steverowbotham

Tell me about it...

I'll start by saying, it wasnt me, but oh so d**n close. Yesterday was the Jack Link's Simcoe Open on Lake Simcoe in Ontario. It is a one day shootout tournament and among the most anticipated of the year. I havent entered for a number of years but decided that I was going to do it this year. I committed hard and for the last month, almost every day off work has been spent on the water following these fish as they transition to their fall feeding grounds. The last two weeks were a grind. The weather and water has been unseasonably warm and they fish have been scattered from 4 feet to 60 feet of water with no rhyme or reason to it. It has made it extremely tough to pattern as they have not "set up" for the fall bite. Going into the tournament, we had 3 spots that we were going to die on, all within a relatively close distance of each other. We just had to get there. The night before the tournament brought strong wind gusts and the lake was pretty blown up. 4 and 5 foot rollers put a beating on us, making the 27 mile run to our first spot. The first fish in the boat was a 13 incher, not a good start for a tournament that regularly takes 27-30 pounds to win. We grinded and grinded and came up with one 5+ and decided to move on to our next area. We graphed a small shoal super quick on our way there and marked 1 loner fish, but decided to move on. We got to spot #2 and made a couple passes to no avail. Decided to make a bait change and voila, fish on. We still had to grind, but we were getting bit almost every pass, and they were all decent fish including 1 over 6. Eventually, these fish scattered and the bite died. We had about 3 hours to weigh in, and decided to try for the loner fish on that little shoal, since it looked like a good one. As soon as we dropped the trolling motor, the screen was lit up with smallies and we pulled another 4 quality fish off that shoal. It was ticking rain the entire day, gusting and cold. We bundled up for our long, wet, cold run back to weigh in and made it with 30 mins to spare, so lets fish by the ramp for a bit. The launch is in Lake Couchiching, which is attached to Simcoe and known for plentiful, but smaller fish. Somehow, we were actually able to make a quick upgrade in that spot. Weigh in time comes and one of my best friends has the lead with a 30.86lbs bag of smallies, insane. Up we go and drop 30.13 on the scale. Bittersweet moment. We finally broke 30, but this year it wasnt enough. It wasnt even good enough for 2nd as another team dropped 31.89lbs on the scale to break the previous record of 31.50 lbs. Insane day and an incredible fishery, where over 30lbs of smallies isnt safe!

His story to mommy was something along the lines of "catch big big fish, in daddys boat. water too deep"

The other day, I skipped the storms and when it cleared up in the afternoon, I launched the boat for a couple of hours with my son Henry. He turns 3 in July and has never been on the boat. I more or less just wanted to take him for a ride but when we started marking good numbers of fish, we dropped down and got into one. He helped daddy reel it in and had a blast. Fun for me, fun for him! It was awesome hearing him tell mommy what happened in his broken english lol

I put together this video last week of my top 5 ways to catch spring pike. Hope it helps. Mods please delete if not allowed.

Finally got back on the water for the first time in a month. On Saturday I hit a Lake O trib for some rainbows on opener. Did alright. Tangled with a whole bunch but only managed to land 4 and a bonus little brown. Sunday I launched the boat on Simcoe in search of some jumbos and got into a good school pretty quickly. Landed well over a hundred fish and got some real brutes. A weedline in 8-10 feet of water held the fish and a small finesse minnow on bottom got the bites.

Great pics everyone. I'm lucky enough to live on Lake Simcoe, I have a hard time choosing pics, I'll narrow it down to 5. Part of a 29lbs bag in 2015 Giant swimbait fish Biggest of last year, around 7 3/4 First 8 lber 29.95lbs winning bag. SOOO close to 30.

When I saw MN, I figured smallies. But nope! Good job dude!

