Canada Multispecies Fishing Report

Spring time means another fishing trip into Canada for me. Late May into June I try to get to a couple of lakes in Canada to do some walleye and bass fishing. Due to the wacky weather conditions we did have to change it up a little bit.

This was the first time I had been to Perrault Lake in Ontario, Canada. I went with several friend from our fire department who had been going for the last 15 years. We stayed at Manotak Lodge just outside of Perrault Falls. Our hosts Dave and Linda Becker were the great. When we got to the lodge they had some bad news for me and fellow angler Matt, who were looking for walleyes. The big females had spawned already and moved down out of the spawning lakes and the rivers. The males had also been on the move. There were several males in the rivers yet, but had to be in the right place at the right time. Most of our walleyes came off of 3/8 oz BFT jigs white and purple worked best. We tried chasing the fish on the main lake pulling spinner harnesses and pulling cranks with no luck. Water temps were in the upper 50’s at best. Pictured here is one of our nice males on our first day out in the Ord River.

The first day we were there was beautiful 70 degrees and sunny. The next couple days were aweful. Temps in the 40-50 degree mark, snow, rain. You name it! I’ve never been so glad to have my Gamehide Typhoon rain gear in the boat. Kept me dry and warm.

The good thing about fishing on this lake there were plenty of toothy critters to chase after. They really like the X-Raps in Ghost and Perch. The ghost pattern really produced in the boat on most days. I found that the Perch color worked best for me. We mainly tossed these in shallow bays and reefs. We rarely fished deeper than 12′ with these.

The other way we fished was what my group called bloater fishing. You either take a bloater or semi frozen hearing about 8" in length and push a 2/0 treble hook through the stomach so it come out just behind the dorsal fin. You hook your leader on and toss it over board in shallow bays 8′ of water or so. You leave you bail open and wait for the line to come off. This produced the biggest northerns we caught for the most part. It was a nice way to sit out on the beautiful evenings.

Like I had said ghost X-Raps produced northern. It also was a favorite with the bass. We noticed after our snow storm/sleet storm on the 3rd day that the bas were moving up into the warmer shallow bays. Near the end of our trip the females even started to show up. Most of our bass were males. They typically ranged from 12"-18". We did manage 2 of them on the last day there were 19". Jigs also produced. We tipped many 3/8 oz jigs with chartruse/pepper ring worms and cotton candy ring worms and K-grubs. Live bait just didn’t seem to get the job done. We tried minnows and crawlers…they just weren’t as interested.

I wished the weather wouldn’t have taken a turn half way through the week. I’m sure we would have hit on the big females on the main lake. I really would like to fish this lake in the late spring and early fall. I know you could make a killing on the eyes and bass.

I’m hoping for a couple more reports from Canada this year. I’m planning on one trip for sure this September from the Little Moose Lodge in Emo, Ontario. I’ve fished the chain of lakes here before and had a great walleye experience. Terry and Monica Berryman make awesome hosts. I know theyy will put me on some good walleyes.