Although the season kicked off last week in the Montreal area, it officially kicked off yesterday in several other Quebec regions.
• Also read: Well equipped to trick zander
To help you thwart the percids you’ve been discussing for a long time, I asked four guides to find out which approaches they’ll most favor during the first 15 to 20 days of the season. Here are her tips.
Lake St Louis
Until the water reaches a temperature of 18 to 20ºC, Marc-André Paquette makes his customers fish in the Pointe-du-Moulin with slow trolling at a speed of 1.6 to 2 m/h sectors L’Île-Perrot, in near the Beauharnois power station, at the mouth of the Châteauguay river and along the Blue Canal. The main search is for intersections between the main flow and the countercurrents. Along these breaks, on the edge of the structures, at a depth of 3 to 7 meters, he will exploit a deep-diving plug like a Yo-Zuri DD Walleye, a Rapala Shad Rap or a Deep Husky Jerk. He will be using a parabolic rod with braided line rated at 20 pounds, to the end of which he has tied a fluorocarbon leader weighing 10 pounds/test.
► To learn more, call 819.640-2264 or visit the website guidepechemapaquette.com.
Lake Saint Pierre
For the next 10 to 12 days, when Alec Delage and his clientele target suckers, they will be fishing almost exclusively with jigs, with 1 ounce jigs fed with a Phenom Mister Twister and a trailer tripod positioned in the stern. The line used is a 15lb/test braid with a 50cm length of 10lb Fluorine leader. They will exploit depths of 8 to 12 meters.
Popular sectors are the embankments of the sea route at buoy 110, near the dams outside the restricted zones until May 28th, at the mouth of the Richelieu River near the river embankment and just near the entrance to the Chenal aux Corbeaux .
Walleye are fished on the island tips with jigs between 3/8 and 1 oz fitted with a brown or black and yellow-green phenom. The tip of the hook is covered with an earthworm to enhance the olfactory aspect. In addition to vertical jig, they position themselves offshore and cast bait on shallower spots. You will collect them by making them jump. Trolling with crank baits or a ChatterBait along grassy areas at 0.8-1.3mph is also a very productive approach.
All the islands of the archipelago are a destination at the beginning of the year, as are the edge of the Saint-François-Bature and the rocky islands and lighthouses in the middle of the lake.
► For more information, call 450 271-6139 or see website guidealecdelage.com.
Saint Lawrence River
To catch one of these yellow or black bass around Montreal, Sylvain Fishon Thibeault uses a fire tiger-colored worm harness and impales a large earthworm on the two hooks. It trains its presentation at depths of 10 to 15 feet using a rudder droop weighing between 1⁄2 and 1 ounce. “After spawning, the zander make their way to rocky spots,” explains this fishing guide. To ensure the descent at a controlled speed of 0.8 to 1.2 m/h, he uses sea anchors.
If the fish are picky, all the roders aboard his boat will tie 1/2 to 5/8 ounce jigs along with a chartreuse or chartreuse colored Power Worm or Gulp Minnow and Black. The whole thing is complemented by a whole worm that is stung on the head so that it follows the same axis as the template.
A trailer tripod, not made of particularly flashy metal, but made of fluorescent material, ensures a larger number of shots. Its main thread is a 12 or 15 pound braid or a 20 pound/test monofilament. He installs a double barrel and a 15 pound fluorocarbon leader that is the same length as the rod.
So when the swivel makes contact with the rings, the customer knows all he has to do is lift the bar. These favorite spots are under the 40 motorway bridge at the crossroads of rivers, opposite and downstream from the Repentigny marina at the crossroads of the Chenal Saint-Pierre, opposite the church of Varennes in the crags, at the top of La Ronde and on the Quai de l’ horloges.
► For more information see sylvainfishon.com or call 514-887-9842.
In the North
According to the travel guide Sylvain Cousin, you should pay attention to depths of 2.5 to 4.5 m and the proximity to estuaries in the neighboring regions of Abitibi-Témiscamingue and Outaouais at this time of year. Specimens of all sizes are still common in breeding areas.
Sylvain and his guides try to locate areas of rapids and eddies, countercurrents, current changes in direction or even stagnation. The walleye remain there because many forage fish, which are at the bottom of these predators’ food chain, are attempting to feed on the eggs that the spawners have recently laid.
This creates a large storage chamber until the water reaches the critical temperature of 13 °C and a summer migration takes place. Whether right at the mouths of the rivers or in the adjacent bays where the big females wallow after the act, Sylvain uses slanted jig heads from the company Jig Agile. According to him, these white and red or chartreuse colored shad darts attach to the ground by lifting the back. Unlike Rissofish, which lie sideways in sediment deposited on the seabed, these are more visible and easier to grab for specimens that are still reluctant to hibernate. In addition, he adds a very powerful leech that is impaled by the suction cup.
For tackle he uses a semi-rigid rod and a small 6 or 8lb/test braid reel. He attaches the jig directly and sees no point in tying a fluorocarbon leader with such a thin super line. “The best trick in such a presentation is to hold the tip of the stick in the air in an exaggerated manner, as if the hand were at the noon or 1 o’clock position on a clock.
So when you move, your jig bounces and moves only a few centimeters at a time, otherwise more than a foot,” explains the specialist in this beautiful corner of the country. At the beginning of the season, the proposed approach has proven itself several times at Cabonga Reservoir near the Cabonga River, Dozois Reservoir in the Ottawa River sector and Grand Lac Victoria in the Baie des Missionnaires.
► For more information, call 819.328-3164 or browse the site facebook.com/aventuresylvaincousin.guide.
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