REDS, ORANGES, YELLOWS AND BRONZE.

Other than a few local fishing outings during the busy summer travel months, home waters have remained quite safe from this prying angler. Winter and spring had been hectic with both work and play, and once the real heat arrived it was comfortably rewarding to just chill alongside friends in more northern climes.

Back to school truly marks the beginning of autumn. Being a shift-worker, an easy routine during other peoples Monday to Friday grind is to see the kiddies onto the morning bus, while the boat waits hitched to a running truck. Reminds me of many frosty mornings packing the WarCanoe at first light for those long anticipated hauls up the Mighty Moose.

While living up north what really got the fishing juices flowing in fall were a few things. The rivers would swell up some with the seasonal rains, making travel easier to further reaches of the wild. The Cree turned from fishing to hunting, resting pike and walleye from any hooks and nets. Cooler air made it more accommodating to spend entire days enjoying the outdoors, and the fishing for at least a few weeks in October would generally be the nutz. Pike schooling up and putting on the feedbag were a seasonal favorite, and sighting seals, belugas, moose, hawks and bears while on route was a more frequent occurrence.

Back at home here in the valley that same colorful, fall spirit to fish and explore lives on. When younger, never having had any chance for bass, walleye or trout in these parts during this season, everything today seems new and rather experimental. Within the past 3-years for “just bass alone,” I have fortunately had the time to sample nearly 40 new lakes, with much of this testing being done during autumn. It’s a rush really, as most of these water bodies were scouted out in books, online, talking to friends, in topo & hydrographic software and Google Earth, and then finally set to target. A few places just rocked the socks off, most were OK, and some were total duds. Like this year, September 6th the bass season got rolling for me, and in the past six weeks with many outings and nine new lakes to test this fall, there were a few explorations which worked out great, and some that taught a tough lesson. With pavement, gravel and bush trails going everywhere, the journeys through the land of maples, elm and oak all sharing vibrance before winter takes hold, the bass at the end of the road simply give a greater reward to the entire experience. It’s an awesome time of year to be enjoying outdoors.

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As far as the bassin’ goes, it wouldn’t be honest to say I completely started the season in September. There were a few occasions I had to get out through the summer months, and one such day was with friend, Christine. Our morning on the water she showed me as she has in the past, what it takes to actually catch fish, and I felt grateful that she took time out during her vacation home here to make room in her busy schedule. I much appreciated this from Chris… she is a talent, an optimist, a worker, and interesting woman… the real deal.

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On the way home from a trip out in western Ontario, travel buddy Tony stopped in Petawawa and signed up for the Hawg Bass Tournament on Muskrat Lake slated for September 8th. Without a partner, he eventually recruited not-so-bass-guy, me. Having never fished a tournament and being rather skeptical with that whole scene, I thought… why not? Best to experience such things to really know. Well, two days before competition a serious bass season began with my little prefish to just set some hooks on frogs, senkos and toobs. Come tourney time, it poured rain and howled cold winds all day. But, Tony made it worth it more ways than one. Big bass for $500 and third place overall for another $500, we walked away happily in the money and I learned a thing or two. With much thanks to the Capn’ of the A$$ Tracker, I’ll likely be retiring 100% for my tournament career.

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Mikey’s had an awfully crazy fall with plans to basically lay new roots and begin a new chapter in his life. It’s ballz and about bloody due. Finding time with this work-a-holic ain’t been easy, but we did. Mike a backwoods billygoat, it only seemed befitting we go on a good tour in the hills. Our day was met by unseasonably gnarly, cold-front, north winds while we tried for smallies on a deep and remote lake. No tanks caught; which we know are in there, we did pretty darn good considering with some decent bass. Enjoyed that outing.

