Snap swivels
One of the most popular and useful attachments, the snap swivel prevents your line from twisting when you’re using lures designed to rotate (most in-line spinners and spoons). Best is a good-quality, stainless steel ball-bearing snap swivel, which can cost anywhere from 75¢ to $3 apiece. Avoid cheaper versions with barrel swivels, as they typically can’t spin well enough to keep up with the lure’s rotations. The result? Line twist. Also avoid safety-pin-style snaps, which tend to open. Instead, choose models with a secure lock snap or a cross-lock snap made from a single piece of wire.

Snaps
Crankbait manufacturers put a great deal of effort into creating lures that swim just like baitfish to trigger predators to strike. But using a snap swivel when fishing crankbaits can affect the lure’s action, reducing its effectiveness. So for crankbaits, just use a snap instead. Best is a black, cross-lock model in the smallest suitable size for the lure you’re using.

Swivels
Swivels are commonly used as weight stoppers in live-bait or Carolina rigs, but that’s not all they’re good for. I use a ball-bearing swivel as backup when fishing a lure that rotates too fast for a snap swivel to keep up. I simply tie one side of the swivel to the main line, then attach a metre of line to the other side, and tie the snap swivel to the end of that.

Three-way swivels
Also known as triple-barrel swivels, these are useful for trolling deep water. Attach the main line to one ring, then on the bottom ring tie on 15 to 75 centimetres of monofilament attached to a sinker. This gets the rig down deep. On the remaining ring, tie on 50 to 150 centimetres of line attached to a spoon, crankbait, floating jig or even a streamer fly.

Wire leaders
I’m always shocked by how many anglers use steel leaders when fishing for trout, walleye or bass. You don’t need a wire leader unless you’re going after pike or muskies, which are the only freshwater fish with teeth sharp enough to cut fishing line. As with the other terminal tackle, use a quality leader with a stainless steel ball-bearing swivel and cross-lock snap.

“He held one of the wings and tried to hold the bird up so it wasn’t hurting, but you could hear it crying in the footage,” she says. “The captain held the beak and got the lure out and they let the bird go. Though it was kind of bewildered in the water, it was fine.”

She recently contacted Outdoor Canada to share her story, photos and a video of the uncommon catch—a cautionary tale for every angler who fishes near birds.

The lesson? Keep your eye on your lure, and always have some bite-proof gloves and a pair of pliers on hand. Steady nerves certainly don’t hurt either.

Check out her photos and video below:

Hoooked: The gannet was going for a mackerel when it got caught on the jig

Not ready for take off: The bird struggles to fly, with the hook still embedded in its mouth

Click here to view the embedded video.

—Allan Lynch

North Saskatchewan River
Resembling torpedoes, lake sturgeon regularly cruise the North Saskatchewan River seeking bottom-dwelling prey. And the stretch of river running through Edmonton offers boundless chances to catch these living fossils. Guide John Conroy offers packages starting at $150 and will show you where to cast. (780) 668-0288; www.bbjtackleandfishingadventures.com

—Gord Nuttal

Kootenay River
From Canal Flats and Fort Steele, B.C.’s Kootenay River winds 65 klicks through world-class bull trout water with fish weighing in the double digits. The best angling is early April through to late May when the water’s lowest. Elk River Guiding Company offers guides and accommodations. 1-877-423-7239; www.elkriver.ca

—George Gruenefeld

This email was from Ken Orr, a member of the Australian National Fly Fishing Team and one of the most talented anglers with whom I have had the pleasure of sharing a brown trout water.  

I met Ken more than 20 years ago when I was in Tasmania working on a magazine assignment for Outdoor Canada—I know, it is a dark and dirty job, but someone has to do it—and we hit it off like long lost brothers.   

Canadians and Australians share many common bonds. I think it is the “Commonwealth connection,” but then, maybe it is the fact both countries were colonized by fun-loving scallywags, rascals and ne’er-do-wells. Whatever the reason, I consider the short time I spent fly fishing with Ken in Tasmania, for the wildest strain of brown trout in the world, to be among the top one or two most pleasant fishing experiences of my life. 

