Hi Everyone

I've been fishing since I was a kid, grew up with a worm and bobber, then trolling on the great lakes in Ontario, Canada. After a 7 year hiatus (undergrad and graduate school), I've gotten back into fishing, just wrapped up spring steelhead with my centrepin.

 

Anyways, I've been invited to a friend's cottage in the haliburton region of Ontario, I believe the lake is called Sawyer's lake which connects to another: Kashawigamog. Apparently there are bass, muskie and laketrout... this friend has a young son who loved when we caught 6" rock bass from their dock, but this year I was hoping to introduce him to some smallmouth/largemouth. I have lots of time to prepare, wont be going there until mid august.

 

I have a few rods, spinning and baitcasters all rigged with powerpro 15lb braided. I was thinking of tying some fluorocarbon leaders and using plastic baits, as Im not sure how available dew worms will be. Anyways, I have access to a canoe, and there are some spots that can be fished from shore, but was wondering if I can get some suggestions on plastics, how to rig them, and what size hooks/weight to use... I found a thread here about versatility baits and a lot of them are available to me, but I have no idea what type of hooks/weight to use... I was hoping I could get some suggestions on baits for bottom fishing, then something for topwater, and something that goes across different depths like a wacky rigged senko. If you have time and have a suggestion on your miind, please let me know what bait, color, hook etc, as I will be going on a bit of an online shopping spree (nobody tell my wife!)

thanks in advance

 

Aaron

A tall order indeed!

 

You seem to know of the Senko-style bait (one of the most versatile baits), so that's a start: wacky or weightless texas-rigged will work.  

 

I'd recommend EWG hooks for versatility.  You can wacky and texas-rig with those.  3/0 or 4/0 are pretty standard.

 

Colors: start with greens, browns, and blacks.    Those natural colors are for generally for clearer water, blacks are for muddy. 

 

For bottom: you can still use those Senko-style baits/stickbaits.  Get a bullet sinker (1/4 oz is a good starting place), put it on the line before tying the hook to make a weighted texas-rig.  You could also use a craw/creature style bait. 

 

Topwaters: try a topwater popper, simple and effective. 

 

These will get you started.  Check out some more BassResource topics, there's a lot of great info that can help with the specifics and how to do certain techniques. 

Welcome aboard Aaron! Don’t forget the life jackets when out on the water. Sounds like you have a good time ahead of you. I’m sure there will be some northern fishermen that can help you better than I can. Good luck and post your results this summer. 

The bass where you fish are high % Smallmouth. 

You use spinning tackle so I recommend 3 rigs for soft plastics; drop shot, finesse C-rig/ Split and Ned rig.

Hooks; Owner Mosquito  or Gamakatsu Drop in size 1 for nose hooked drop shot. Owner #5133 or 5100 size 2/0 for Finesse C-rig/ Split Shot. 

Weights; 1/8 oz tubular “mojo” sliding sinker, Size #4 round split shot, 1/8 oz tear drop drop shot.

Ned jig Owner Block Head 1/8 oz.

Worms; Roboworms 5 1/2” curl tail and 6” fat straight tail.

Colors, Oxblood light red flake and MMIII.

Ned worm 3” Aaron’s magic or Green pumpkin Amber.

Leader for 10# braid 6 to 8 lb mono or FC, 6’ to 7’ long.

Drop Shot weight about 10” below hook.

Split Shot weight about 24” above hook

Study the BR site video’s for each technique on how to rig and fish them.

Good luck,

Tom

PS, the above is what I use. Everything is available from Tackle Warehouse add 2 weeks to Canada.

 

 

 

 

smallmouth bass

watermelon red flake/brown gold flake/white pepper flake tubes use with with ewg hooks in weeds or  3/16 oz round head jigs with a stout hook.

3" spook jr in bone or pro blue

black bitsy bug jig with a pit boss jr trailer in junebug

white super fluke with an 1/0 octopus hook

neko rigged swamp crawler (nail wt.) and a 1/0 octopus hook

 

trout

#3 inline spinners like a blue fox or a mepps

power bait trout worms or powerbait mouse tails

 

musky (so frustrating I wouldnt bother and #15 braid won't cut it)

double bladed inline spinners with bucktail 

 

 

 

Are there no pike in this lake? In addition to the suggestions above i like paddletails as a search bait. I use a jighead but a weighted swimbait hook also works. 

A small swim bait on a jig head is great way to easily catch some fish,  a 3.8 or smaller keitech/rage swimmer would be a good place to start.

17 hours ago, Kenny Yi said:

A tall order indeed!

 

You seem to know of the Senko-style bait (one of the most versatile baits), so that's a start: wacky or weightless texas-rigged will work.  

 

I'd recommend EWG hooks for versatility.  You can wacky and texas-rig with those.  3/0 or 4/0 are pretty standard.

 

Colors: start with greens, browns, and blacks.    Those natural colors are for generally for clearer water, blacks are for muddy. 

 

For bottom: you can still use those Senko-style baits/stickbaits.  Get a bullet sinker (1/4 oz is a good starting place), put it on the line before tying the hook to make a weighted texas-rig.  You could also use a craw/creature style bait. 

 

Topwaters: try a topwater popper, simple and effective. 

