| Fishing is still good,tuff at times but putting your info a past years data to application provide continued success.
I do beleive fish respond negatively after years of continued harrassement.The important thing is adapting to the changes that have occured.
Being versatile and innovative but yet simple is key.Fish are dumm,they got to eat.Knowing where and when they eat,sleep and rest enables you to put certain key pieces and elements together.
I guess the biggest negative factors in recent years is water levels.Low water makes unhappy fish!Very skittish and shallow water is not as safe as it use to be for both fish and angler.
Staying on top of them,leads you to success!
Remember they got to eat,now wich wich one is on the chow,will have to see.
marc |
| Jason:
I started fishing muskies in Canada (LOTWs) in 1965, that's 37 years ago. I'll bet that there aren't ten people in North America who have more hours on the lake than me. Here's what I see and think. When I first started fishing muskies catch and release was pretty much unheard of, and although there wasn't too much pressure every fish caught was pretty much killed (I killed a few myself, I have three skin mounts). There was also lots of commercial fishing that unintentially caught muskies (this still happens with native fisheries).
During those years I have seen the lake go from a pretty good trophy fishery
(35 years ago) to a fishery where I would spend a whole year trying to catch one 50" fish (25 years ago). About this time Muskie's Inc and other organizations started to promote "Catch and Release". I did my part in the area to do the same, (made a few enemies at the bar, but we slowly started to see eye to eye). As time marched on the Ontario MNR started to change regulations and went from a two fish per day with a 28" size limit to what is now a 54" size limit with a bunch of spots in between.
Also in that time (from about 1985 to 1999 or so) another thing was going on in the NW angle part of the LOTWs that greatly effected fishing pressure.
Ontario was restricting by various means (user fees, and different limits and restrictive and confusing custom regulations) the amount of fishing pressure on that part of the lake. During that time muskie fishing pressure was pretty light, and fishing was outstanding, (I had 17 fish 50" or bigger in the boat in 1999, and probably averaged 10-50" fish/year in the boat during that period). Since that time the problems with Ontario has been pretty much settled, and the word got out, (no thanks to me) and fishing pressure has dramatically increased.
I suppose I could say (lie) and tell you that this doesn't effect me, but I can assure you that it does. I now have spots that (not on the Fishing Hot Spots Maps) that used to produce a 50" fish almost every year that I'm now not even seeing a fish, (I have many examples, and wait in line for some of them). Fishing is no doubt still world class, and better than what most people will ever see, but it's not as good as it used to be, and I think most of this is caused by fishing pressure. I'll also say this, we have had very unusual enviromental conditions the past two years (2000 very bad algae, 2001 very high water), so I'll hold my complete judgement till we get a somewhat normal year. By the way Dick Pearson, Jack Burns, and Myself are working on an article for Esox Angler on this very subject.
There is know doubt that muskie fishing pressure effects muskie fishing success, and it doesn't take long for the fish to figure it out even on the LOTWs.
Doug Johnson |
