Carp fishing with chick peas as bait

For the most part, I've been neglecting carp fishing for most of the season, Chasing predators like pike, bass, and walleye, have taken up most of my spring and summer fishing efforts. The few times that I did try to target carp, I had less success than usual. Numbers and sizes were much lower than previous years, and much like last season, other "nuisance" species like suckers, tench, and channel cats, seemed to move in on the boilies and range cubes I was using to prebait for carp.

As September rolled in, I decided to try switching things up. For starters, I ran out of the base mix I use to produce my boilies. Having produced hundreds of pounds of boilies over the past decade or so was getting "old", and my source of cheap manual labor, aka, my once willing younger kids, have now grown up, and aren't interested in working for the minimal wages I used to pay them as young kids.

In the past, I've had limited success chumming with prepared corn, so I was looking for an alternative. My initial criteria were low cost, easy production, and endless supply. I gave myself up until the winter to stick with the new system, and would determine whether or not it was a feasible plan, based on results.

I picked up a few kilograms of food grade dried chick peas, to see what I could achieve. For starters, chick peas contain a high nutritional value. Soaking them for 24 hours gets them soft enough to use as bait, without having to worry about them harming the carp's digestive system. As well, they seem to take on flavors pretty well. Soaking them in warm water with a mix of spices, works wonders. Way easier than boilie production, and very cost effective for bulk production of chum. Dry chick peas yield about double the weight once soaked, so I end up spending under $2.00 CAD per KG , once I've added my spices and flavors.

For the initial tests, I decided to chum 2 kg of soaked/flavored boilies, for 3 days before fishing, for a total of 6 KG. For hook-bait, I tested the soaked chickpeas with extra measures of the same spices used during soaking, vs fried chick peas, seasoned with the same spices. While the soaked chick peas sink, the fired version float as popups, at least until the get water logged and end up sinking within 1/2 hour or so.

With both versions, the spices diffuse once they hit water, and with slight current, my assumption was that they drift downstream to attract carp, similar to bloody bait attracting catfish, or sharks in saltwater. The added oil in the fried version, likely gets up higher in the water column as it diffuses, giving more coverage. In contrast to boilies, whose core ingredients area mix of flours and flavors, I had a hunch that the downstream lines may have a better chance of getting hit first, due the the diffusion.

For my first attempt at catching carp on chick peas, I brought along my son Eli, and his girlfriend Audrey, for a short evening outing, to a spot I had pre-baited not far from home. My goal for these sorts of outings, is to fish 3-4 hours, with at least 2 rods, each baited with one style versus another.

Sure enough, during this outing, we had 2 runs, both on the downstream lines, baited with the fried / popup version of the chick peas I prepared. We landed both fish, with the first being the smallest I have ever seen caught at that spot, maybe in the 6-7 lbs range, The second carp was much bigger, but still on the lower end of the average carp I typically get into there, weighing just over 21 lbs, her new PB.

The following morning, I took my youngest son Zev, to the same spot. He landed another carp on the same setup, again, with the downstream rod producing on fried/spiced chick peas. Picture got a bit messed up, as the carp splashed my camera lens, no big deal, it was a smaller one at 16.5 lbs.

A few days later, I invited my older son Levi to join, along with his wife, Lindsey. After a false run within the first 15-20 minutes, things were quite. Sure enough, just as we started packing up to leave a few hours later, the downstream line baited with soaked/spiced chick peas went off, and after a crazy fight during which this carp even jumped, Lindsey landed her new PB at 20.5 lbs.

At this point, I new I was onto to something good. Not only had my new baiting system caught some decent sized carp, but I had also managed to avoid "nuisance species", all while saving a lot of time, effort, and money, to purchase and/or produce bait.

The final question was whether or not using chick peas would be efficient at bringing in some of the trophy sized fish that the given spot I was fishing, had produced in the past. My gut feeling was that it would, but I wouldn't know for sure unless my plans came to fruition.

A couple weeks later, with water temps starting to cool as fall kicked in, I took my son Zev out for a short morning outing, after having pre-baited with spiced chick peas for a few days prior to fishing. Within a few minutes of getting our lines in, a saw a very nice carp surface, and a moments later, the upstream rod right next to where I saw the fish, went off at high speed.