So, imagine my excitement when he tracked me down and we subsequently reconnected after all these years. The memories, as they say, came flooding back. 

In Australia, for example, it is rare to randomly cast for trout, as we do here in Canada. Instead, Aussies use a technique they call “polarizing,” relying on their eyesight and polarized sunglasses, as they stalk a stream or the “margins” of a lake, watching for a fish to “porpoise” or rise. Only then do they present their offering to the fish.

And those magnificent brown trout are another intriguing story. Not only are they the wildest strain of brown trout left on Earth, but they’re the result of a curious afterthought. 

 The story goes that when prisoners were being shipped from England to Australia in the 17th and 18th century, which served as a penal colony, someone had the bright idea of packing salmon eggs on wet moss and shipping them in the cargo holds of the old wooden vessels, with a view to creating salmon fisheries in the rivers and streams “down under.”  

Without almost any consideration or reflection, a few thousand brown trout eggs were also thrown in for good measure.  Brown trout eggs, it should be noted, from the famous chalk streams of England—the very same streams that Isaac Walton wet his flies and wrote about so long ago. 

By now, you can probably guess how the story turned out. The salmon eggs were delivered to the hatchery in Hobart, where they were tended over with care, but when the fry were subsequently planted in the creeks, streams and rivers, the salmon never established themselves and the experiment ceased. 

But the offspring of those few brown trout eggs, those postscripts, found Tasmania to be perfectly to their liking, and they thrived. To the point where no further eggs were ever shipped from England. So the brown trout you can fly fish for today are the direct descendants of those very same wild trout Sir Isaac wrote about and marveled over.

As a matter of fact, Ken tells me that, “next year is the 150th Anniversary of the introduction of trout into the Southern Hemisphere, so there will be a lot going on to celebrate, not only the event, but the fact they are still truly wild browns.” 

Ken also tells me that in addition to guiding trout anglers from around the world, he is spending more time teaching and training folks how to fly fish.  

You owe it to yourself to put this at the top of your “bucket list.”  And if you plan far enough ahead, with discounted seat sales, it is not nearly as costly nor as complicated as you might imagine. No more so, in fact, than a trip to the Rockies or the Caribbean. Remember too, that the seasons are reversed in the southern hemisphere, so when it is cold and snowy in Canada, and you’re looking to get away from it all, it is gloriously hot and sunny in Tasmania. 

As a matter of fact, here is an absolute, money-back guarantee: If you ever get the chance to fly fish with Ken in the stunningly beautiful highlands of Tasmania, where a significant portion of the countryside is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, where you share the landscape with kangaroos and Tasmanian devils, and the water with platypus and the trout, you will pinch yourself to discover whether what is unfolding is reality or a dream. 

Visit Ken’s website www.orrsometassietrout.com.au or contact him at: orrsome@skymesh.com.au

Be sure to follow Gord on Twitter @gordpyzer

Sure, it’s rare to see a fly angler using two dries, but I often fish a small dry, such as an ant, behind a larger grasshopper. The challenge when fishing the ant is its lack of visibility, but tying it on behind a large, easy-to-see pattern cures that. Almost as rare is the two-streamer method, which usually pairs a large fly with a small one, or a dark fly with a light one.

The nymph-streamer combination, meanwhile, probably makes the least sense at first glance, because streamers are usually fished with an active retrieve and nymphs with a dead drift. But by fishing this combo on a down-and-across swing, you can present both realistically. Whichever two-fly configuration you choose, here’s how to rig it up.

Hopper-Dropper
The hopper-dropper is the classic set-up for the dry fly (hopper) and nymph (dropper) combination. Most anglers simply tie a two- or three-foot-long piece of tippet to the bend or the eye of the hopper’s hook, then tie the nymph on the other end. Think of the buoyant hopper as an edible strike indicator for the nymph drifting through the water below it.

This basic set-up also works for two nymphs, two dries or two streamers, but with a few modifications. With two nymphs, the tippet length between them should be one to two feet, while two dries should be no more than a foot apart so that they drift naturally together in the same current line. As for two streamers, always tie the second fly to the bend of the first streamer’s hook so both flies ride and move properly through the water; separate them by two feet of tippet.