World record is 18 inches and it's the longest standing freshwater record in North America. Too bad about your GoPro

Well, it's that time of year! With this cold snap, I put the boat into hibernation yesterday... had a couple drinks... shed a couple tears... then jumped on the computer to sift through the GoPro footage I have accumulated over the season. Plenty to go through, but I put together a highlight reel of some of my favourite moments of the season to accompany the report. I hope you enjoy. Ice season started a little late, but better late than never. The main lake never froze enough to venture out, so we were contained to Kempenfelt and a few small zones in the north end of the lake. Though I really wish we could have explored more, these spots still kept us busy and entertained throughout the season. We fished various depth ranges from 22 - 122 feet to put a good number of solid lake trout on the ice. Typical baits such as swimbaits, spoons and tubes did most of the damage with the occasional crankbait fish showing up. Once the ice season passed us by, I didnt get out for perch or steelhead like I normally would. My wife and I bought a new house and that kept me busy until mid May when other seasons started to open up. I did a lot of multispecies trips throughout May and June targeting lake trout, pike and salmon on a number of lakes. Caught some really good fish and would rank it as one of my best springs in a while. Once bass season opened up, I shifted my focus there and with the exception of the occasional musky outing, I never really switched gears for the rest of the season. I fished a lot of different lakes, but obviously, Simcoe still has my heart!

Lol. I don't deny that I'm very lucky to live on the lake that I do.

Lol. Let's call it a well chosen camera angle. That said, the fish was over 22 inches and somewhere in the 7.5 to 8 pound range. My biggest of the year for sure

Had an opportunity to get out yesterday and go check one of my "big fish" zones. It doesnt put up a lot of fish, but when it does, look out. It didnt disappoint. This may be my last day out these season, and if so, what a way to end it. Lots of footage to edit in the coming weeks when the boat goes away. In the words of Dave Mercer... G-G-G-G-GIANT BASS!

nice fish!

Fishing a deep ledge. 80 feet of water was within 100 yards of where we were and they started busting.

Fished a couple tournaments since my last post, figured I'd do an update. The smallie season is winding down, almost time to get ready for ice. About 3 weeks ago we did an open tournament and had a good bite going. The 7 1/4 I posted before was caught during part of our prefish. The bite died on tourney day, but we stuck to our zones throwing smaller swimbaits and dropshots to scrape up a 22 pound limit for 3rd place. A couple days later, I had some time to scoot out and check some new zones and was able to land about 15 fish, the biggest 5 going around 24-25 lbs. The most fun that day was finding a school of herring surfacing over 80 feet of water and getting 3 smallies feeding on that mess. Had my final tourney of the season yesterday and our prefish went well. Morning bite was garbage, but the afternoon was on fire so we knew we would have to capitalize on every bite. We didnt land a fish for the first 2 hours but figured out a deal in 40-50 feet of water and put over 20 fish in the boat, the best 5 going 27.3 lbs. Good enough for 1st place, by an ounce. Tight tourney with several 24+ pound stringers. Good way to end the season!

8 pounder last fall

Try a bunny strip

I have an area in a river around here that gets stacked with 3-4 pound smallies for about 3 weeks in late summer / early fall. Then they disappear. It's all a part of food source and migration routes.

Got her in about 28 feet of water on a rock ledge that drops into 40 or so feet. Casting a swimbait on a 7'6M rod and 15lbs fluoro. She ate about half way back and you know when you set the hook its a good one. Only jumped once but dogged pretty good. You dont realize until they're in the net, how big they are.

Those 7's are the ones we look for. Had a decent morning this morning before work.

Got out today on Canadian Thanksgiving Monday. Very cold morning at -2C (28F) when we launched, but it warmed up nicely throughout the day. The day was a grind overall, but landed a dozen good fish including this giant. My biggest so far this season at 7 1/4

Those were mostly jerkbait fish

Finally got my old man out to do some fall smallie fishing last week. Fish were on fire in the 28-42 foot flats, chasing small herrings. Multiple double headers and scraped up a 24-25 pound bag of them. Still no fall giants showing up for us, but with the weather finally starting to cool off, they should put on the feed bag and get fat for us.