Shooting for 14!

[Swamp Girl]

After watching and loving the youtube series, 39 HOURS, in which teams to compete for both size and number of species, I decided to add some spice to a coming solo, wilderness canoe and fishing trip. I'll be fishing Ontario for 21 days next June and whereas I'll be focused on smallmouth as my favorite fish, I'm giving myself other goals, such as at least two 100-fish days, catching at least two 40-inch pike, and catching at least ten smallmouth over 19.5 inches. These three goals should be doable as I'll be fishing lakes that might get one visitor a year, are loaded with cisco, perch, and white suckers to fatten pike and bass, and I'll be there in the prime time.

 

However, my biggest goal will be catching at least 14 species. Here's what in the 14 or so lakes I'll be fishing: brook trout, rainbow, aurora trout, perch, musky, splake, sauger, black crappie, pumpkinseed, burbot, bluegill, rock bass, whitefish, lake trout, white suckers, smallmouth, largemouth, and walleye.

 

Aurora trout will be pert near impossible to catch, but I'm gonna try. Ironically, some of the lesser species, size and fight-wise, worry me, like white sucker and pumpkinseed. I just won't tender that much time to then and I'm not equipped to catch them. Pike will be impossible to not catch. I'm also pretty confident about muskies. Splake and sauger worry me. My one splake lake will be a drive-by and sauger are also found in only one of my lakes. I won't off-load the canoe to fish for splake, so I'll be making a few casts from shore. Burbot baffle me. I'll have to do some research to have a shot at them. Whitefish also worries me simply because I've fished for decades in lakes with whitefish and only caught two while targeting other species. These should be easy: largemouth, smallmouth, walleye, lake trout, rock bass, musky, bluegill, and black crappie.

 

I'll be content with 12 species, but I'm shooting for 14! 

 

I will take photos of one representative of each species and post them upon my return. I'm already laughing at my likely getting more excited about landing my first pumpkinseed than my fourth musky. 

[J Francho]

1 hour ago, ol'crickety said:

Aurora trout will be pert near impossible to catch, but I'm gonna try.

That's a toughy.  Do your research - there are still some naturalized populations in some lakes.

[Swamp Girl]

I have located two lakes with aurora trout. Both also contain brook trout, so that worries me since they're both brookies. I know aurora have a brighter belly, but I worry that I might catch a dull-bellied aurora and think it's a brookie or a bright-bellied brookie and think it's an aurora. Well, I will be taking photos, so other fishers can help me. 

[J Francho]

I think if you get one without (or very minimal) spots, you can call it an Aurora.

[soflabasser]

Sounds like a fun challenge. I enjoy multi species fishing and can't get enough of it.Down here in South Florida you can easily catch 10 species of fish in a couple hours, even +20 species in one day if you wanted do.

[jr231]

What's awesome about bass is all the different ways they can be had ! Not many fish like em. 

[AC870]

Whatever floats your boat...

[soflabasser]

2 hours ago, Yeajray231 said:

What's awesome about bass is all the different ways they can be had ! Not many fish like em. 

That's one of the main reasons why I fish for bass.There are so many different ways to catch a bass and that makes it fun to catch them with new techniques. One can spend a entire lifetime bass fishing and never use every single lure known for catching bass.

[Fisher-O-men]

3 hours ago, Yeajray231 said:

What's awesome about bass is all the different ways they can be had ! Not many fish like em. 

Yep, I would trade all 14 species for a 14 pound Bass!

[N Florida Mike]

Dang man,if you can do all that you need your own outdoor show !!

[Swamp Girl]

13 hours ago, soflabasser said:

Sounds like a fun challenge. I enjoy multi species fishing and can't get enough of it.Down here in South Florida you can easily catch 10 species of fish in a couple hours, even +20 species in one day if you wanted do.

20+ species in a day? Makes me wanna move to Florida! 

1 hour ago, N Florida Mike said:

Dang man,if you can do all that you need your own outdoor show !!

Nah, I don't know enough for that. I'll simply be fishing pristine water, rising at four in the morning, and fishing until ten in the evening for 21 days. Putting that much time on the water should produce. 

[Lucky Craft Man]

How about Lake Trout?  I'd venture to guess there are Lake Trout somewhere in a system you are fishing (I mean there would have to be is there are Splakes).  Why not go for 15 species?

[Swamp Girl]

1 minute ago, Lucky Craft Man said:

How about Lake Trout?  I'd venture to guess there are Lake Trout somewhere in a system you are fishing.  Why not go for 15 species?

Oh, yeah, I'll catch lake trout. I mentioned them a couple times in my opening post. 

[mrmacwvu1]

I know it sounds stupid but get yourself some trout magnets

 

you can catch all of the trout species plus the panfish and others as well

[Angry John]

Sounds a lot like swimbait city to me.  Grab a lot of sizes of keitech's and go to town.

[Swamp Girl]

5 hours ago, mrmacwvu1 said:

I know it sounds stupid but get yourself some trout magnets

 

you can catch all of the trout species plus the panfish and others as well

I didn't know about them, but I do now. Thanks for the suggestion! 

[Swamp Girl]

21 hours ago, AC870 said:

Whatever floats your boat...

Water.

[mrmacwvu1]

16 hours ago, ol'crickety said:

I didn't know about them, but I do now. Thanks for the suggestion! 

 

don't be afraid to try some of the crazier colors.

 

hot pink killed the brookies this year for me

[Swamp Girl]

On 12/24/2016 at 11:38 AM, mrmacwvu1 said:

 

don't be afraid to try some of the crazier colors.

 

hot pink killed the brookies this year for me

Will do! Thanks for the tip.

[fishwizzard]

The Trout Magnet line of lures was about all I used my first year of fishing and I caught all sorts of panfish and other non-game species on them. I even got a tiny little channel cat once.  They make a lure called a Trout Slayer that looks like a little craw and when used with the supplied head has a great gliding action and a slow fall. 

[Dwight Hottle]

You are probably going to need live or dead bait for the burbot fished on bottom. Lake trout love burbot so if you do catch one little strips of burbot on a spoon will be a killer bait for the lakers. 

[Swamp Girl]

On 12/24/2016 at 11:38 AM, mrmacwvu1 said:

 

don't be afraid to try some of the crazier colors.

 

hot pink killed the brookies this year for me

Will do! Thanks for the tip.