Well Saturday October 01 may have been our last day out fishing for the New Brunswick 2011 fishing season.

Jamie had wanted to get out last weekend even though it was apple picking time. It was put to a vote and it was close. Jamie’s vote was for fishing.

Hint: We didn’t go fishing, you can figure out how the voting went.

Chipman Weather Was Looking Good

Jamie kept his eye on the weather for the Chipman area throughout the week and emailed me saying Saturday was going to be a bit rainy with a little wind but it was a better day than Sunday was going to be and wondered if I wanted to go fishing. DUH!!

“How’s leaving at 5am sound?”

I was outside waiting just before 5 and was surprised at how warm it was. I didn’t even need a jacket on at 5am on October 1st. Of course we talked and joked all the way there and hoping the water level had dropped.

Well we’re here at Chipman but where’s The River??

Most of the time we leave in the dark and plan to get to the water right at daybreak, not today. We were pretty eager so we left a little early and arrived while it was still pitch black out.

We took the canoe off the car so Jamie could get his fishing gear out of the trunk and then we fished for a bit at the shore until it was light enough to get the canoe, ourselves and all our gear in the water.

Jamie bought this really cool head lamp. He looked like a miner. I have one similar but I usually only take it with me when Atlantic salmon fishing. The sure come in handy when there’s no light and you’re trying to tie on a fly.

Once we could start seeing the water we saw that it was extremely calm. Perfect, we didn’t even need jackets on until later when it started raining and when it did start raining a sweater kept me warm and dry, for most of the day.

The cloud layer was low and heavy so it looked like the heavens would open up on us at any second. However the water was like reflective glass and there was no wind at all. Perfect for fishing the weeds for big pickerel.

We Saw Action Immediately

We were only on the water for a few minutes. Once we reached the opposite side of the cove where I like to fish the weeds we had pickerel going for our baits. What a great sign to have early.

It was very quiet, until the first shotgun blast rang out. I think duck season just opened up on us. Once we heard that first shot it was like machine guns going off every 10 minutes or so.

I told Jamie he better get rid of that duck suit for the day.

I landed the big perch you can see on the left, gave it a little kiss and set it free.

We caught a few perch throughout the day. I love the way they tease the bait before they chomp down on it. Don’t sure what kind of fight a 3 pound perch would put up.

They sure can put up a good fight even when they are only a half pound, or less in some cases.

Then There Were Flying Pickerel

If you’re a fisher I am sure you love it when pickerel take to the air. This is what was happening on Saturday, they were wild and wacky fish to say the least.

It’s so cool to cast a bait and have a pickerel right under it. That’s always gets me going but when a bait hits the water and a pickerel leaps 5 feet through the air to smack that bait, well the beats all else.

I love Atlantic salmon fishing and Saturday I think these pickerel we imitating salmon leaping in the air. We need to take a non-fisher who loves taking video and pictures to capture some of the action that was going on.

We also had many pickerel exploding on baits right at the side of the canoe, usually soaking at least one of us. A few times I saw wakes and deliberately drew the pickerel boat side before they could strike.

I even pulled my bait to the back of the canoe so I could bring it right along side of Jamie. HaHa, your all wet.

The pickerel fishing and catching went on pretty much all day with only a few minutes between the action. Just enough time to cram food in our mouths.

The rain eventually started but at first a sweater was all we needed. Later the wind picked up and the rain got to the point I needed my rain gear on. That’s when it became a little tougher to keep the canoe on track, thank goodness Jamie has a trolling motor. We didn’t even have to use the anchor, all day.

Most Pickerel Were 20” or More

My two best chain pickerel were 22” and 23 1/2” however most through the day were about 20”. Well except for when my bait passed through the pickerel nursery and I caught two little guys.

One was so small I could almost hide it in my closed hand while the other was more like a hammer handle. They were good for a little teasing and jokes about size matters.

As you can see I have on my ‘Happy To Catch A Fish’ face.

