One of the nice things I discovered about doing the fishing seminars at the Spring Fishing and Boat Show in Toronto the past week was meeting up with a bunch of hot fish heads.
Guys like Grant McAllister of G2 Angling www.g2angling.com and Jeff Chisholm of the Quinte Ice Fishing Team and guide service http://www.quinteicefishing.com
From listening to the boys spin their yarns, the end of February is the time to be on the Big Bay, but you better get down there quickly as time is running out - the season ends next Tuesday on March 1st.
Quinte is a special place for walleyes any time of the year, but especially in the winter, as you can target both trophy size 'eyes as well as numbers of smaller fish fit for a king's dinner.
Jeff was telling me that the week or so leading up to the Spring Fishing Show was interesting as you had to "play" with the walleye in order to coax them to bite.
The key in situations like this, where the fish spend an inexorable amount of time, finning with their noses almost touching your bait or lure is using the best ice fishing sonar unit you can buy. For the past two winters now I have been a Humminbird Ice 55 unit and it is truly amazing what it will show and tell you.
Indeed, most anglers mistakenly believe the key feature of a sonar unit is its ability to tell you if there are fish or not below your hole. That is important for sure, but that is only a small part of the picture.
Where units like the Humnminbird Ice 55 unit excel is in their ability to tell you everything you need to know about the mood of the fish. For example, when you can watch how each walleye responds to subtle changes in your jigging motion, changes in lure colour and even alterations to the makes, models and sizes of lures that you're using, you've solved the most important and difficult part of the presentation puzzle.
"While the past couple of weeks have favoured the anglers with expert sonar reading skills," says Chisholm, "I am anticipating that the days ahead will uphold Quinte's ice fishing reputation. And the conditions are improving for ATV travel across the ice.
"Rapala Jigging Raps continue to be our bait of choice," says Chisholm. "When dealing with inactive fish, we've had our best success by downsizing to the W5 size. The walleye are also hitting Blue Fox More-Silda spoons and the new Lil’ Finn spoons well. We usually ice our biggest fish of the season during the last two weeks of February, before the season closes on March 1st, so we are looking forward to the upcoming final days."
Grant McAllister echoes Chisholm's optimism.
"The ice fishing has been phenomenal," Grant was telling me at the Show. "On any given trip, we are consistently catching scores of resident walleye in the two to six pound range and lots if incoming migratory walleyes in the 10 to 13 pound range.
"We're catching the majority of our fish using 28-inch long, medium action, Northland Pro Angler Trick Sticks spooled with 10/4 Fireline Crystal on a combination of Northland Buckshot Minnows, Fish Fry Minnows and Puppet Minnows. As a starting point, we are tipping the spoons with three mud or dace minnows., but once the activity starts slowing down, we start scaling all the way down to just a minnow head for dressing!"
Both McAllister and Chisholm mentioned that would-be-Quinte-walleye anglers would be wise to pay close attention to the light conditions on any given day of ice fishing. They both noticed, for instance, that over the course of the season thus far, that fish activity levels on low light days has been consistent from dawn to dusk. On the other hand, when the weather has been bright sunny days, the first and last light bite has been ferocious.
"In order to combat the slow down in action during the brightest time of the day," Grant told me, "we've been picking up and moving to the deepest pool in proximity to our fishing area."
It's obviously a successful strategy other ice angler would be wise to adopt, given that McAllister hooked his biggest walleye of the hard water season so far, a 13-pound 11-ounce goliath, in a deeper pool at 11:30 in the morning.
"Understanding that these creatures are light sensitive," he said with his characteristic smile, "and adapting to the light conditions, will put a few more fish on the ice for you!"
With only a handful of days left in the Quinte walleye season, let me give you some good advice. Phone the boss and tell him you're too ill to come to work and then head down to Quinte for one last fling. Because all the signs are pointing to it being the best bite of the winter.