By rigging these two-fly combos this way, you can quickly change strategies when needed. Simply untie the first fly from the leader, but keep the two flies connected to one another. That way, the combo can be stored in your fly box and reattached when needed—with just one knot to retie, it’s quick and easy.

Blood-knot rig
For fishing two nymphs together, you can also create an effective rig by tying the tippet material to the leader using a blood knot and leaving an extra-long tag end. One nymph is then tied to the end of the tippet and the other to the tag end. You can even add a second dropper this way. And if you need extra weight, attach it (instead of a nymph) to the end of the tippet. That way, if you get hung up, you’ll only break off the weight, not the flies.

Although this system works well, the one drawback to it and other complex set-ups is the lack of versatility. If you’re fishing two nymphs, for example, but find a rising fish and want to switch to a dry fly for a few minutes, you’re faced with some time-consuming tackle tinkering. Then when you decide to go back to nymphing, you have to retie all over again. Still, it’s a small price to pay for the decided advantage of fishing with two flies.

Double Trouble
Two-fly rigs are definitely trickier to cast and more prone to tangles than are singles. And things only get tougher with heavier or more air-resistant flies. As well, the longer the tippet between the two flies, the harder they are to cast. It helps to use a stiffer tippet material, such as Maxima, but you also need to adjust your casting. Open your loop slightly, and be sure to wait for the backcast to straighten out fully behind you before starting forward. This helps keep the flies away from the fly line, the leader and each other.

Across the province, millions of fish from the province’s nine fish culture stations are being loaded onto trucks, boats and aircrafts to support Ontario’s recreational fishery.

The province’s fish culture stations produce around 8.5 million fish, which help stock more than 1,000 lakes and rivers across Ontario. Species being stocked include Atlantic salmon, aurora trout, brook trout, brown trout, splake, lake trout, lake whitefish, rainbow trout, walleye, muskie and Chinook salmon.

“Ontario fisheries are a significant resource contributing to Ontario’s economy and recreational angling opportunities,” said Minister of Natural Resources David Orazietti. “We all have a role to play to ensure a healthy, diverse fishery for everyone to enjoy and to pass on to future generations.”

Fish stocking has a long history in Ontario, dating back to 1865. While about half of the fish are stocked in an effort to restore degraded fisheries, the rest are intended to provide additional fishing opportunities.

If you’re headed out on the water to take advantage of the province’s incredible fishery, be sure to check the regulations for your region. You can find all the information you need, including changes to limits and season dates here

May 9, 2013- Fisheries and Oceans Canada and the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) are pleased to announce that a Memorandum of Understanding concerning the future of the Experimental Lakes Area has been signed effective immediately. This agreement is a major milestone in the transition of the Experimental Lakes Area to a third party operator and is the result of seven months of confidential negotiations between the federal government and IISD.

IISD is a Canadian-based, internationally renowned public policy research institute for sustainable development that champions sustainable development around the world through innovation, partnerships, research and communications. 

“The federal government has been working diligently for many months to secure another operator for this unique, world-class facility,” said the Honourable Keith Ashfield, Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. “I believe that IISD is well-suited to operate the Experimental Lakes Area with excellent capacity, expertise and international reputation to take on this important work. We are pleased to have worked with IISD to get to this point and look forward to working with them towards a final agreement.”

 ”The Experimental Lakes Area complements IISD’s work in freshwater management and, if the Experimental Lakes Area does come to IISD, we would ensure it remains an independent, world-class research facility that continues to produce leading-edge freshwater ecosystems science in the public domain and in the public interest,” said Scott Vaughan, CEO and president of IISD. “IISD has been working with the federal government for several months to get to this point. This is not a finished deal but is an important step, and we look forward to working with Ottawa, Ontario and Manitoba going forward.”

