Part 1: Although this was to be the first report of the New Year, there have been several successful Steelhead trips already. This time however, Jay was to have his first experience with the silver bullets of Lake Ontario tribs! We managed to intercept a window of weather that was to play into our hands just perfectly. Prior to today, there had been a 5-day period of extreme cold temperatures both during the night as well as the day. When conditions are like that, the fishing is just not very easy! We timed our drive to the river so that we would arrive around 11:00 AM & the previous nights temps would have had a chance to warm up a little more. Some of the slush ice would be gone too making our drifts through the holding areas 100 percent. Before noon, we were wetting a line with sunshine & air temps above freezing but feeling more like Florida to us after the last few days. I worked with Jay for about 15 minutes explaining most of the details required to work a float effectively and where the fish would be holding at this time of the year. When I felt that he was ready, I put a fresh egg sac on his hook and coached him some more. Several minutes & several casts later, it finally happened! The float went under and Jay set the hook into a real beauty. The fish came up to the surface shaking its head violently as I thought to myself; this wasn’t going to end well. It was in the 12 to 15 pound class and probably too much for him to handle for his first fish. Line was coming off the reel at an alarming rate as Jay tightened the drag a bit to try and slow the fish down. He played the fish for over 10 minutes like a tug of war. Every time he managed to gain some line, the beast took it right back out. We actually had to chase it down the river a ways just to get back some of the distance between us. Just when I thought he was making headway, the fish decided to turn, bolt down river through some shallow rapids and break off. Jay was left with an unbelievable look on his face that should have been photographed. He had just been spanked by the best! Although the battle hadn’t ended well, he just didn’t seem to mind. Fighting a fish with this much power in the middle of the winter was just too good to believe. I retied his leader, put him back to work in the same area he just fished and told him there were probably more to be caught. He eventually had another encounter with a fresh silver bullet as the float disappeared under the surface once more. This time when he set the hook however, the fish was a little more cooperative. Jay was able to fight the steelie and bring her close enough to be able to be landed. Several times he had the float at the tip of the rod and that is considered a landed fish when you don’t carry a net in my eyes. I tried a couple of times to grab the tail with a glove but she was never quite close enough to get a good shot. With all the cold temperatures lately, the river had created shelf ice along the shore and as luck would have it, the fish decided to go under one of the ice flows. Another mishap was about to occur as she cut the leader just above the hook. Although this didn’t end with a picture, it didn’t really matter, as she would have been released anyway. Jay had hooked into two of the most powerful winter fish he had ever had on and was happy just to play with them for a while. I was pretty sure that his luck was soon to change and we moved to another run nearby. After explaining to Jay where to drift his presentation, he was off to the races. Several minutes passed and then it happened again, “Fish On”! Immediately after lighting his cigar the fish hit and he was tight to a nice steelhead once more. He had plenty of open water to fight this fish and I was able to get a grab on the tail for his first picture. She was a beautiful fresh steelie of about 7 or 8 pounds and returned immediately to the river to fight again. This was to be the last fish Jay was to get into today, but it was still more than he ever expected it to be. By being able to catch fish like this in the middle of the winter with a rod & reel should make someone think twice about ice fishing. It really has to be experienced in order to be believed! [attachment=0:2ah4x4c5]Jay Tailing Steelie.jpg[/attachment:2ah4x4c5] [attachment=1:2ah4x4c5]Tailing a Tiger.jpg[/attachment:2ah4x4c5]

