High Water on a Thursday Evening

Post by **Fishboy** » Thu Jul 10, 2008 9:19 pm

I hit the Ottawa River with a friend this evening. We arrived at about 6:30, the wind had died down, and the bugs were all over the place. We fished the Quebec side fairly hard and had one brown (12") and 3 bass to show for our efforts. All fish were caught on weighted streamers in sizes 8 to 10.

It was a bit disappointing, given all the bug action, that we didn't see any rises. It was as if the fish had disappeared. I can only speculate that the higher than usual water has affected the fish's feeding habits by providing them with all they need subsurface.

The river is still very high so be careful if you venture out in search of browns.

Post by **FishingIsHealing** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 12:34 am

Yah the river is extremely high. Certain death for anyone who falls in at this point. Even if you do manage to have a life jacket on, you will just be carried down to the Dams at the EB eddy paper mill and die in current there.

Be extremely careful..............river is super dangerous......would suck to hear about someone drowning in there.......

The Ottawa is RAGING!!!!

Stay Safe

==Tom==

Post by **Salar** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 9:46 am

Yes, the Ottawa river flows are very high. They were spilling water up at the Des Joachims dam yesterday.

Post by **Fishboy** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 4:46 pm

That's what I figured, Salar. What with all the rain in these parts, the Ottawa River drainage must be super saturated. Apparently, we had only 9 rain-free days in the month of June. It could take a few relatively low precipitation weeks to lower the river to levels much safer for wading.

Post by **joco** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 6:47 pm

OK
i work at that eby eddie dam..and never seen or almost never seens water like that this time off year..right now there 9 door open..meen dams door..never you see more then 2 or 3 usely ans sometime no door at all open today there was 9..this is a lot off water going down.

and its not only the ottawa river that is high the gatineau is high some lakes are high..we did got a lot off rain..in the past 2 months.

i did try the deshene bay last week in kayak .yooooo..way to mutch current to go up the the walls..dangerous there..compare to last year at the same time.

please be safe.

joco

Post by **Bass Addict** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 9:39 pm

Joco where the '' blank '' is all the water coming from

McLaurin Bay is flooded.................

The water must be from up north

Post by **FishingIsHealing** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 11:41 pm

As Joco said, the Gatineau is also extremely high! I've never seen such a current like I did last weekend on the Gatineau......

There was whitewater in so many places, and that river is usually very flat and not moving as fast as I saw it. I could imagine a human falling in, they would have no chance and be sucked underneath in the undertow.

I even saw islands covered up by water which humans had walked out to and built those rock people Inukshuks or whatever. The islands were under water completely all that was sticking out were inukshuks......

Up near Low, the water was very high and quick also, the Paugan Dam is a scary dam to be ontop of, and we crossed it and the Paugan Reservoir (lac ste. Marie) was extremely high too!

Also, the trout creek I go to frequently has been so high lately, that the fishing has been very hard. Usually when the water is low, the fish just pool in one area and you can catch a couple every time. Now, they are anywhere they want to be, with the entire creek to explore and excess amounts of food and baitfish everywhere.

As Joco said, many lakes and rivers are high. I agree that most if not ALL are high right now and the Eb Eddy plant has most of it's gates open at the dam!

You do not want to fall into the water in Ottawa. So I wouldn't attempt wading at all, I wouldn't even attempt kayaking unless you are a pro and very strong and can paddle your way to shore easily with your kayak.

Driving on the Champlain Bridge and looking upstream to the Britannia Beach is terrifying, you see a huge white wave up there, which is Deschenes, and it's just so strong, I can imagine being in a sailboat and getting sucked through it and then tipping over and drowning .

Yikes, very scary!

Please be safe everyone! Drowning is an awful way to go.......