Every year for the past 3 there is a group of us that go to
Waterfalls Lodge in Spanish Ontario, this year was no exception. We left Sunday morning, stopped at the Big Nickel in Sudbury as usual, and head right over to Waterfalls Lodge.
We were welcomed by Rob and Kathy,spent the first afternoon fishing off the docks, and than hit the sack. We woke up at 4:30 am, and hit the water hard on Monday. This year, the water was exceptionally warm for May, 19 Celsius (approx. 67 F) so the pike were coming out of the spawning bays. We hit a lot of large Smallies, both off shore, and in deep water while trying for Pike....I had one come out of 36 feet of water, and destroy my X-Rap!
Eventually we found the pike, and started getting them on X-Rap's, Spinner Baits, and X-Zone Swamers, which is what started to produce the most consistent larger fish.
Here are some of the fish we caught on our trip.
 |
| One very cold morning, and the smallies were hungry! |
 |
| A nice pike out of 20 feet of water...They were definitely scattered this year. |
 |
| Use a net on any sized fish when throwing a Trokar.....don't want that thrashing around your hands and arms! |
 |
| This one crushed a cisco coloured Swammer! |
 |
| Managed a few coincidental smallies on top water frog's! |
 |
| Was throwing a generic beater frog for pike......I will keep my Kooper's Live Target Frogs in one piece for Bass Tournaments! They work too good to slice em up on Pike. |
The
Swammers really came into their own when I found some pike in 12-20 feet of water, just outside a spawning bay. I put it on an articulated football head jig head made by
Stringease, with a 2/0 TK110
Trokar hook, and yo-yo'ed the bait back to the boat. They always seemed to hit it right before it started to drop. Having a fast gear ratio and a 7 foot rod helped to pick up line and set the hook home.
