Pike Fishing

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Collins Lake Pike

Having been away overseas for the first two weeks of the Walleye and Pike opener in Ontario has left me anxious to get the old Green Machine out for some action.  Having finally found some time this past Friday afternoon I was faced with the big decision on where to fish.  Ive got a long list of lakes to try out including spending more time on Lake Ontario, however, what I really needed was a sure thing for some Pike action.  Really just something to scratch the fishing itch and to start the season off with a bang.   In my opinion the best way to achieve this is too hit up the closet thing we have in the area to a sure thing for pike: Collins Lake.

So a couple of guys from the office and I loaded up the boat and made our way to Collins in search of some Esox Lucius.  Immediately upon our arrival we were met by a few critters.

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After relocating the turtle to a safer location and letting the Geese get their chicks away from the boat ramp, we launched old Greenie and immediately started a troll line.  The north section of Collins is essentially a large basin with depths pushing 30 FOW.  The north has so pretty decent drop offs that line the edge of the basin that have healthy weed beds along the slope all the way up to near the shore.  These are perfect conditions for trolling crank baits and spoons and after a few moments, our game plan paid off.

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Many of the pike were caught in the 10 FOW range although the bigger beasts seemed to be a bit deeper.  We worked this method all the way up an edge of the lake unitl a natural pinch point and cut across to a flat weedy bay.  The bays are typically where I would start at the beginning of the season followed by troll lines along drop offs closer to summer but we were so anxious this time around we couldn’t wait.

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We pitched around in the flat bay with crank baits, angled spinners and inline buck-tail spinners with a decent success rate.  The action was good on the cast and the troll so we continued to meander around the lake using both tactics.  The great thing about Collins is that it is such a eutrophic lake, you can pretty much catch pike anywhere in the lake.  I admit there are hot spots like around the lake edges and basin rims, but really there is forage and weeds everywhere so long drift lines or troll lines through open sections can also pay off.

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there is a lot of talk from folks about how fishing for pike gets better as the sun goes down.  This is likely due to the natural advantage these predatory fish enjoy in low light conditions.  While this old piece of fisherman’s advice may be true sometimes, I think its important to not neglect the mid day and early afternoon bite.  Heck don’t neglect any time of day, as fishing for Pike during these times can be just as good.  For those interested in reading up on Pike activity and their feeding patterns in a little more detail, check out this study by Beaumont et al conducted in the UK. http://www.fao.org/3/a-y5999e/y5999e23.pdf 

 

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All in all, a good, albeit late, start to my pike fishing season.  Once again Collins you didn’t disappoint!

Cheers from the lake,

Albert

 

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Snotrockets on Sydenham Lake

Summer is nearly here in Southern Ontario and bass season approaches at a frighten pace. One week for crying out loud!
Only way to beat the stress of prepping for such a holy occasion is to break out the boat and relax with a little fast paced Pike fishing (my kind of relaxations).  And that’s exactly what I felt like doing this dreary Friday afternoon.

With an eye on the sky and my mind on Pike, I slipped away from work in the early afternoon and headed home to hook up the boat. Pike was on the menu and the word on the street was Sydenham was hot this time of year.  The plot thickened as one of my readers, Frank  from Pennsylvania, had contacted me about a trip he was doing in the area and was interested in the pike fishing we have around here. Having spent time on Loughborough and Collins already, he was looking for a change of water and Sydenham fit the bill perfectly.  The locals had reportedly informed him Sydenham is one of the best places to chase around these toothy critters.

With our destination set, we made the quick drive and met near the boat launch, which is located down town Sydenham, right behind the public school. After a quick introduction, we loaded our gear into the green machine and tore away from the launch. The afternoon found us fishing the south west part of eel bay to start, just past the old train bridge. It didn’t take long for Frank to tie into a decent 4.5 – 5lb pike.  the fish was caught by pitching a large spinner bait into the weeds over 5 to 9 FOW with a vigorous retrieval.  Nice Fish Frank!
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Pike are slimy, slippery, toothy little buggers, but I wouldn’t trade them for a world!  Luckily, we didn’t have to, because the bite was on in a big way and there were plenty to go around.