Zev did a great job fighting the big carp, despite it's best efforts to run ashore a couple times. When I finally saw the big carp, I had a feeling it was his biggest yet, and sure enough, after I netted and weighed it, the carp turned out to be bigger than any of my other kids have ever caught, at 31.5 lbs!

Another monster landed, and new PB for Zev. Again, the fried chick peas out performed the soaked version, but this time, it was the upstream line that got hit for the first time. Whatever the case, I'd say the relatively random idea of using chickpeas, had far exceed my expectations so far.

With all the Jewish high holidays falling in October, I knew my fishing time would be more limited than usual, being that we don't fish during those periods.

My first October outing yielded another smaller carp after 2 days of prebaiting, but nowhere near the sizes I've landed there during October in previous years. With some cold fronts moving in, bigger carp usually go on the feed. I figured the spot could produce some nicer carp once water temps dropped. By mid October, the temps were about right, but two back to back baiting campaigns failed to produce any bites, despite a couple outings fished with multiple rods along with one of my older sons. Sort of a bit frustrating, as I know that prebaiting the spot with boilies this time of year can have good results. However, I had committed to giving the chick peas there fair chance, so the trophy carp at this given spot are going to have to wait until next season, as the carp bite at this given spot dies down completely. once water temps hit 55F or below.

For my last October outing, and likely the last carp fishing of my 2024 season, I headed to carp wintering spot where I have had some varied success over the past dozen years. Water temp was in the low 50's, and water level much lower than normal. so the spot likely warmed up nicely during our 7 hour outing. Unfortunately, not a bite all day, though I only ran one of our two rods with chick peas, and the other with a mix of corn or popup boilies.

That does if for this years testing of fishing for carp using chickpeas as bait. As you see, the results were wonderful as long as the water remained warm, and then seemed to taper off very quickly as it cooled. 

Hoping to get some more testing of chick peas versus boilies done next year.

Another float tube fishing season is in the books. Safe to say, that I won't be doing much more float tubing until 2025 at this point. Throughout 2024, I did a bit less float tube fishing than in the past couple seasons, and consequently, landed less fish than usual.

Being that safe ice around town was mostly gone by late February, I attempted to start off the season in early March, at one of my warm water spots that typically produced some pike and bass. On my first outing, I popped one of the air bladders while inflating it, despite having tested it the previous night at home. As I was in waders, and about 1 hour's drive from home, I decided to wade the swampy shoreline instead. Wading in the muddy silt was quite tough, but I managed to land a few small fish.

 

Unfortunately, I was not able to find replacement bladders anywhere, but luckily, I still had a spare with a slow leak in the seam, which meant I'd need to refill every few hours during any given outing. Not the end of the world. I returned to the spot about 1 week later. While I was able to get out in my float tube, the bite was off, I only managed to hook one small pike, but lost it near the float tube.

I spent the next few weeks wading or still fishing, and by the time I got on the float tube again it was already the second week in May, shortly after pike season re-opened. The spot has been slow over the past few seasons, but I did OK this time, landing 4 pike, as well as an incidental largemouth bass.

By far, the biggest surprise of the day was a nice 4 lbs tench that hit a big spinner I was casting. Being that Tench are normally bottom feeders caught while still fishing, it was the last thing I was expecting.

My next float tube outing came a couple weeks later, when I headed back to the same spot. Action was a bit slower than the previous outing, but still landed a few more pike.

As I went out of town early in June, I didn't get back on the float tube until later in the month, just after the bass season opened. By that point, I decided to give pike a rest, and start targeting some bass. On my first outing to a vert small lake I had some success on in the past, I managed to land some smallmouth bass, but nothing too big.

Again, after more travel, it was the second week in July until I finally made it up to my favorite smallmouth lake for the first time in the season. The bite was a bit tougher than expected, and the smallmouth were headbutting lures, as opposed to biting. I ended up losing the biggest one of the day, so had to content myself with a pic of this one instead.