I had been using a few other baits but you’ll notice I caught this 23 1/2” pickerel on the trusty red senko worm I have been using for the last few years. They do a great job of making pickerel go nuts.

For the better part of the day I was using a black and redish purple 5” senko. I used this bait for most of the day because it was such a dark cloudy day and I find a dark bait gets more action when it’s getting darker. And it did, all day long.

Poor Jamie managed to hook into a nice fat pickerel. I did a great job at netting his pickerel and then I gave him the net. That’s when he took the hook out, well it really just fell out of the pickerels mouth and it flipped and then slide right back into the water.

Didn’t even get a chance to take a picture or measure the monster. Could have been bigger than mine but we will never know now.

I had my camera almost ready when I saw it go. I think I should have snapped a picture of Jamie’s face.

You can be sure the next one he caught didn’t get away so easily.

Jamie Wasn’t Letting This One Slip Away

Even though the rain and wind eventually won out we still had about 12 hours of fishing. Who could ask for more. It was an awesome day and we even got home before dark.

Now I can’t end this post without making a little bit of fun of Jamie.

Jamie’s Been Abusing Froggies, Again

About a month ago Jamie and I were fishing and he pulled the lovely looking segmented frog from his tackle back. He tied it on and let it run along side the canoe to see how it moved through the water.

It looked marvellous so he made his first cast with it, right into the weed bed and BAM a pickerel came up out of the water and slammed it good.

Immediately it headed toward Grand Lake with Jamies froggy.  Well the tension on Jamie’s reel was real tight and the line snapped and the fish was gone, with Jamie’s frog.

Since then he purchased a couple more of these great little frogs and decided to give it another try Saturday. This time he managed to keep the frog but it wasn’t getting as much action as some other baits we were using so he set it aside.

Later when we were packing up to go home I noticed that his little frog was following him around but when I took a closer look I realized it was actually hooked into the bottom of his boot. We rescued it with a pair of pliers and now it’s safely back in his tackle box for next year.

All in all we had a really good day with non stop action. Thanks Jamie.

It can be really frustrating to have water in your fish finder. Just like a watch with water in it the display can start fogging up making it tough to read.

It would work fine until the sun hit it directly causing it to heat up a bit and then the fog moves in, on that display that is.

My first experience with getting water in a fish finder was on a 7 day fly-in fishing trip we took to northern Quebec twenty some years ago.

I leaned over the side of the boat as I was connecting my fish finder and it went straight in the drink. Only for a second but I guess it was long enough to take in a tiny bit of water, just enough to fog up my screen.

After a couple of days of that I was ready to toss the fish finder back in the water, for good.

We went through some financial difficulties some years ago and I sold the boat to help make ends meet so today I don’t have a boat but we are getting closer every day to the time I’ll have another fishing boat.

The fish finder I’ll get will have to be really water proof so I am looking now and adding fish finders to my wish list which I keep leaving where Jenny can find it before Christmas and my birthday.

Today I am browsing Garmin Fishfinders on Amazon. I really like Amazon and find great deals all the time. It’s always at the top of my list when looking for fishing related products.

The Garmin Fish Finder 400C 4-Inch Waterproof Fish-finder

I couldn’t believe how far fish finders have come since my first fishfinder. So much more detail and I’m looking at colour display units as well. How cool is that.

Fish finders took us from trolling the bottom to find structure to watching a colour display without getting snagged on bottom in the process.

I have to find an affordable fish finder so we stay on budget and the Garmin Fishfinder 400C is is just that. A great investment in my retirement.

No problem telling a fish from a weed or a rock and that’s important to me as I don’t get out fishing as often as I would like so my time is important and I don’t care to waste it fumbling around finding fish and structure.

Water Temperature Is Important

When on the water it can be really important to know the water temperature and the Garmin 400C Fishfinder does a great job. It can make the difference early and late season when the water temps fluctuate and shut down or turn on fish.

