Because it is so short we try to squeeze as may fishing trips as possible in this period. Usually we take a 2 nighter up on French River like last year but this 2020 was special as you all know so that did not happened but I managed to get myself and my family on Nipissing Lake and Erie Lake both trips were a week long and we stayed on islands just to be 100% isolated 🙂 

 

Fishing was good…

…with excellent parts when I got out on my own in the kayak.

 

Kayak fishing gives me the same thrill like wading in a river, an absolute experience in close contact with the water and the fish.

After 3 years since I started kayak fishing I can say that I fish by far better from it than any other boat type and yes that includes big open water lakes. 

 

 

This boat probably help me transition more into the “Dark Side” as it gave me opportunities to try new things and new water types.

We will talk more about the “dark side” in a later post, I promise, but for now let’s stay focused on the summer part 🙂

 

Summer time is topwater action with big lures and aggressive tactics. Many of my fish come out on top water but the biggest ones are still eating better under the surface.

River fishing for me in the summer is drifting on the kayak or raft boat fishing with two setups one for the surface one for the deep. The oversized nymphs were the absolute best all-around ers.

 

Single or double 5mm tungsten beads, no #6 or even #4 jig hooks in four basic colours. Chartreuses worked good with stained water, brown with clear water, white more closer to the river mouth or in the big lakes and black is best in ANY type of water. Black is best in muddy conditions and even in the super clear water, you just have to adjust the size sometimes…bigger profile in the muddy water opposed to smaller/slimmer in the clear water.

 

Topwater is a different animal, my best flies for this application are:

 

And wheat I use with great success lately:

  

They all have their time and place. When used accordingly they do a LOT of damage. In prime time you can easy have a session with 20-30fish to the boat. Let me know if you want a more introspective into this category.

 

And just to top it up this is something I used on Nipissing Lake just a few months ago:

 

Needles to say how excited were the kids in the boat seeing this lure on the water. And I can’t even say how excited I was when I had some monsters attacking it. 3 fish in total but just one brought to the boat, none landed. Obviously I have to work on my technique with these monster lures, maybe setup need to be changed or the hooks on the lure.

 

But there is nothing more rewarding when I can get someone else to hook into some slabs, especially if they are the young generation:

Just look at these faces…priceless 

 

Cheers,

Sotto