Well, Norm & I were back out again today to see if the water had cleaned up some after the tournament weekend. It had and was back to almost perfect color but still a little higher than usual from the heavy rainfall from last week. We hit similar areas and wouldn’t you know it, landed a lunker in the high 5 pound range. This was surely a fish that we could have used a couple of days earlier but that’s fishing! The air temps were in the upper 50’s and the water temps had fallen slightly and were around 58 degrees but the sun was out and that would hopefully activate the fish. The one thing I noticed though was the presence of a new boat fishing the shallows. As we approached him, he decided to put a ski had on that covered his face completely. Looked like he had something to hide and I don’t think he was robbing a bank! He was obviously an observer from the B1 tournament and another guy that was looking for a free ride. He definitely didn’t know the area because he ran up on rocks several times and had to push himself off with a paddle. I’m sure there will be even more in the next couple of weeks! Throughout the day we managed to get into fish pretty much all over on a variety of different presentations. Although we didn’t really have any competition, our 5 best would have been another 20 pound plus bag once again. Go figure! We stuck it out until almost 5 o’clock and called it a day. It was nice to get out again in a non tournament position and just enjoy the day!!

No rest for me today as I was back on the water with Ross & Jack this morning, searching once more. I had decided to go to another body of water and couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw how high the water was. Looks like another day of finding fish again! Just trying to orient myself along newly developed current breaks was a treat as both of them casted jigs to the murky depths. Along with the high water was the presence of coffee with three creams! This was going to be a challenge to say the least as I began the exploration. Water temps were definitely falling with the color and were showing about 57 degrees at best. Fortunately for us, the sun was out and the air temps reached almost 60 degrees with a light SW wind. As with the last few days I was able to locate fish in shallow and although they caught more in the deep, the largest ones came from less than 3 feet of water. Both Jack & Ross caught their fair share of 2 to 3.5 pound smallies throughout the day, mostly on jigs but it was Ross that would get the lunker. Late in the afternoon he managed to hook into a personal best smallie that soon came to rest in the net, in awe. A quick weight read 5.25 pounds and surpassed his previous best by well over a pound. A few quick picks and back to the mud pit she went. By 4:00 we had seen enough and called it a day. As this trip was a 50th birthday gift from Ross’s wife, Jack got to benefit from it as well. They had caught & released plenty of fish today and the birthday boy had a great present with plenty of memories to last a while. Great day on the water!

Day two saw us up & out early and we arrived with plenty of time to just relax before putting the boat in the water. With our weight from yesterday putting us in the lead, we had to have a guest aboard today in the form of a camera man. I just hoped he wouldn’t be in the way while trying to land fish! The day started with us blasting off first and it wasn’t long before the camera guy realized that the floor of the boat was the place to be as the wind chill numbed his face. We arrived at our location and wasted no time with the fish. I believe it was the second or third cast and a 2.5 pound smallie was swinging into the camera lens with a lift. We managed to get a limit of fish fairly quickly but they weren’t the size I expected and to make matters worse, we were sharing the fish today. It’s always amazing to me how people tend to flock to an area on the second day when they know how well you did the previous day. Oh well that’s tournament fishing in Quebec! We even had one boat that was committed to shadowing us for about two hours. They would go around the outside of us just to get ahead of the path we were on and even when I turned around they would manage to do the same. I just told Norm to block them out and keep fishing as it would only get worse if we acknowledged their presence. Although we bumped up our bag slightly throughout the morning it wasn’t until the camera man was out around noon that we started hitting bigger fish. The sun was warming the areas we casted and the fish became active. At one point, both of us simultaneously hooked up and it was chaos. Norm slammed a decent fish and one second later, I nailed another. When I saw both fish go to the air I realized that mine was quality and hoped Norm would land his first. Not going to happen and I was forced to swing a 4.5 pounder into the boat and net his instantly after. We had just managed to put 8 pounds of bass in the boat in seconds and cull out two fish for about four pounds. We were pumped and wanted more! Unfortunately, the rest of our culls were just ounces as we bumped & grinded our way through the afternoon. We did have a few fish try to attack us right at the boat only to miss the lures completely. I hoped this wouldn’t come back & haunt us at the scales. Time was getting on so we decided to head back to the weigh in not chancing anything. I’ve lost tournaments by 0.05 before and wasn’t going to leave anything to chance today. We made it back in plenty of time and waited quite a while before it was our turn to weigh. As we were in first place going into the second day, we were forced to wait and weigh in last today, building the suspense even more. When the scales came to rest, we had missed the win by 0.56 pounds and finished second. Mere ounces had separated us from Norm’s first win as we came up just short. It was the huge lunker of 6.43 on the first day that secured Jacque & Stephane’s win and they deserved it. We weren’t as fortunate and never really had a kicker to aid in our two days of fishing. We hadn’t dropped any fish that would have made a difference and executed to almost perfection in the tournament. Although we did have to throw out all the pre fishing we had done at least we had adjusted quick enough to be able to be in contention. Norm & I had competed in the largest Quebec tournament and finished second. I know he will cherish the memories along with the trophy for quite some time. He had gotten to compete and see all the good along with some of the bad and now had a better understanding of the tournament scene. I hope he’ll be able to sleep tonight!!