Pitching and trolling throughout eel bay, we kept hooking up with fish.  At times it felt like we couldn’t keep our lures in the water for longer than 30 seconds.

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Surprisingly enough, only 3 of the 17 fish caught were hammer handles (i am referring to small pike which resemble a hammer’s handle!).  Numbers weren’t as high as we have seen them in the past, but I attribute this to the size vs numbers cycle I have observed in our area.  It seems pike populations grow in pulses with tons of small fish for a couple years, followed by reduced numbers, but an increase in size for the following few years.   Based on todays performance, id say we are on the upswing of the size portion of the cycle.   From my experience I can also infer that our fishing success had a lot to do with timing.  We hit the water immediately after 3 days of rain which in my opinion is the perfect time to catch pike.  Moral of the story: Don’t be afraid to get wet because the gators certainly arent!

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As always, I finish the post with some sort of plug for the local lake or area I am writing about;  17 decent sized pike in the span of 3 hours on a beauty of a lake, I don’t think a plug is really needed…………

 

Cheers from the Wild

Albert

For more information on the lake check out the Sydenham Lake Association’s website

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Newboro Lake – Spring Pike

We are a week away from the opening day of bass here in South Eastern Ontario.  Most people are spending the weekend polishing up their spinner baits and putting new braid on their bait casters in preparation for this holy day. For me though, this is just another weekend to chase the last remnants of spring pike around with the bonus of little to no boat traffic to get in my way.  Kicking things off at 6am, my friend Dave and I took the 45 minute drive to the Crosby/Westport area and launched at Newboro Lake.  I had only ever fished Newboro twice before, and Dave had never been, so although we had a slight inkling of where to start, the majority of the trip was an exploratory one.DSC_0054

As almost always for spring pike, we started with a troll line using spoons on a line that had produced on my previous two trips (thank goodness for Navionics path tracking!).  This produced two decent 2 -3 lb pike.  Moving on we tried a two edged approach by trolling along sharp drop offs near a set of islands where the depth changed from 9 to 25 ft over a distance of about 15 ft.  One line targeted the shallows and the other probed the deep. This produced some pike as well as a decent 2 lb out of season small mouth that was promptly released.  On to the next area!

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We toured around a good 1/2 of the lake and continued to pick up stragglers throughout the rest of the morning using a multitude of techniques including spinner baits, crank baits and even some extra large swim baits.  Fish were caught in a variety of depths and conditions indicating a high degree of variability.  In my opinion this is indicative of the transition between spring spawning and the usual summer haunts.

The trip was a great way to explore and put some time into getting to know the lake.   Not to mention a great way to relax after a busy week in the office.

Hopefully next visit will see us catching some of the elusive walleye that are said to inhabit the lake.

All in all a great way to warm up the rigs for the fast pace action that is bass fishing in southern Ontario.

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Cheers from the wild!

Albert

 

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Early season Pike on Collins Lake

Pike fishing has always been a passion of mine and early spring is one of the best times to catch these fish.  Spring finds these fish thick in shallow water and can be caught by both casting and trolling.  Spinners and spoons are go to’s for these fish however swim baits and crank baits are also effective.

Lucky for us Ontarians (especially in the kingston area) we have many Eutrophic lakes that are absolutely teaming with Pike.

Two of my work mates and I left work early on May 14, 2013 and headed to our favourite local Pike spot, Collins Lake.  The water was a bit choppy with a 15 km/hr SW wind that ran right through the large fetch on the lake so we were limited to trolling at the beginnning of the outing.  We immediately hooked into a decent 1-2 lber and then hit a lull.  Ever persistent when using techniques I have alot of confidence in, we kept trolling and the fishing slowly picked up.  By about 6pm we were getting into decent pike on a pretty regular basis.  When the action died down on the trolling we decided to switch up and throw some spinner baits into the shallows.  Sure enough, the switch in gear paid off.  The action once again heated up and our numbers swelled to around 30 fish with at least one double header ( two or three if you are using Tarpon rules and leader touches count!).

All in all, a good first kick at the pike can in 2013.

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