2 weeks later, I returned for more float tube fishing on the same lake, hoping for redemption. This time, the bite was even tougher, with similar conditions. Worse, I lost the 3 biggest bass of the day, including one that was likely in the top 3 biggest I've ever hooked on that lake.

The following day, I managed a few hours of last minute float tube fishing during the evening. While I managed to land 5 largemouth bass, they were all quite small, so didn't bother with any pics. At that point, I gave float tubing a rest through the entire month of August, and into September.

Finally, due to a long heatwave through most of September, I managed back to back outings for smallmouth bass, back at my favorite float tube fishing lake. The bass were not where I expected to find them, and while fishing was tough, perseverance paid off with a few nice smallies landed to end my 2024 float tube fishing season.

Late season trip to Le Domaine Shannon

After our last trip to Le Domaine Shannon in July, I didn't have any plans to return until next summer. Then, my friend Jimmy contacted me about another potential trip we could do, this time to Buckhorn Lake in Ontario. When that trip didn't work out, I suggested going back to Lac Wahoo at le Domaine Shannon, for another shot at some big pike.

While I have fished for walleye at Le Domaine Shannon late in August on a number of occasions, I have always been to other lakes, targeting walleye. Namely, Lac Lenotre in 2010, again in 2014 combined with Lac Fig, and then LeNotre again in 2015 and 2017. This trip would be my first attempt at pike fishing on Lac Wahoo this late in the season.

Knowing that the weather up there can change on a dime this time of year, we came equipped for a variety of scenarios. Turned out, that we experienced every scenario of weather we had planned for, and made good used of our gear.

Day 1:

We arrived early Monday morning. After unloading and getting the boat set up, we started off by trolling for pike. Surprisingly, we were able to get any hits, so after about an hour or so, we switched to casting. Again, fishing was slow, but I did manage our first pike of the trip casting a topwater lure. We achieved our goal of catching one for the table.

After a couple missed hits while trolling, it was evident that the pike bite was about as slow as I've ever experienced on Lac Wahoo, despite seemingly perfect conditions.  Jimmy and I managed to land 1 more pike each, before calling it a day after 8 hours of tough fishing. Mirror like lake to cast or troll in hot weather, one would expect better results.

Day 2:

Still not much wind, but heavy clouds and increasing rain were what we were up against. Almost immediately, I landed my first walleye of the trip while trolling, a smaller under slot size fish, returned to grow bigger until next time we meet. As it became evident that the pike were still off, I suggested we simply target walleye. From past experiences at the other lakes at the outfitter late in August, the walleye bite is exponentially better in the rain, and with the pike bite non existent, I figured we'd switch it up for the day. Sure enough, I landed a bigger walleye while casting the Rapala Husky Jerk I had been trolling with.

Jimmy followed up with another walleye, and we headed back to the cabin for a succulent meals of pan fried walleye.

After lunch, we headed back out to try for some more walleye. Sure enough, I managed another walleye as well as a pike, before lighting and a strong thunderstorm  chased us off the lake for the rest of the day.

Day 3:

The storm that increased overnight, ended up being blown out by powerful winds, while the outer temperature dropped well into the single digits. By the time we hit the lake on Wednesday morning, the windchill was likely below freezing, in contrast to the t-shirt weather we enjoyed the previous couple days.

With heavy cloud still covering the skies, Jimmy landed another small walleye on our first trolling pass, again, too small to keep. As the day progressed, the winds kept intensifying, and eventually got rid of the clouds, at which point I knew that the walleye bite was very likely over. Sure enough, I landed another keeper sized pike, and after a few hours of nothing, I finally hooked into a bigger pike while trolling. I fought it to the side of the boat, at which point I realized it was barely hooked, Sure enough, it came off a couple feet away from the landing net, Jimmy and I estimated it to be in the 8-9 lbs range, as we both got a good look at it. That was all she wrote for day 3, despite us putting in a good 10+ hours of fishing in tough conditions.