Part 2: After having such a big meal last night, we both decided to skip breakfast and head to the river instead. I opted for a different section in pursuit of fresh, untouched metal heads as we hiked into an area that was free of fresh footprints. I thought Jay was going to hit fish in every spot he fished, but to my surprise that was not to happen. It took over an hour and several holes before he finally had a take and was “Locked Up”! It was another beautiful, fresh steelhead and one hell of a battle before I grabbed the tail of an 8 or 9 pound fish. With a very light, pink stripe down the side of this fish, I couldn’t wait to take a few pics. Once more, the fish was released unharmed afterwards to fight another day! Jay was definitely getting the hang of this and I thought it was time to relax on the instructions and see what he could accomplish on his own. In the next spot, I showed him where the fish generally hold under this water flow and backed off to be one with the trees. Although it was hard for me not to continue instructing him, I knew it was for the best. It was even tougher seeing his float go under in the holding area and not react. Fortunately, he was paying attention and set into what was to be his personal best of the trip. This was a big male and he had other ideas in store for Jay. I knew he was about to have the fight of his life as line peeled from the reel and the fish headed down river. I just had to coach him a little bit to try and gain the upper hand before another disaster occurred. As he started to gain some line, the fish took even more out and we were almost forced to follow him down. Fortunately Jay was able to turn the beast and began to reel him back up stream to where I could manage a shot at the tail. I made sure that I was only going to take one attempt and made it count with the glove. What a relief when I got my hand around his tail and cradled the front of him to show Jay what he had just caught. This was a spectacular fish of between 12 & 13 pounds and definitely worthy of a few pictures before being released. Jay was happy before, but once he realized how big this fish was, he couldn’t have been happier. At the beginning of this trip, he would have been just glad to get to play with a couple. He never imagined that he would land a fish of this size on his first trip. Once we calmed down and re rigged his line from the fight, he was ready for more. I thought he had learned enough to be able to fish on his own after this and set up my rod to show him what a Center Pin float rod could do. Somewhere along the way, he hooked into another silver bullet and fought what I like to refer to as a “Skippy”. It was a steelhead of around 3 pounds and just went ballistic. We didn’t bother to take a picture this time, as his last behemoth of a fish was more than enough! I finally got to wet a line after that and 6 casts later, I was tight to a real chromer. This fish had all kinds of power as he literally went mental! There was nowhere for him to go as I easily turned the fish and took control. Minutes later I was beaching & tailing an 8 or 9 pound silver bullet on the ice flow nearby. I took a moment to show Jay the fish and carefully released him back to where he belonged. We fished a little more before getting out of there all together to try another section of the river. We actually decided to go back to the same area we had fished the day before and see if we could get into a few more before we headed back home. I had to retie my setup due to frayed line and left Jay alone once more to do this. A few minutes later, I heard a voice call my name and looked over to see Jay’s float tight up at the tip of his rod. I thought he had a problem and went over to see if there was anything I could do. Apparently all he wanted to do was show me that he had touched the tip of his rod because there was a fish on the end of his line. He had managed to land a beautiful steelhead of around 4 pounds and needed no help in doing so. I had created a wise guy! I just unhooked her and released the fish without a picture once more. After I was finished setting up my rod, we shifted a little further upstream and hit another section nearby. I instructed Jay to where he needed to run his drift and waited in anticipation. It took a while, but eventually his float went down with authority. I was sure that this was a good fish as it just went crazy! Long runs with violent headshakes were followed with 180-degree turns and charges straight back at us at rocket speed. This fish was pissed! Just when I thought things were calming down and we were getting to a position where we would eventually be able to land this thing, it happened. The fish shot upriver then down almost at the same time and over a deep ledge, all the while never slowing down. Something had to give and it was the leader as the rock edge cut the line. The not knowing is always the worst and we had no idea how big this thing actually was. All I know is that at this time of year, the fish usually don’t act that way unless they’re huge. It definitely would have been nice to get another pic of just one more and that was the one. I made a few more casts with Jay before we called it quits and landed another skippy chromer of about 3 or 4 pounds. This was to be the last fish as we were ready to roll. It had begun to snow quite heavily a little earlier and I knew the drive home wouldn’t be easy. All in all it was a great trip with Jay finally learning why I go back time after time in pursuit of these beautiful fish. He got to play with 8 and managed to land 6 of them the first time out. That’s enough to make him want to go back! I know I will be there as well.