I was on the water again this weekend with Norm, but this time we weren’t pleasure fishing. We were entered in the Berkley B1 Tournament, along with another 143 boats. The competition had boats from as far away as the east coast, along with plenty from Ontario & Quebec. This would prove to be the largest tournament event ever held in this province and Norm wanted to fish it. After many, many years of tournament competition, I really had no desire to enter. Norm had already enrolled us though and I was going to show him just what it was all about. As with every event, this one was also going to have its pro’s & cons! The first morning saw cold, crisp air temps barely above freezing after a torrential rain just days before. Would our fish still be there and would they be willing to bite? Winds were light but out of the NE making the long run a little bumpy at times. Add the cold air and it felt like you were driving on the highway with your head out of the window! When we did arrive I wasn’t surprised to see the water color looking like coffee with three creams. It had changed from clear to mud with the 50 plus millimeters of rain that had fallen and this was definitely going to affect the fishing. We had only practiced a day and a half but realized where we needed to be and we were here. Water color wasn’t going to stop us from catching! Along with the color, we had also lost about 5 degrees in water temperature and that worried me more. With only two fish in the livewell within the first couple of hours, I knew we were going to have to make a serious adjustment. High, muddy water and fish tuck in tight! Tight it was and we went right in and just started pounding them! Norm was on fire and the fish were big. We were culling soon after and three pounders were a thing of the past as they were exchanged for quality. One more big fish was all we needed to exchange but this was a little more difficult than all the previous ones. Eventually we were able to get the last cull done and I knew we had a phenomenal bag for the first day of the tournament. With plenty of time left in the day, I decided to pull the plug and head back comfortably. We took our time and didn’t pound the fish along the way in ensuring their safety and arrived with over 30 minutes to spare. With the weigh in under way from the first flight of boats, we had to wait until the second flight was called. This felt like forever but we finally were able to weigh our fish. I knew there were a lot of low weights but there were also a couple of big bags weighed and I was sure we would be another. The water weigh in system finally had the scales stop on 24.71 pounds and we officially took first. Two other bags over 24 pounds were also weighed in making it a close event and one we surely had a chance to win. In all this mass of fish, we really didn’t have a kicker in the bag as all were pretty much clones. Hopefully tomorrow, we would be able to change that!

Day two saw us in even stronger winds but this time from the NE causing a completely different scenario. I would once more have an interesting day of boat control and have to hit different areas due to the shift in winds. As with the previous day we were still in the clouds with no sun throughout the day. Air temps felt a whole lot cooler with the winds and I don’t think it made it over 55 degrees by the peak afternoon time. Thankfully, the fish were still on fire and Brian went back to hammering them once more. As with yesterday, there were a couple of particular areas that held more fish than the others and we took advantage of them, seeing as how they were slightly out of the wind. The jigs were once again working better than the Crankbaits and he kept with them throughout the day. This is not to say that he didn’t catch on them, but they were few and far between. The fish were pressed to the bottom and rather reluctant to lift in the dirty water. I believe that he had at least one fish over 5 pounds today and just like yesterday, plenty of others slightly smaller as well. This day ended just like the previous one with action throughout. Another spectacular one despite the weather!! This was to be the third and last day of Brian’s trip before he was off to try his luck with Muskie and hopefully his best. The winds hadn’t subsided at all and were still blowing 10 to 20 from the wrong direction as we began the day. It’s never great to have an east wind let alone a strong one, but we tried not to worry about it as I held the boat in position. It wasn’t easy to feel the bites or even the bottom but Brian managed to get several fish in each area as we jumped all over looking for only bigguns! Today had fewer fish landed but they were slightly larger and that was even better. I think he had a couple over 5 pounds with one of them in the high fives. Plenty of mid three pounders and a few more over four were caught along with a pile of bass in the 2 to 3 pound size before it was all said & done. In the three days out he had managed to get great numbers and many of them were quality bites. Anytime you can succeed with the conditions we were faced with, it’s a good thing. Brian would have to wait another year before a smallie would be fought again. He will however be tangling with multiple salmon and incredible steelhead back home and I think I’m jealous. I wonder if he would trade places for a few weeks!!