Backlit Display For Early/Late Fishing

When I go fishing it’s usually from before day break until it’s so dark it can be tough to find your way to the boat launch. That’s the time accidents happen on the water so having a backlit display is literally a life saver and gets us back safe and sound.

Cassidy Lake Pickerel Fishing 2011 Part One

Casey landed his first pickerel and had the biggest grin on his face. Not sure if it was because it was his first fish of 2011 or because it wasn’t me with the first fish.

Ha, maybe a little of both. I sure hope it’s not a sign of things to come for 2011 as he just kept catching them and smiling, a lot.

Casey was using minnow baits with blood red hooks and what a huge difference it made to the fish catching.

I didn’t have any lures with the blood red hooks and they just weren’t interested at all.

He kept offering me lures, even ones with red hooks but I don’t like losing other people’s lures so for a time I just said thanks but didn’t use them.

Well after Casey’s 7th fish to my zero I was willing to lose one of his lures. Errr I mean use one of his lures.

Finally I hooked into a monster. Well maybe not a monster but I am sure it was all of 12 maybe 13 inches, it just thought it was bigger.

Fishing Tip of the Day: If you haven’t given blood red hooks a try yet you don’t know what you’re missing out on. Casey was smart and started replacing the hooks on his baits at least a year ago.

You can be sure I will be ordering some red hooks to replace my existing hooks.

I will tell you that if you invest in lures with blood red hooks or buy new blood red hooks for your lures you just might get a whole lot more action.

Casey couldn’t seem to do anything wrong Friday, even though it was Friday the 13th.

Even though I started catching pickerel they were few and far between for me. Casey on the other hand just kept catching them.

A Great Day of Pickerel Fishing

I was still determined to catch some pickerel on lures without red hooks. After all I fished for many years before red hooks and did great.

Well I did manage to catch a few more using a perch pattern and ended my day with 7 pickerel and a sun burned face. It really looked like I was most embarrassed about getting my butt kicked

I believe that Casey landed 25 pickerel by the end of our day. So he caught the first fish of the day, the most fish of the day along with the biggest.

I am already looking forward to my next trip to Cassidy Lake. I had kind of forgotten about the lake once we started pickerel fishing the Chipman, New Brunswick area.

I guess there’s just not enough time to fish all the places I love as often as I would like.

Maybe I will get more fishing in once I retire in a couple of years.

Casey, thanks for the great day of fun and I love what you’ve done with your boat. It’s going to be an awesome summer.

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• A Chain Pickerel By Any Other Name (thejoyofflyfishing.com)
• Cassidy Lake Pickerel 2011 (flyfishinginnewbrunswick.com)

It was a very long winter and I didn’t get out much at all so when Casey emailed me to see if I was up for a little fishing trip to Cassidy Lake I forgot all about the long winter.

I’ll tell you it didn’t take long to respond to his email. I want to just email the word DUH!!.

Cassidy Lake is actually the first lake I fished for chain pickerel and is where I landed my personal best at 24″.

My fishing buddy for that day was Roland who had never fished pickerel, he hadn’t even seen one before. Beginners luck allowed him to hook into a 26″ pickerel as his very first catch.

Twenty years later and I still haven’t beat or matched his first pickerel.

It’s been more than 20 years since I fished in Cassidy Lake. After I sold my boat and started using a canoe I found I got trapped in the back end of the lake way too many times once the wind picked up which was most days.

I think I got about 3 hours sleep Thursday night. I just kept looking at the stupid clock all night and was up by 4am checking my fishing gear.

So glad Casey had the same problem and showed up early.

So We Were Off To Cassidy Lake, Friday 13th, 2011

It drizzled and rained all the way there but once we made the turn and headed down the hill towards Cassidy Lake the liquid sunshine stopped and I think the clouds even got a bit lighter.

Gloomy Day on Cassidy Lake New Brunswick

We pulled into the boat launch which was just a path when I used to fish here. So much easier to lauch a boat now.