Back out I went once more when I saw the water levels lowered, after a long series of high water days. The fish were going to bite, I thought! I arrived on the river around noon the first day and was into a beautiful, dime bright bullet of a fish on my second cast. This was going to be another one of those days I thought as I soon released the 10-pound female chromer! Unfortunately, that was all there was going to be in that area and I moved on. I spent the rest of the day jumping from hole to hole and picking up 4 fish by days end. The second day wasn’t much different with another 4 fish being the best I could manage once more. One fish however, gave me quite a battle as I had to relive a grueling battle almost identical to the one Tom had on the last trip. This fresh steelhead had no intentions of letting me land her as she headed down river, spooling line from the center pin reel at an unbelievable rate. Seeing as how this was the exact same area that Tom got spooled, I didn’t have much faith in winning this battle. Amazingly, I did manage to win though and was rewarded with another 10 pound silver bullet. She must have come up from the lake overnight I thought as I quickly photographed & released her to battle another day. The fish may have been few & far between, but the average size was definitely bigger on this trip. They were mostly in the 8 to 12 pound range and incredibly stronger in this higher water level. The third morning was a little different with the wind being the toughest battle I was to fight today. It’s never easy fishing a float with winds gusting at 30 MPH. There’s really no control while trying to present the bait naturally to the fish and today was going to be a challenge. I actually had to use the bends & islands in the river to shield me in certain areas. I figured I would take advantage of the situation and do a little exploring in new areas of the river. I was rewarded with a couple of fish from places that I never knew existed. A third fish came from another area that had never produced even a single hit in all the times I had tried fishing there. This was an amazing fresh 12-pound female steelhead that fortunately never left the pool she was in. She did however; travel up & down the entire area several times, giving me a ten-minute battle. With the weather changing from freezing rain & snow, I released this fish without being photographed. Setting up the camera with the tri pod & timer just takes too long when the conditions are miserable. This was to be the last fish as I was about to pack it in & head home. The weather was getting worse and the temperatures were falling throughout the day with snow & freezing rain in the forecast. All in all a pretty good trip with every fish having to be worked for! A total of 11 fresh steelhead were caught ranging from 8 to 12 pounds. Once again, I can’t wait to get back!!!!

Well as luck would have it, today was even warmer than yesterday! Temperatures were to get into the 60’s with overcast skies and warm winds of 10 to 20 knots from the S/SE. Warren was taking advantage of these crazy temperatures and joining me for his last bass fishing day, for this season. The weatherman called for showers all day but thankfully was wrong again. Most of the day we fished in almost T-Shirts as we both enjoyed the Florida like weather of November. What began slowly was soon to change as Warren finally hit into a small concentration of good smallies. In 4 casts, he had 4 fish and all were above 3 pounds. Weed beds along rock piles once again produced some decent sized smallmouth bass on tubes. In one location, we found larger bass in the 4 pound range, but were forced to move when the rain and winds kicked up making it too difficult to hold there. As strange as the weather was, the fishing remained great all day. We had several squalls come in on us with high winds and showers, but never really got the worst of the weather until the last 20 minutes of the day. We both realized how lucky we were to have spent such a warm day on the water for the last day of November by milking it for everything it had. We held out until it was just too close and then bolted for the boat dock. I knew we were in for it as I turned and headed into the blackest of skies I had seen in quite a while. We were greeted with higher winds and heavy rain for the last of our run back to the truck. I was glad that we stuck it out for as long as we did as there were probably 15 or 20 fish caught in the last hour of the day. Warren even landed a bonus Walleye of over 7 pounds. This was his personal best too!! Overall, there were about 60 or more smallmouth bass caught up to & over 5 pounds. I hope this is not the end to my season as the fishing is still going quite strong. If the weather holds out a little longer, I might get out a few more times before I call it quits for this season and concentrate on the steelhead fishing. All in all a super day of fishing for smallmouth bass!!

Darren was to accompany me to a local lake in pursuit of jumbo fall smallies today. He had experienced these fat, fall footballs before and was looking foreword to getting into more of them. As luck would have it for the end of November, the air temps were to reach into the 50’s with sunshine and no wind. Water temps were almost 50 degrees and climb throughout the day. Within the first 5 minutes, there were a couple landed and a few others lost. We moved all around trying to locate a mother load of bass and caught a few every where we went. Bass of 3 to 5 pounds were the norm and an occasional walleye as well. The best areas were located on rock piles with some weeds adjacent. Depths of 4 feet to 30 feet held fish with the better areas once again being 14 to 20 feet deep. Tubes were also the lure of choice as these fish were feeding on crawfish as well as minnows. Certain areas held better fish and larger concentrations but by making long casts and covering water, fish were caught all over. There were no real giants today, but 50 or more bass fell victim to the tubes with the largest ones going just over 5 pounds. All in all a great day with unbelievable weather for this time of the year.