Day 4:

The winds calmed down overnight, and the cool morning soon gave way to another warm and sunny afternoon that had us back in our t-shirts again. Unfortunately, this turned out to be the slowest day of all, with neither of us catching any fish, until Jimmy landed another keeper sized pike casting a spinnerbait about an hour or so before we called it quits, choosing to make an earlier fire and enjoy watching the lake calm down for sunset.

All in all, while the fishing was much slower than expected, Jimmy and I had a great time as usual. It's easy for people to put in many hours of fishing when the bite is on, but when the bite is off as it was during this trip, less dedicated anglers would likely not have put in the effort we did, especially given the weather we faced on 2 of the 4 days. The bonus was the non existent mosquitoes, black flies and horse/deer flies we normally deal with in July. For the first time, I was able to get by without using insect repellent or coils we normally light to fumigate the cabin. That being said, I'll gladly trade more bugs for better fishing any day.

Big pike and walleye at Le Domaine Shannon

Back from another fishing adventure to Lac Wahoo at Le Domain Shannon. The objective was to try to land some big pike over 10 lbs, and possibly some keeper sized walleyes for the table.

My friend Jimmy came along for this adventure. I'm always happy to fish with Jimmy, being that we are friends since childhood. As well, Jimmy's skill level when it comes to casting is second to none, and he regularly outfishes me by a long shot when we target predatory species like bass and pike. While I have fished Lac Wahoo many times over the past decade, Jimmy only came along with me a few years ago, during the month of June. We didn't get any big fish during that trip, and I mentioned that July was one of the best months to target bigger fish there. I figured that the combination of Jimmy's skill level, and my knowledge and experience on the lake, would give us a shot at some very good results.

Day 1:

After driving through the night, we ran into some car trouble on the last forest road, about 10 km away from our cabin on Lac Wahoo. I'll skip the details for now, and get to that at the end of this blog post...

After getting a later start than expected, we started off  casting lures, as the lake was still relatively calm. After a cast or two, Jimmy raised a giant pike that swiped at his lure next to the boat, but didn't get hooked. Sort of heartbreaking but hopeful for another one at the same time. Jimmy had the shakes, but I assured him that he would very likely have another shot at a big pike.

We kept casting, eventually landing some pretty small pike, including our first of many double headers. 

Soon after, Jimmy landed one big enough to feed both of us nicely, so we knew what lunch the following morning would consist of.

After the wind picked up and boat control became difficult, we decided to do some shallow trolling. I rigged a buzzbait on the shallower line, and Jimmy put a spinnerbait on for the deep line, while I trolled in roughly 5-8 feet. We caught a few more small pike, and eventually, Jimmy hooked into a much better pike. He didn't realized just how big it was until we landed it. 

A thick 38 inch / 12.5 lbs pike on our first pass of the lake! Way to start your trip...

After a short celebratory pause at the cabin, we got back to trolling. This time, I tied on a deeper running spinnerbait, and sure enough, I got hit within less than 1 minute. Another solid pike landed.

After some more pike, Jimmy landed a walleye, that we added to our fillets in the fridge back on shore, and we ended of the day casting topwater lures. Many more small pike, including this one I caught on the 3d bat lure.

Day 2:

After being up for 30+ hours Saturday to Sunday night, we slept in. Just as well, pike fishing had slowed down a lot, we were struggling to catch them most of the morning, no matter the trolling depth. Wind was too strong to try casting as well. At some point in the afternoon, I decided to hit another spot nearby on foot, where I've had some decent mixed bags of pike and walleye.

I tied on a Rapala Countdown, and sure enough, I hit walleye gold on my second cast.

By the time Jimmy joined my, I already had 2 walleye on shore, and we caught a couple more. Unfortunately, his was under the legal limit of 37 cm, but mine were all within the slot size limits. We kept the 3 walleyes I caught, and made quick work of them back at the fillet table.

Back on the boat, the evening bite was a bit better than the morning bite for pike as far as numbers, but nothing too sizeable was landed.

We noticed a large branch "swimming" across the lake, with the help of a busy beaver.

Day 3:

We started the day off by trolling a bit deeper with the help of my portable sonar. My goal was to stay in the 12 to 15 foot range, hoping to eliminate many of the smaller sized pike we had been catching over the first couple days, and focus on bigger fish. 

