5/30 to 6/3 - Rideau Lakes Region, Ontario

Meet Square Bill - star of the week.  I had one day where I caught 50+ smallmouths with this same lure (and the wear and tear shows, poor little guy)

After taking a year off due to starting a new job last summer, I resumed my annual trip to Ontario, Canada with my dad this year.  I don’t know how long the tradition has lasted, but it is over 25 years on the same lake, I bet.  Joining us was Kenny, who started going a few years ago.  Thankfully, he could drive up with my old man last year when I couldn’t.  This 5 to 7 days each year is the highlight of my father’s year, his Christmas, as he calls it.  Me, I don’t bass fish much anymore, so it ends up being close to the sum of my smallmouth and largemouth quota each year, and so I also look forward to it, especially chasing smallmouths, one of my favorite fish.  Fishing at this lake is always good compared to home in Pennsylvania, with some years being better than others, but this year the stars aligned for an exceptional year, as we fished a new lake too.  We used to stay in lodges with three square meals a day, but the US dollar isn’t doing what it used to with respect to the Canadian dollar, so we started renting cottages with boat slips a few years ago.  This year we stayed on a new lake on the Rideau chain of lakes, and it was a good one.  We still trailered the boat to our old lake for a few days, too.

Joe was there.

The cottage we rented was dirty, small, and dirty.  It had two beds for 3 guys, so someone had to have the couch (me one night, Ken the others by choice, I hope).  The landlords were nice enough Canucks—they even let me use their free WIFI (while sitting in their dairy farm’s driveway with my phone) and let me make a free long distance call or two also—but they had just taken possession of this home improvement project over the winter, and really had no business charging anyone to stay in it until they cleaned and repaired it.  After a sleepless night for Ken and I, we figured out a way to survive, eat and sleep.  But mostly, we fished.

There were too many fishing highlights and not enough pictures due to crappy weather and just being used to big fish during this trip.  My dad won’t take a picture with a fish if it isn’t 6 or 8 pounds, and even then it’s like pulling teeth.  I will let the pictures I did take tell the story.

May 30, 2015 - Checking out the new lake.

We dropped the boat in at the ramp down the dirt road from the cottage.  It was windy and warm, too windy to fish anything but crankbaits and spinnerbaits.  This was the first day that the old square bill crankbait tore the fish up. 

Another healthy smallie.

Bowfin too.

After dinner on the first night, Ken saw this guy prowling around the dock looking to eat some bass fry while the proud papa bass was distracted.  We fished from the dock most nights to unwind and did well.  I even got a mess of crappie on the fly rod.  

Ken caught everything from rock bass and perch to 2 pound bass and a pike right from the dock while we were just "playing" after dinner.

May 31, 2015 - Rain gear all day, and no one thought to take a picture, but the fish cooperated, which is all that matters.

The view from the cottage was certainly nicer than the cottage itself.

June 1, 2015 - Cold front day after the rain on Sunday.  

We used the oven for heat in the cottage in the morning.  We trailered the boat to our lake of 20+ years, and did very well on largemouth in the foot of the lake. We even caught a few pike throwing cranks and spinnerbaits.

A good bass on a cold, cloudy Monday.

Drop shots, tubes and jigs fished along the deeper drop offs did the trick.

June 2, 2015 - A banner smallmouth day on the "big water"

Mostly big males, staging before the spawn.  I caught more fish than
I could count this day.

Ken found a nice largemouth in the wind.

June 3, 2015 - My last morning.  

At first we didn't get a lot of fish at the new lake (although Ken and my dad killed them the afternoon I left for home and the morning after!) , but the average size was much larger than our old lake.

Ken with a good one from the new lake.

As I drove home on Wednesday afternoon, the boys killed the fish before the next set of cold fronts came through.  I made great time and wasn't too tired for a meeting on Thursday at work.  Despite bad weather and less than optimum accommodations, the fishing and the company made for a good 5 days of fishing.