As soon as I stepped out of the truck I was so glad I had my winter clothes. The wind was quite chilly. I immediately put on my neoprene waders, my toque and even my gloves.

Casey did all the safety checks and we launched the boat. Our first day of fishing for 2011 had begun.

Casey’s Fishing Boat

Once we were on the water, away from the shore the wind didn’t seem nearly as cold. Not sure why but I was certainly happy.

Note: I didn’t catch a single fish using my favourite red worm I write so much about, but more about that after I get some rest.

Pickerel Fishing Cassidy Lake New Brunswick Part Two

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Didn’t really think we were going to get another day on the water but Casey got Jamie and I together again at French Lake. One of my favourite places to fish pickerel.

Jamie, Myself & Casey Pickerel Hunters

We were not really sure what the weather was going to be for Sunday but the forecast on the Weather Channel said to expect rain and winds of 20km.

It’s also the end of September so I packed clothes for every condition and thanks to Casey’s reminder I brought gloves. Well it started out cold enough I had on a sweater and my winter jacket and of course the gloves.

As the temperature drops at night so does the water temp causing the Chain pickerel to become rather lethargic until they warm up a bit so we didn’t leave as early as we usually do. We were still early enough to see a black bear and a coyote, but not early enough to see any deer hanging around apple orchards.

We pulled into one little bay section of the lake and the pickerel must have been there sunning themselves. Once we turned into the bay we saw pickerel scattering in every direction. I am pretty sure they were laying close to the the surface so they would warm up but I could be wrong, they may have been having a meeting about where to hangout for the winter.

A friend and fishing buddy of Casey’s, Ron, said he would meet us at the lake and might bring his son. Well he showed up alone so Jamie went with him. Ron was just launching his boat as we pulled in. Perfect timing.

It was good to meet Ron and hopefully we will get together again for another fun day on the waters of New Brunswick. Maybe next year we’ll get out for some bass and pickerel in the same day.

Time to head home after a great day of fishing

It seems that day always comes to an end too soon but there is always another day. If things go well we may even get one more day out on the water before the season closes for us here in New Brunswick.

Tuesday, June 22, 2010 was a very special day for me. I finally got to fish New Horton Lake. It only took me 30 years to get to it.

I moved to New Brunswick some 30 years ago. My brother-in-law told about a brook that flowed from the lake and I fished it for years but never actually fished the lake it’s self.

I actually had my best opening day one year. There was still plenty of snow around and the lake was completely frozen over.

I was standing at the beaver damn and ready to fish the brook when it started snowing. It snowed so hard I could hardly see across the little brook but at that exact moment the trout went nuts and I caught my limit of brookies in just a few minutes.

I never had to move my feet.

My friend Casey lives close to the lake and has told me about it before so I was excited to fish it some day.

Well I got home Tuesday morning after my daily walk. I headed into my office to check the email and of course log onto a few fishing sites and forums to check out what’s being talked about.

Casey saw that I was online and PMed me with one question. “Do you want to go fishing?”

I didn’t even respond before I had the phone in my hand to call him. An hour later we were on our way to New Horton Lake.

I remember Casey telling me that New Horton Lake didn’t take much to get really choppy as it’s a fairly large body of water. This day however there was no breeze or wind at all, yet.

When we arrived I was amazed at how much bigger the lake was that I had thought it was from looking at it only from the brook mouth.

Here’s a picture of what the lake looked like when we arrived. I was so excited to get started I am sure I was pacing.

I have to say that Casey could not have chosen a better day to take me fishing.

How Our Day On The Water Went

We started by trolling and caught a few white perch to start with.

It was a hot day, very hot and the water temperature started rising quickly. In no time the bass started become more active, just what we were waiting for.

I had never seen a white perch, I think they should call them silver perch, what a cute little fish.

The picture above shows a small perch but I guess they get to be 14 inches and bigger. Plus they fight just as hard as a bass. I will have to get back there again and try for a few of them as well.