Once in a while, the plan works out better than expected. The first hit came on a Rapala Husky jerk I was trolling. From the big head shakes, I knew we hit a fish, much bigger than I'd keep for the table. After a good fight, I hoisted another nice pike out of the lake.

After releasing the pike, I noticed that it had broken one of the treble hooks on my lure. I decided to replace the broken hook before resuming trolling. While I was getting the hook changed, Jimmy started casting a spinnerbait, and sure enough, he hooked into another big fish. Another good fight, and another monster pike landed by Jimmy.

Talk about being at the right place at the right time with the right presentation. This one was slightly longer than his first big pike a couple days prior, measuring 39 inches and weighing 10.5 lbs. Released in good condition as usual.

That turned out to be the only success we had deep trolling for the day, most of the rest of the pike we caught were in shallower water, and quite small as well, except for this one. 

With a but of rain coming in, I decided to hit my shore spot, which produced my biggest walleye of the trip at 19 inches / 2.25 lbs. 

Not a monster by any means, but a very welcome addition to the fillet table, and subsequently, my freezer.

Day 4: 

This was our final day of fishing, as we planned to leave early the following day to to potential issues with my car, which I'll get to shortly.

We spent much of the day trolling various depths, 12 to 15 feet, 15 to 20 feet, and deeper as well. Each pass of the entire lake takes about 1.5 to 2 hours, we eventually switched back shallow trolling after spending half a day with not much to show for. Jimmy ran his spinnerbait on the shallow side, with a trolled a Mepps 5 spinner. Jimmy connect with many tiny pike, seemingly a lot small than most of the small ones we caught over the previous 3 days. Eventually, I hooked a nicer fish.

We decided to end the trip by casting the calm waters before an incoming storm. A few more tiny pike, and eventually, I caught another walleye casting the Mepps 5 spinner that I was trolling for pike.

That ended our trip, which turned out to be extremely successful. We landed well over 100 pike in 4 days, including 2 in the double digit weight class. Walleye fishing was better than normal with a total of 10 walleye landed, many of which we caught while we were targeting pike. The weather was great, most of the rain only came after dark and ended early morning, so we enjoyed a good 8 to 9 hours of fishing per day.

As a bonus, we found some decent sized patches of wild blueberries, and both of us picked a bunch before leaving.

Over the years, Lac Wahoo has become my favorite lake to fish at Le Domaine Shannon, though they have many other very productive lakes, for both pike and walleye. Hoping to head back there again, hopefully sooner, rather than later...

As for the car trouble I mentioned earlier on, here is the tale of that "adventure", for those of you that may be interested.

Travelling on forest roads many times over the past couple decades, I have come to expect tire trouble. Usually, picking up nails is the culprit, and as such, I travel with a patch kit, bike pump, car lack, and spare "doughnut" style replacement tire that came with my CRV.

Before this trip, my wife had a small fender bender, that added some tear to an already damaged plastic skid plate under the front end of the car as well.

As we got closer to our destination, the damaged skid plate kept getting worse, until it was partially dragging on the dirt roads. Sort of annoying, but nothing serious. Sure enough, shortly after turning onto the final (and roughest) road we take to get to our remote cabin,  my front tire goes flat. I had all the repair gear handy for a slow leak, but when I inspected the tire, it actually had a horizontal tear in it, about 1 inch long. Now way to fix it with a plug from my patch kit, we were forced to unload the trunk to get to the spare tire, and ended up changing it before making out way to the cabin. 

Skid plate damage:

Spare tire:

At this point, many thoughts were running through my mind. The spare tire is not designed for off road use, nor long highway trips. I was hoping that perhaps someone from the camps crew may pass by, but that was not likely, as we were the only ones out in the remote area, some 30 kilometers away from the main camp. With no cel phone signal or satellite phones, we had no way of reaching anyone to help, or maybe order a new tires for us and possibly have it delivered to the main camp.