 

These will get you started.  Check out some more BassResource topics, there's a lot of great info that can help with the specifics and how to do certain techniques. 

Hi Kenny, thanks so much for all of this! I'm compiling a spreadsheet/shopping list today, so far most of these are available to me!

16 hours ago, Smells like fish said:

Welcome aboard Aaron! Don’t forget the life jackets when out on the water. Sounds like you have a good time ahead of you. I’m sure there will be some northern fishermen that can help you better than I can. Good luck and post your results this summer. 

Hi SMF, thank you! My wife and I recently purchased some nice PFDs for kayaking, salus angler, anyways, we spent a bit extra to get nice, comfortable PFDs to make sure we wore them...first trip out, wife takes hers off... *facepalm*...it went back on eventually..

11 hours ago, WRB said:

The bass where you fish are high % Smallmouth. 

You use spinning tackle so I recommend 3 rigs for soft plastics; drop shot, finesse C-rig/ Split and Ned rig.

Hooks; Owner Mosquito  or Gamakatsu Drop in size 1 for nose hooked drop shot. Owner #5133 or 5100 size 2/0 for Finesse C-rig/ Split Shot. 

Weights; 1/8 oz tubular “mojo” sliding sinker, Size #4 round split shot, 1/8 oz tear drop drop shot.

Ned jig Owner Block Head 1/8 oz.

Worms; Roboworms 5 1/2” curl tail and 6” fat straight tail.

Colors, Oxblood light red flake and MMIII.

Ned worm 3” Aaron’s magic or Green pumpkin Amber.

Leader for 10# braid 6 to 8 lb mono or FC, 6’ to 7’ long.

Drop Shot weight about 10” below hook.

Split Shot weight about 24” above hook

Study the BR site video’s for each technique on how to rig and fish them.

Good luck,

Tom

PS, the above is what I use. Everything is available from Tackle Warehouse add 2 weeks to Canada.

 

 

 

 

Hi WRB, thanks for this list! Not all are available from the one place I prefer to shop, but i have enough time that I can wait for the longer shipping time from the tackle warehouse!

7 hours ago, PaulVE64 said:

smallmouth bass

watermelon red flake/brown gold flake/white pepper flake tubes use with with ewg hooks in weeds or  3/16 oz round head jigs with a stout hook.

3" spook jr in bone or pro blue

black bitsy bug jig with a pit boss jr trailer in junebug

white super fluke with an 1/0 octopus hook

neko rigged swamp crawler (nail wt.) and a 1/0 octopus hook

 

trout

#3 inline spinners like a blue fox or a mepps

power bait trout worms or powerbait mouse tails

 

musky (so frustrating I wouldnt bother and #15 braid won't cut it)

double bladed inline spinners with bucktail 

 

 

 

Hi Paul! Thanks! Honestly, I'll keep my trout fishing on the river, this trip, in my opinion is primarily for bass and to make some good memories for the little kid we will be visiting, the lake trout are supposed to be quite deep, especially during August, and I dont know of a way to get lures down that deep, aside from downriggers (wont be brining those). I'm not equipped for musky fishing, but I would like to do that one day especially since I live near Lake St. Clair which is supposed to be good musky fishing

 

7 hours ago, michaelb said:

Are there no pike in this lake? In addition to the suggestions above i like paddletails as a search bait. I use a jighead but a weighted swimbait hook also works. 

 

Hi Michael, there might be pike, but most reports are bass, muskie, laketrout, I'll have a few huskyjerks and countdown body baits to throw around incase, they would also go after some of these soft baits too, right?

5 hours ago, BlakeMolone said:

A small swim bait on a jig head is great way to easily catch some fish,  a 3.8 or smaller keitech/rage swimmer would be a good place to start.

Thanks Blake! Will be adding swimmmers to the list!

Deep lake trout fishing can be done jigging with Heddon Sonar or Silver Buddy blade lures using standard tackle. Let drop to the bottom lift with the rod and reel back up...repeat.

Musky often strike larger size jerk baits used for bass fishing Rapala Husky Jerk  and Bomber Long A CHO color (chrome gold/ black back/orange belly) can be fished on bass tackle

Good luck.

Tom

2 hours ago, WRB said:

Deep lake trout fishing can be done jigging with Heddon Sonar or Silver Buddy blade lures using standard tackle. Let drop to the bottom lift with the rod and reel back up...repeat.

Musky often strike larger size jerk baits used for bass fishing Rapala Husky Jerk  and Bomber Long A CHO color (chrome gold/ black back/orange belly) can be fished on bass tackle

Good luck.

Tom

Hi WRB

for a silver buddy, is there any guideline as to what weight to get? does it depend on lake depth? I'm assuming lighter gives more action, but is slower to get to bottom, but is there a way to find out whats best?

https://www.bassresource.com/fishing-techniques?field_tags_target_id=168&items_per_page=20

1 hour ago, simko said:

Hi WRB

for a silver buddy, is there any guideline as to what weight to get? does it depend on lake depth? I'm assuming lighter gives more action, but is slower to get to bottom, but is there a way to find out whats best?

Depth + current determines weight.

Lake Trout not Rainbow trout  jigging works good in the summer. 

1/2 oz to 30’

3/4 oz to 75’

Rainbow and Bass in-line spinners like Panther Martin 1/4 oz.

Tom