Rideau R. @ Long Island Locks

[Hookup]

Stressed from work and personal events of the week, my wife called me at noon and told me to go fishing tonight. This is why we are going to last the test of time. Anyhow, I hummed and hawed about it at home. I was worried with the cold weather that was moving in, the fishing would be completely unproductive, which in my current stressed out state would likely cause me more aggrivation. Finally, faced with the choice of, sit on the couch and watch TV or get my damn butt into the water and fish... I packed up the car and left.

I wasn't sure where I was going. I figured either the Jock or the Rideau R. at long-islands. I'd only fished those locations 3 times this year so far, so I wasn't able to say which was doing what. Todd had posted some recent Jock trip photos that had me interested, but I know that the Rideau R. location has some bigger fish at the end of the wash... I simply left it up to fate... if I see a blue car next, then I go to the Jock... if it's Red, Rideau R. Red car it was... Rideau R. I was headed... (I like low stress decisions).

I was on the water by 6pm, maybe a bit before. I started on the north shore across from the overflow damn. I think some of you call that the sandy beach. I started with a muddler minnow, which quickly proved not to work, so in continued hopes of surface action bass, I tied on a dalberg slider of table-scrap invention... Still nothing happening... Sure a few small fish, 4-6" would try to take the bait, but it was just too big for them to grab onto... all short-strikes....

The thing was... there were a lot of bugs in the air... some large mayflies,(hex?) and some caddis... and a good number of them were crashing/fluttering down... So I wanted to stick with surface presenations...

Within 20min I had figured out that the smallies wanted agressive surface action more than anything else. I found that a tiny foam surface popper would work... the rappid pop-pop-pop of the popping foam bodies got the strikes... and man, did it get strikes... and fish... Many strikes from smaller fish, but enough bigger boys to keep me on the pattern.

I couldn't give anyone an estimate of number of fish brought to hand... it had to be well over a dozen... Most were in the 8-10 inch range, but there was a solid 2lb'er taken from a small hole... he/she put on quite a show for me and people watching... It was the best of the night, but another pair of 1+ lbd'rs would make an appearance closer to 7:45pm...

I did have one very interesting fish. I heard a surface strike over my rigth shoulder.. so I reversed and threw to the boil... A very tiny, 6" or less bass grabbed my popper... I just got tension on him in when my line took off... and I mean it took off.... I had to let slack out fast for fear of my rod breaking.... then the drag peeled... awesome... I knew right away what had happened... that's the second time in that same location a bigger fish chomps a smaller... Now I need to go back there with a bigger setup, and wireguard...

The big gal held on for quite a while and honored me by letting me fight her back towards me, to have her swim right by my legs, no more than 1foot away from me... It looked to be about a 30" musky/pike. At that point I started to get thinking that just maybe, by some stroke of luck, the hook had some how set into this beautiful monster and that the final 30min of my fishing evening would be spend playing this tune... but it was just not meant to be... the big fish got tired of holding and swimming with this small snack and eventually let the little bass go. I was able to live release the bass, though it definately looked worse for ware.

It was a fantastic evening and the only disapointment was no one else was out to enjoy it with me.

I'd highly recommend getting out on that strech tonight if you can before the really nasty stuff gets here this weekend...

[Todd B.]

Tim,

Glad to hear you had a good evening on the water. The Hex hatches have been pretty good lately, though there hasn't been too much surface action during the hatches. My guess is that the bite this evening should be good, given that it's been a couple days since that cold front moved through. They should be good and hungry by now. I think another trip to Long Island is in order.

As for your big fish, my guess is that you lucked into one of the muskies that frequent that stretch and I haven't seen any pike pulled out in my many years of fishing that stretch. We ran into two of them last season.Until the SM switch over to baitfish in the fall I like to chuck olive woollybuggers or olive crayfish patterns when I'm fishing streamers. The trick is that they have to get down to the bottom in the deeper holes. This can be a challenge depending on the current(s).

[Hookup]

I would have guessed musky from the view I got.. but it's so hard to tell when your heart is going.. the entire time I was thinking.. I know you've got this because you want to hold onto it.. please come closer so I can get a look at you..... don't let go yet, don't let go yet...

Since I'm a sucker for the topwater action I was very happy with the results.... now, had someone been there throwing buggers... I can say that I would have been out fished 3 to 1. I missed as many strikes as I took and I feel it was because the popper is quite a bit bigger than a size 6 or 8 bugger, so the smaller fish had troubles taking it.

One little guy took the poper so far in the hooks were into his gills... I was able to get the hooks out by gently going in from the gills and pulling the popper out... a quick cut of the line, and away he swam... hope that he makes it.

If you do get out there, let us(me) know how it goes... I doubt I can get out tonight again... but man I want to... maybe for a quick fish from 6:30 - 8:20... oooh... need to find a flower shop on the way home from work I think.

[Todd B.]

Yeah, well if the buggers aren't producing, the small poppers come out! They will always bring up the agressive SM.