Eventually, with incoming rain a couple evenings later, I brought the tire into the cabin, hoping that I could find some way to fix it. Luckily, that repair kit I bought a couple years earlier came with 6 plugs, one of which I used last summer during a trip to Mijocama. After getting the first plug in, I added a second, then a third, and eventually a fourth, which finally sealed the tear enough for the tire to hold full pressure overnight.

The makeshift workshop:

The improvised patchwork:

Not too beautiful, but now that the patch had not leaked overnight, it was time to see if it would hold the cars weight. Once the spare was off, and the car hoisted, we figured it would be easier to work on the skid plate as well.

First, we lifted the inner sections. With a rivet missing, I improvised by using a branch of the same diameter, and breaking it off at the opening, then covering it with duct tape, to avoid it moving or poking the tire. Then, I tied the bottom end to the main chassis, using braided fishing line, and covered with duct tape to protect it from damage.

See both duct taped areas:

Then, we made sort of "handles" out of duct tape, the threaded them through and around a couple slot at the front of the skid plate, twisting and sealed them down with more duct tape.

Behold, the miracle of duct tape and it's thousands of uses...

By now, the jack sank into the sand a bit, and we weren't able to raise the car high enough to get the original tire back on. I lowered the rotor onto a log to avoid damaging it, and used a couple flatter logs under the jack to get the tire changed.

The following morning, the tire kept it's pressure. I originally had planned to take it on a test drive, but Jimmy advised against it. Either way, whatever happed was going to be; either it worked like a charm, or we'd be changing the tire again...

Thursday morning, we left extra early just in case. Not knowing if I'd be changing another tire on the road, or if I'd be heading to a garage in Grand Remous or Mont Laurier to find a replacement tire, or maybe not even making it back to the main camp. We took the drive extra slow, instead of my usual 45 minutes or so, we took close to 1.5 hours to make the 30 km trek to the main camp. Lucky of us, as we saw our only moose of the trip on the way there.

One we got that far, I figured the worst was behind us. The tire was holding up, and eventually, hit pavement an additional 73 kilometers later, though on much better dirt roads. I checked the tire pressure again at that point, and it held up perfectly. 

Needless to say, I didn't bother looking for a new tire up there, and it held up find all the way home to Montreal, 300 kilometers later.

It's little wonder that most people driving on this sort of terrain opt for raised pickup trucks with off road tires. But for myself, who makes a trip or two per year, I'm comfortable enough using my city vehicle. That being said coming prepared, and with the right mindset, can make all the difference in these sorts of tricky situations.

  

Mijocama fishing summer 2024

Back from our latest family trip to pourvoirie Mijocama to kick off summer 2024. As usual, family and friends joined for another epic trip, shortly after the opening of bass season. Over the years, we have come to expect some good bass fishing there, though one can never be sure. After enjoying some of the best largemouth bass fishing in a decade during our 2020 and 2021 trips to Mijocama, 2023 was quite different, with very few bass, and a lot more pike landed.

For this trip, I was joined by my three youngest sons. Levi's wife Lindsey joined us, as well as Eli's girlfriend, Audrey. We rented a couple boats to accommodate the 6 of us, and there began our planned fishing adventure.

Day 1: 

With heavy rain in the forecast for most of the day, we got to Mijocama around noon, and before bothering to rent the boats, we broke camp at our usual cabin. By mid afternoon, the rain had just about stopped, so we got a couple boats, and headed out to try our luck casting for pike, being that the bass in Giles lake are typically evening feeders.

After a few missed hits and follows from some small at my first spot, rain chased us off the lake. About an hour later, the sun popped out, so I headed out to try again. Sure enough, I landed a small pike on my second cast, only to be chased off the lake by a heavy thunderstorm again.

The thunderstorm turned into steady light rain, which kept my family indoors for the rest of the evening. As my friend Jimmy and his gang had just arrived, he and I put on our rain gear, and headed out to cast for pike in the rain. The pike were nipping at out lines non stop, but were not biting. Still, it kept us motivated to stay out until dark, with only 2 pike landed to show for. As I had planned to make some shore lunch for my family, we kept them.