Today’s announcement of the Memorandum of Understanding between the federal government and IISD provides a framework within which an agreement can be negotiated that will enable IISD to proceed as the operator of the unique, world-class Experimental Lakes Area. In order to facilitate the smooth transition of the facility, Fisheries and Oceans Canada and IISD require this agreement to address past and ongoing responsibilities, remediation of the lakes and the site, the transfer of material assets needed to operate the site, operational support, data sharing and other matters.

As an important part of this agreement, Fisheries and Oceans Canada will conduct a sampling program over the summer of 2013 as part of the transition to maintain important scientific research and ensure that long-term data sets can continue uninterrupted. Fisheries and Oceans Canada will work with scientists who have active research at the Experimental Lakes Area to support their needs for the upcoming summer research season, including monitoring activities and requirements to access their equipment.

IISD will continue discussions with the landowner, the Province of Ontario, on an agreement to operate the site going forward. Both Fisheries and Oceans Canada and IISD are committed to ensuring that these discussions are successful.

 For more on the subject, see Outdoor Canada‘s coverage here, here and here.

No, I am not suggesting that if you wear a thick sweater or don a hefty jacket that you’ll catch more fish.  But, you will if you bulk up your bait. 

Indeed, when it comes to walleyes, Windsor, Ontario buddy and guide Jon Bondyis a lucky man.  As well as living in the “banana belt,” where spring arrives much earlier than elsewhere across the country, the Detroit River where Jon spends much of his time afloat, is open for walleye fishing year round.  So, for the last month, Jon and his clients have been smacking huge numbers of walleyes as well as some giant fish. 

To tell the truth, he has been driving me crazy, sending along his annoying daily images of the big fish his clients have been catching while I have to be content, counting down the hours to Opening Day.

And nearly every one of those brutes has fallen victim to a “bulked up” jig, which includes either two scented soft-plastic baits on his jigs or a livebait/salted shiner added to the softbait enhanced leadhead. It is a deadly trick. 

Indeed, the way I normally do it is by starting with a 1/16- to 1/2-ounce ReelBait Flasher jig, the one with the tiny spinner that throws off extra fish-attracting flash and vibration, selecting the specific weight based on the depth of the water I am fishing. 

The fastest route in the spring, to a trophy walleye like this one, is a bulked up jig.

Then, I’ll thread on a scented, soft plastic 3- to 5-inch Trigger X Minnow, Gulp! Minnow, or Berkley Power Minnow, so the hook exits the back of the bait in the normal manner.

Now, here is where it gets interesting. Instead of fishing the jig dressed in this manner, I’ll add a second soft-plastic minnow to the hook by running the point under the jaw and out the nose as though it were a live minnow.  Indeed, many times I will use a live shiner, chub or dace to finish off the bulked up jig.  (Some skilled walleye hounds I know, even prefer nose-hooking small scented soft plastic crawlers and lizards.) 

Regardless of what you use to top off the dressing, when you “bulk up” or “double up” your jig this way, you’re offering the walleyes a much bigger and more attractive meal without adding too much extra weight. 

The combination also has considerably more tail wag and action, and twice the bouquet if you’re using scented baits and/or live or salted minnows. 

In addition, because a bulked up jig weighs more, you can cast it much further, especially if you use one of the new ultra-thin diameter super lines like Fireline, Nanofil or Sufix Fuse. 

But get this: While a bulked up jig weighs more, allowing you to cast it further, it actually sinks more slowly due to the water resistance the deadly duo provides. So you can routinely fish a bulked up bait in much shallower water than you would first imagine. 

Finally, while bulking up a jig works well for walleyes all year round, for some strange reason, it tends to shine in the cold water shoulder seasons of early spring and late fall. 

In other words, right now!  

Be sure to follow Gord on Twitter @gordpyzer

“We look forward to bringing Bass Pro Shops’ low prices and friendly expert service to the many sportsmen and women who live in the region,” says BPS founder Johnny Morris. “We are also excited to add to the momentum of an area that already draws millions of visitors each year.”

Niagara-on-the-Lake enjoys a rich tradition of outdoor sports and history as it is situated in southern Ontario where the Niagara River meets Lake Ontario. Some 10 million people visit this area each year and another 2 1/2 million people are within an hour’s drive of the site.  