I had the best time and we both caught fish so the day was a definite success in my books.

I had the largest bass of the day right up until about 5 minutes before we left when Casey hooked into a 17″ jumper and won the day.

Casey’s really dark bass fought hard and jumped high out of the water a few times, just to make it more exciting. The strike looked like he hooked into a log on the bottom but then the log jumped clear out of the water.

I told Casey I was going to modify the picture using Photoshop but he worked to hard for me to do that to him, this time around.

Does Casey look happy or what? Congrats and thanks for the awesome day.

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My man and I live on one of the premier walleye fishing lakes in the state of Minnesota.  We moved here about 5 years back and have loved every minute of it.  We have always enjoyed walleye fishing.  I was shocked when my partner began taking an interest in bass fishing. There are lots of articles in the sporting mags about fishing for large mouth bass, but we had not fished for them.  My partner asserted that we had enough walleye in the refrigerator and could catch more any time, but he would have liked to engage in the game of fishing for large mouth bass.

I enjoy being out in the boat and getting a tan, so I did not actually care what my hubby was fishing for.  Then one day we were out on the lake and he caught an enormous bass casting into shallow water.  I was dazzled at the sight of this beautiful fish leaping out of the water, shaking his head making an attempt to get rid of the hook in his mouth.  I had been relaxing in the sun reading a book when the fun started.  My husband ordered me to get the net.  I stood with the net and watched the enormous bass jump out of the lake again.  Following the leap my man’s fishing rod almost doubled over as the fish made a dive to the bottom of the lake.  This battle went on for approximately five minutes before we ultimately had the large mouth bass in the boat.  We took pictures and then released this wonderful fighter.

After seeing the fun my husband had in hooking the big bass I announced I would have liked to give it a try.  After only three casts I felt pull on the line and then a powerful pulling.  I have fished for years and could not believe the strength of that fish.  He swam under the boat to try to lose the hook.  He then took an air borne jump from the water.  The leap in the air dislodged the hook from his mouth.  It was actually the most thrilling fish I ever lost!  I knew why my partner had switched to fishing for large mouth bass.

Fishing for bass requires the utilization of artificial lures.  There’s a giant selection of lures in numerous shapes and sizes.  During the past I can’t say I have paid much attention when my hubby is picking out lures, but with bass fishing I have started my own tackle box.  What an astonishingly fun fish to catch.  I don’t take a book with me in the boat when we are fishing for large mouth bass.

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The advantages of aluminum fishing boats these day have grown up and more popular over those that are made from fiberglass and steel. They are strong and typically they are resistant to corrosion, leaks and rots.  Once the aluminum fishing boats get damaged, they are easy to fix and repair.

When purchasing this type of boat you have to spend a lot of your money but it will pay off in the long run much savings in maintenance, towing, fuel, upkeep and repairs.

This aluminum fishing boat not only for fishing but it is also ideal for recreational activity with your family or friends. If you want to cruise with your friends or your family you can use this boat whether in freshwater or in saltwater.

Aluminum fishing boat can be a good choice for individual fisherman because it is easy to manage. With a high strength to weight ratio, makes this type of fishing boat easy to carry by just one person. You can also easily loading this fishing boat on an ordinary vehicle and when you are ready to use it you can set into the water.

People love to have this fishing boat for one reason that is easy to upgrade. You are allows to add or install some features that you want or desire on this boat. The durability of an aluminum fishing boat is not questionable. They sport a solid construction with metal pieces welded along the boat and makes joint disconnection less likely to happen to prevents water from getting inside. Aluminum fishing boat withstand impacts by means of deforming into dings or dents which can simply be hammered out unlike fiberglass fishing boats that usually shatter.

Getting an aluminum fishing boat can be a good and undoubtedly investment you should have. This aluminum boat is lighter therefore it requires a smaller motor that require less fuel to operate. They need not to be waxing like other type of fishing boat. The only thing you should do and know when doing maintenance is the boat needs regular cleaning that’s all.