for the kind of hunting I’m doing. All day still hunting in the big woods, where a long shot is about 70 yds and most times you only have a very short window to swing and get ready to shoot. This little rifle is nice and light and nimble for carrying all day long.

The view from my “office lunchroom” today.

I’ve spent thousands of hours on the ice over the years, chasing just about everything that’s in season at one time or another. I will admit though, as I’ve gotten older, my time in the ice has dwindled greatly. Some of it is due to being busy with work and other stuff, but I also don’t enjoy the cold like I used to. If I could launch the boat year round these days, that’d be just fine by me. Boy did you ever! If you can keep it over on your side of Lake Huron, that’s be fantastic ?.

Woke up to the first actual snow on the ground today. It was all gone by about 1:00 when the sun came out. As a bass fisherman, it isn’t a nice sight, but as a deer hunter, it was a lovely thing to see. If it only showed up for two weeks in November, then was gone for the rest of the year, that’d be just about perfect for me.

With the big boat already put away for the winter, of course we have had some lovely, warm and dry weather here the last several days. Got the mower out one last time and gave the yard a good haircut, and mulched up all the leaves while they were nice and dry. Sure is nice at our new place for leaves, very few and they’re all pretty small so I can mulch em all up in one pass. Take that, stupid leaf rake!

@Catt, you look like you could use a touch more sunscreen in your daily regiment ?.

Went for a walk behind the house this evening, the river is starting to look more like fall now. Cold, swollen and pretty much free of any summer weeds. Still was a very peaceful place to spend a bit of time on my own watching the sun go down over our fields and river.

I’ve noticed a bit of an uptick in game populations around my neck of the woods the last couple years. We’ve had a couple winters that weren’t so harsh for cold or snow depth, which helps the deer and turkeys out big time. Last year the deer trails in the big woods that I hunt looked like cattle trails in a pasture field, beat right to mud. Tons of turkeys in the fields and hardwoods around here too. Couple weeks ago I saw about 30 two fields over from my place. I hope to get my field cut down next year, as it’s been grown in quite a bit the last few years. Hopefully they’ll be hanging around here then and I can get into a few birds come spring.

Nice frosty morning over the back field this morning. Looked like a beautiful morning to chase a deer or two around, but sadly I had to work. Next Monday is rifle opener here though, and work can go pound sand for a couple days then ?.

Been pretty much the only jerkbait I’ve thrown the last few years. I’ve caught a ton of nice smallmouth, largemouth and I also do quite well in the spring and later in the fall for big pike with them. Pretty darn good bang for the buck as far as I’m concerned.

Well, looks like that dirty four letter word has decided to show itself for the first time here this year. Woke up to below freezing temps and flurries coming from the sky, and an icy back deck for the dogs to skate across for their morning rituals. Then I remembered that I had to check out a new project with a customer today, that happened to be about six miles up a big lake. That was not a very fun boat ride at all! I was gonna keep my boat out for a few more weeks still, but after this mornings freezing run, and the fact that I’ll have to tow my rig about 1/2 hour to it’s winter storage spot when I do get it winterized ( don’t want to leave it too long and have to tow it in snow/salty roads), I decided she’s getting prepped for hibernation this weekend. By the time I get done with deer season in a couple weeks, it’ll probably be too crappy out to fish much anyway. Next year when I get my shop setup properly here at our new place, the boat won’t have to be towed anywhere to its winter bed, so it’ll be fished out of until I can’t launch it anymore for lake ice. Hurry up spring!!!

Your lucky. We have way too many windows in our new place and it takes way too much time to clean them all. Makes for great views though.

Pretty much the same for me, except it’s only two times a year. Late spring/early summer when the white pine up here let all their billions of tons of pollen loose, and again later in the summer when there’s haying going on. The nasal spray I take pretty much makes it clear up 100%, and I only need to take it for several weeks a year, but it’s the best thing in the world for me.

This seems like a subject that can have many different, and “correct” answers. The “best” fall conditions for someone like @N Florida Mike are likely to be much, much different than for a guy like me, way up here in Ontario. He’s probably looking at a very slightly cooler weather pattern, with probably fairly clear sky’s, whereas I’m likely looking at cold, possibly even at or below freezing conditions ( at least in the mornings), with often wet days and lots of wind thrown in for good measure. All I’m saying is it’s very hard for so many guys from all over North America giving you an answer, they might be all correct for where they’re wetting a line. I will say that I’ve personally had some good days when it’s downright miserable outside in the fall, but as the season gets closer to ice up, I’ve had some fantastic days when we get a warming trend with low winds. Hope this helps…

Took the day off today and hit lake Simcoe with my cousin. We used to fish tournaments together here about 20 years ago, and haven’t had the time to get out there together for years. Didn’t catch a ton of fish today, but it was beautiful weather and had a great day just roaming around and hitting some old spots and shooting the breeze all day long. Saw a few monsters cruising, but couldn’t hook anything over about 3-1/2lbs or so.

I can’t believe the number of praying mantises there are around our new place. Every time you walk in the field you see one. They’re all different colours too, depending on what kind of plants they are hanging around on. This guy was hanging onto the barn door today, waiting for a nice juicy wasp or some stable flys I guess.