Bass Pro Shops’ unique, award-winning outdoor stores are known for combining retail with entertainment, conservation and outdoor education. Along with fishing and hunting gear, Bass Pro Shops stores offer equipment and clothing for hiking, backpacking, wildlife viewing, camping, outdoor cooking and more.  A gift and nature center will also serve up a wide variety of outdoor-related items from lamps and dishes to bird feeders and furniture. Their expansive boat showroom will feature Tracker, Nitro, SunTracker, Tahoe, Grizzly and Mako boats built by Tracker Marine Group.

“The store’s unique design and unforgettable shopping environment are parallel with the shopping experience we are bringing to Niagara-on-the-Lake,” says David Baffa of Ivanhoé Cambridge, the company developing the shopping centre.

Walleye lay their eggs on shallow, baseball- and basketball-sized boulders, where the eggs can settle into the cracks and crevices, safe from the marauding mouths of hungry perch, suckers and panfish. They also favour areas exposed to wind and current, because moving water cleans and aerates the eggs. This makes the mouths of creeks, streams and rivers prime spots to fish early in the season. Ditto for narrow, necked-down channels in larger lakes and rivers where current is present, as well as shorelines, shallow reefs and shoals exposed to the prevailing wind (typically northwest).

Once you find fish in one of these areas, it’s a safe bet you can come back in subsequent seasons and find them again, as mature walleye return to the same spawning grounds year after year. Not only that, first-time spawners learn where to go by following older, more experienced fish.
 
2. Go deep: Here’s a top secret that few walleye anglers know, and one that is likely counter to everything you’ve always been told: in the spring, trophy-size fish leave the spawning areas quickly.

The common perception is that you need to weed through numbers of smaller, precocious males in the spring in hopes of catching one or two larger female walleye, but that’s simply not the case. Instead, the large females are quick to leave the spawning areas in search of deepwater refuges where there are plenty of ciscoes, whitefish and smelt to eat.

Younger, smaller walleye typically feed on yellow perch, and since perch are shallow in the spring, the smaller walleye stay shallow with them. But as the walleye grow bigger, they switch from what is abundant to what they fancy most—soft-rayed forage fish such as herring, whitefish and smelt, which don’t have sharp dorsal fins and spines.

There’s another reason mature walleye retreat quickly to deep water. The female fish can reduce their metabolic demands in the colder water to devote more energy to producing eggs. So in the spring, if you want to catch numbers of aggressive walleye, fish close to the shallow spawning areas. But if you’ve set your sights on catching the trophy of a lifetime, head for deepwater structures and cover.

3. Do the jig: Anglers have caught more walleye using jigs than all other presentations combined. Still, as close as jigs are to being universal walleye catchers, they stand out in the spring when weather and water conditions are variable, providing maximum versatility.

For example, if spring arrives late and the water is icy cold, the fish may be lethargic and relating to heavy current down deep. In that case, use a bigger 3/8-ounce to 3/4-ounce jig. This will allow you to hover live bait over the fish holding within inches of the bottom. On the other hand, if spring comes early and the walleye have migrated to the nearby shallows, you can pitch a light 1/16- to 1/4-ounce jig into the warm water and pick off aggressive, roaming fish.

Jigs are so effective because they let you tailor your presentation to both live baits and soft-plastic dressings. When the water is frigid in the spring—and again in late fall—live bait gets the nod, especially lively minnows. Leeches excel when water temperatures begin warming up, while crawlers reign supreme in the summer. Still, I like to bring along all three live-bait options, and let the walleye decide what they prefer on any given day.

Scented soft-plastic grubs, worms and minnows tend to work best when walleye are active. And for an even bigger, bulkier presentation, you can team them with live bait. It’s deadly on fish that want the shape and profile of a soft-plastic dressing, with the added flash, flavour and aroma of the real thing.

Keep in mind that walleye are also colour conscious. They respond most positively to shades of red, orange, yellow, chartreuse and green. If you can’t decide what colour jig to use, pick one that’s multi-hued.