Day 2:

Up bright and early while my family was sleeping in, I headed out to do some more casting for pike. On my way, I stopped by Jimmy's cabin, and picked him up to join, along with our friend Marcel. Marcel was casting a swimbait, and literally drew first blood, landing the first pike, and hooking his finger during the release. At least it didn't go in past the barb. I hooked 2 small pike as well, nothing worth keeping. 

After the morning bite, we headed to camp for morning prayers.

Once, done, I headed back to camp for breakfast, and took Zev out for some trolling. Using a Rapala Countdown on one rod, and a Smithwick Rogue on the other, I stayed with that setup for the duration of the trip. 

While apprehensive at first, Zev was quite happy when the line went off and he landed his first pike of the trip.

Headed back to shore, filleted the pike, and the family enjoyed a nice lunch of 6 deboned pike fillets, coated in batter,and pan fried in butter. Absolutely delicious when they are that fresh, though they need some time in the fridge to let rigor mortis set in. This prevents the fillets from "curling" in the frying pan when fish are too fresh.

After lunch, Zev wanted to go to catch some sunfish. Luckily, I convinced him to try some more trolling, hoping for a hot bite. Sure enough, it didn't taker long for Zev to land his second pike of the day, after losing one.

As we neared our cabin, I decided to make a trolling pass in an area that hasn't produced much pike in a while. Miraculously, Zev managed to land 3 more pike on our first pass, ensuring that we now had enough pike to feed more of us the following day, as my brother and his 2 sons joined us later that afternoon.

Seeing Zev's success, both my sons and their women came out for a mid afternoon troll. Unfortunately, the bite had died down, and we didn't manage any hits at all. Levi and Lindsey reserved my guiding services for the evening, during which we spent most of out time casting topwater lures hoping to get some surface action from either bass or pike. Unfortunately, the fish were not co-operating with our plans, but we ended up staying out until dark and getting a nice sunset pic of Levi and Lindsey.

Day 3:

After a night pf partying, I was up early for the morning bite. I headed out with Eli and Audrey for some casting, and my first spot paid off with another nice pike.

That was the only bite of the morning, despite whatever else casting and trolling we managed. After another hefty lunch of pan fried pike fillets, we spent the early afternoon relaxing. Levi spent much of his time playing guitar and target shooting.

By mid afternoon, I was contemplating what happened to all the bass in the lake. None of us had even seen one, let alone catch any. In a short 2 years or so, the bass fishing had gone from amazing to just about non existent, despite the the warm and sunny conditions that normally make for great bass fishing at Mijocama.

I decided to make the trekk out to Lac Chat. This small lake is connected to Giles lake by a small creek, and having fished there about 12 years ago, I knew the lake had a population of both bass and pike. As Lac Chat gets almost no fishing pressure, I figured that the bass population must have exploded over the past dozen years, and that I'd be in for a treat. At the same time, I found it mind boggling that I'd actually have to go to another lake to look for bass, as over the past couple decades, bass caught on our many trips often outnumbered the pike by a 100 to 1 ratio.

Anticipating the horrendous boat conditions on lac Chat, I confirmed with the owners that no one had been there in a couple years. I got a set of paddle to take along, and figured I may be spending hours bailing the small boats out after all the heavy rain and snow melt, etc.

Jimmy declined my last minute invitation to join, and luckily, I ran into Eyal, one of our group's teen boys, that I sort of initiated into fishing a numbers of years ago. He had landed his first ever pike as a small kid on my boat during one of our trips, and I also taught him how to fillet his catches during one of our previous trips to Mijocama. As most of his friends on the trip weren't there to fish, he was more than happy to join me on this adventure.

We motored our boat to the portage point on Giles lake, anchored it, and made the 7-10 minute trekk to the Lac Chat boat launch, carrying a few basic necessities. We didn't bother with any sort of motor, which wouldn't have helped either way. 

The boat situation was not good at all. One rowboat had a huge leak, the other was filled to the brim with water, as were most of the canoes. The last canoe had a hornets nest in it, and the last rowboat was missing most of the seats. I found a replacement seat, banged it into the middle of the boat, as the back was completely twisted out of shape. As such, we weren't able to row properly, but managed to get along by paddling with them.

