Big Rideau Lake favorite forage species - Know your Waters

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OutdoorActionOntario
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Big Rideau Lake favorite forage species - Know your Waters

Post by OutdoorActionOntario »

Hey Everyone. I'm starting a little homework assignment for local lakes and river spots, and it is going to be revolving around the various primary forage species for each specific body of water in and around the Ottawa region.

We have all heard about how important it is to "match the hatch" and for most people this means applying colour and sizes to your lure/bait selection that will match whatever the primary (or among the most common) forage species is for that specific body of water you happen to be on.

So, early August, on a lake that has perch as a primary forage species would likely see an angler having success with minnow style baits in a perch colour, and with a size to match that body of water's yearling class of minnows, for example. Bluegill are also a very prevalent forage species that probably don't get enough recognition from anglers, but are a great dinner treat for any bass, Largie or Smallie.

"Matching the Hatch" - Same thing goes for baits resembling crawfish, frogs, leeches, or someting to match nymphs and mayflys earlier in the season. As some may know from experience, sometimes you can be on a body of water and fish will NOT eat anything that is not the primary forage like a mayfly during their hatch - they just won't touch anything else...

So, I am going to do this for lots of different waterways, but wanted to get the discussion rolling with one of our famous local waterways- Big Rideau Lake. Please, if you have experience on this body of water, if you have fished it recently and had a smallie cough up some of his lunch, or you found some leftovers in your live-well after having a few piggies in it for the afternoon, please go ahead and chime in here with what you feel the primary forage species are for this time of year at Big Rideau Lake. I will be there this weekend and will be posting an update to this post, so please forgive me for not kicking it off with an example, but I simply haven't had a chance to fish this waterway yet this season.

Best wishes to everyone, and tight lines!!!


OAO
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Re: Big Rideau Lake favorite forage species - Know your Wate

Post by BassHunterOttawa »

For what it's worth, Almost all season long you can troll with crankbaits that have perch colours, and also smallmouth bass colourings if you are after pike/musky/walleye and bass on any of the rideau network - they work pretty much year-round.
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Re: Big Rideau Lake favorite forage species - Know your Wate

Post by EagleEyesFlash »

There seems to be more and bigger "'Bait Balls" in Big Rideau the last few years.
Guess with the zebras receding some, the bait is doing better.
The general consensus is, these fish are cisco or lake herring. There's a bunch of types of cisco and think
lake herring is a term given to "Shallow water cisco ". I was starting to think they are gizzard shad, but gizzard shad
are meant to be confined to the great lakes, but can expand their population through canals or connecting waterways.
Other deep lake trout lakes around have this fish in them too, so guess they are not gizzard shad like in Quinte in the fall,
but are lake herring or "tullibee".
Wonder what the OP will determine them to be, cause that's what lakers and mule smallies love to gorge on. :)
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Re: Big Rideau Lake favorite forage species - Know your Wate

Post by OutdoorActionOntario »

Thank goodness we had at least one other post on this or I would have felt terrible. To think I spent all weekend on the water thinking with anticipation of coming back here and seeing dozens of responses from my fellow anglers on this post... Alas, it wasn't meant to be!

Regardless, due to lack of response, we're not going to continue with this attempted series of Lake reviews. BassHunterOttawa gets bonus marks for his participation, however, so does EagleEyesFlash - thanks.

Just so you know: I did have a pretty successful outing on Big Rideau this weekend... Drop-shotting minnow baits/worms in natural tones, as well as some top-water action for the smallies, was using a firetiger perch pattern on the topwater that got bit the most, baby bass colour, not even a hit, so the bright colours did work well for the topwater. Cranks worked as well, but it was the natural colours that i had my success on. I wasn't using anything too flashy for the crankin'. Water got stirred up and turbid in a few spots, so in that situation, used a jig and pig with purples, browns and greens with a matching trailer that seemed to work well (picked up a couple Largies). If you're in turbid water use a jig that makes some noise.

That's all for now. Will be back on the Big R next weekend and will let you know how it goes. In the meantime, tight lines!
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Re: Big Rideau Lake favorite forage species - Know your Wate

Post by rex.stpierre »

I'd have to say shiners...The Big Rideau has an abundance of 3-4.5 inch shiners with a light brown back and shinny silver belly. Some of these shiners even have light brown zebra marks on their side.
I've been out fishing for lakers and have seen balls of them hit the top of the water in 100 FOW.
I have also caught bass trolling for lakers by these bait balls and hooking bass while our lines were going out...
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Re: Big Rideau Lake favorite forage species - Know your Wate

Post by RJ »

It's mostly Shad that you will find in the deeper water on BR. Witnessed a die off in the 10's of thousands 2 years ago while ice fishing on a few inches of clear ice. Dead Shad as far as you could see under the ice.

It does appear to making a comeback but still nowhere near what it was 2 to 3 years ago.

RJ
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