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Never see enough of this old friend; my oldest friend of 31 years, and I surely make that known whenever the chance does finally come about. Fraser joined me one day for a tour up into the other side of beyond. After launching the Lund I pretty much hit a stump right away, and again later on a river rock shoal. Thankfully I was suspicious of the area and only traveling at idle speeds. Our time together we were panning for green and bronze bass on waters known to have chunky nuggets, yet on this attempt any flashes in the pan remained rare. Fra did pick up a golden walleye and a few fish, myself as well. For a monday late September I was surprised how many other anglers had the same idea to go panning for bass. No day is a bad day for fishing I guess.

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Somewhere in the midst of things, I spent a day on the water chasing bass and muskies with another cool fella I had never really met. Len, an old regular to some fishing boards and I had bumped into each other before, on the Ganny, on some icy Bogie backroad, and one other time while shopping fer fishing shtuff. Our day out we worked for a few fish and unfortunately had a good ripper of a ski come unpegged while on the troll. It was a really good day though with Len, and the ski fishing kinda sparked some new interest again. Looking forward to our next time.

One other outing this autumn was a real rare treat. Bren joined me for a day fishing. Armed with a light rod and an inline spinner, she put the beats on bass and pike through the morning until we stopped to enjoy a late lunch before heading home. There’s never enough days to fish with her.

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To the fishing in hand… and something new to share. This paragraph just some rambling about dropshotting, so never ya mind if it doesn’t really interest ya.

In 2010 there were a couple days I tried drop-shotting to very limited success. In 2011 didn’t bother with the method at all. It was this year after witnessing the effectiveness of the drop by Tony and noting that much of the anglers at Hawg Bass were using the technique, that it was worth giving a try again. So, on three new lakes this fall once finding good depth with fish below on sonar, I giver’d with some drop-shotting. First attempt slowly drifting over 30-35 feet and just kinda draggin’ the drop yielded a big hook-up, but a loss. Second time out I hit paydirt as it was a calm day, and therefor easy to short cast and slowly tweak some Gulp back, getting a real feel for things. Must have felt or hooked forty fish that day, but probably 75% of them got off… it just wasn’t happening. The third try it ended up a blow day but boat control was do-able over what I figured were good spots. Same thing happened as the second time out though, but this time lost a biggy and a few others. Fish were interested but something was wrong, and so it was guessed to be the hook or how it was tied. Using Gammy’s with a palomar to the shot, every now and again I had to tweak the knot to make the hook stand up and out more. This thinking relatively standard right??? Well, it wasn’t ti’ll heading into see Gord at Bits & Baits that I decidedly picked up a pack of the VMC’s rigged to prevent line twist. Having a morning to fish the following day, I tried another new lake and picked up five largies. A week later, returned to the lake where I had lost so many of the fish previously, and before big winds made things really difficult, it turned into a great morning picking up a dozen or so smallies, and a few chunkers too. Thing is, over these two outings it was a 100% hook-up and catch rate with these hooks, and some quality fish to boot. So come end of a little trial and error, it appears as though something was found that works for me. It’s been an effective little trick to add to the trade. I’m looking forward to tweaking this method even more to suit, as it feels a little more natural to this walleye jigger from days back.

Bass this autumn haven’t only received the subtle approach to wind up over the gunnels. Everything from frogs, cranks, senkos, tubes and mini-tubes, grubs, swimbaits and inline spinners have taken a turn hooking fish. Keeping with last years fall theme of bass on light gear, this seasons fishing the same tried-and-true methods have worked well again. Decent numbers of respectably big bass have exceeded personal expectation, especially considering it’s been a short window on new waters, and half of the lakes are kinda smaller backwood holes off the beaten path.

So for what’s ahead I dunno? Six weeks of bass has been fun but maybe about enough… (who am I kidding, I’ll be out a few more times) November is around the corner though, and with realistically only six or seven more weeks of boating season left, thoughts are turning to other fish elsewhere. So in finishing bass for now; or possibly for good, I’ll leave the end of this report with just a handful of fish pics and a short 3-minute video / slideshow… (please excuse all the face shots too, creativity with only the tripod is at a premium)

Here’s a whole lotta fish! And there’s a tonne more in the Vid.