While the day was hot a mildly windy, I figured that the lake would calm down for a nice topwater evening bite. Unfortunately, I was wrong. The wind only increased, which made non existent boat control in the tiny 12 foot shallow aluminum boat.

For our first pass, we simply let the wind take us across the entire lake, while casting mid to shallow depth lures across the shoreline. Eventually, we landed on a shallow shoal at the end of the lake, which was also sort of sheltered from the wind gusts. 

On my first cast, I had 2 nice missed hits on my topwater lure. Eyal followed up casting his spinnerbait, and sure enough, hooked a decent pike, that ended up breaking off the lure next to the boat when it wrapped into a log. Despite losing his first pike of the trip, Eyal was happy to have hooked it.

A few casts later, a bigger pike exploded on my topwater lure, and after a few good runs, |I managed to land it by hand, as we didn't bother bringing along a net.

By far, my biggest pike of the trip, and on a topwater lure no less. Made the long trekk to Lac Chat that much more enjoyable.

We worked our way back across the lake against the wind, stopping to cast a few minutes at any spot that looked promising. Unfortunately, no more fish, and still not a bass in sight. At this point, I figured that something must have happened to the deteriorated bass fishery. In my mind, I had originally figured that it was overharvest that crashed it on Giles lake, but as very few people fish Lac Chat over the years, and even less keep anything from there, there must be another cause. Either way, I was happy to have made the trekk out there to try it, and very happy that Eyal came along, despite the relative absurdity of the fishing conditions. From the dinky leaking boat, to the swarming bugs in the deep woods, he never once complained, and happy to be there trying a new adventure with me. We got back to Giles lake shortly before dark, and called it a day.

As I arrived, Eli had just hooked another topwater pike, his first of the trip, on a one knocker Zara Spook, just before dark.

Day 4:

Again, I was up bright and early, after another long night filled with lots of alcohol and many laughs, as it was Levi's birthday. (sorry for the blurry pic).

Heading out alone, I managed to hook and lose a small pike, without much else to show for. Later on, Levi and Eli headed out together, and Zev joined his cousins on their boat, leaving me out solo. I managed to land the first pike of the day while trolling. I radioed Levi to join, and now we had both of our boats making trolling passes in the same area. 

This time it was Audrey's turn, and she landed her first ever pike while trolling a Rapala X-rap.

While I was done harvesting pike for the trip, as we had already eaten 7 of them over the past couple days, she kept it. I filleted it for her, and she enjoyed it after Eli cooked it using my recipe.

Later that evening, it was Eli and Audrey's turn to come out on my boat. Success was immediate, with Audrey landing the first pike within a few seconds of out first trolling pass. The trolling bite continued, and they ended up landing 2 pike each for the evening.

Levi and Lindsey were leaving to head home, so they didn't get much fishing done. Hopefully, they'll have a shot at redemption next time around...

Day 5:

The strong North winds brought in a massive cold front overnight, which dashed any hopes of us getting some bass fishing done on our last day of the trip. After dressing up in our warmer clothing for the first time of the trip, we spent a bit of time trolling for more pike. Again, out timing was good, and Zev, Audrey and Eli ended up landing another 5 pike in total.

None were big at all, similar to the previous evening. But landing a total of 9 pike while trolling in a total of maybe 4 or 5 hours combined between the 2 outings, was far better than anyone else in our group had managed, outside Zev on day 2. Everyone was all smiles.

We stopped fishing by midday, as we planned to head home by late afternoon, after yet another bbq lunch.

All in all, another successful trip, where everyone involved had a memorable time. The pike were more aggressive, but a lot smaller on average than last year. The massive surprise was that between a good 30 of us, no one manage to land a bass in 5 days, and to my knowledge, I was the only that spotted a decent sized one cruising in the shallows all trip long.

I'll try to do some research online as to what might have possibly happened to them, but suffice to say, that I doubt we will see the 50+ bass days of yesteryear at Mijocama any time soon. I'm thinking it may possibly have been LMBV, which affect bass and sunfish, which seem to have been affected as well.