MANITOBA
With the onset of cooler temperatures, many areas of the province have lakes with enough ice to walk on. Many of the trout lakes in the central and northern parts of the province are producing some outstanding catches of rainbow, brook trout and brown trout.
Jay Siemens and crew drove all the way up to Lynn Lake to fish a couple of lakes stocked with big brook trout. They fished both Gemmell and Digney Lake just west of Lynn Lake off of Provincial Road 396. You can look up both lakes on the Manitoba Lake Information for Anglers website. If you look in the Manitoba Master Angler records in 2017 a 29 inch brook trout was registered from Gemmell, the second largest ever recorded in Manitoba.
Jay was able to land his biggest brookie ever and has it all on film.
Meantime further south Roger Geres was able to walk out on Persse Lake just south of Riding Mountain National Park and land a Master Angler brown trout. Roger says ice conditions were far from ideal but should be getting better each day. He has been fishing from two to seven feet for the trout using Berkley Trout paste on jaw jackers. Small hair jigs , small tubes and small fly’s are also catching fish.
Geres says ice varies from lake to lake and each step so be careful, and use caution. Roger says the trout have been real spooky so being quiet seems to help a lot!
Just a bit further to the west Clayton Schick ventured out onto Lake of the Prairies. He found some good solid ice and a huge walleye!
NORTHWESTERN ONTARIO – JEFF GUSTAFSON
Gussy – Clearwater Bay is still wide open, will be for a while yet. The small lakes are all covered over in the last couple of days, I’m sure you can walk out on some crappie/stocked trout lakes, but you won’t see me out there for a bit yet. I’m moose hunting DEC 8-15, will get after the ice fishing following that.
SASKATCHEWAN
Ice is starting to happen on some the smaller lakes in the south and the back bays of reservoirs like Lake Diefenbaker. Daryl Gilbert, who guides both waterfowl and anglers, has taken up residence at Saskatchewan Landing. He has started doing a series of videos on ice angling in Saskatchewan. Check out his first ice video. You can find Daryl at www.darylgilbertoutdoors.com
Here is the video
ALBERTA – WES DAVID
Mild November weather has caused severe delays in ice setup and the quality of the ice conditions on larger and small waterbodies. Therefore, delayed first ice fishing opportunities throughout central and southern Alberta.
Historically, most Alberta ice anglers don’t set out until mid to late December. However, if the weather has been cold enough for long enough periods to let the water body freeze over with quality ice, there will be ice anglers on the hard water during the month of November. But that has not been the case for November 2022. Weather, ice conditions, and hunting season have greatly delayed the presence of first ice anglers throughout Alberta.
WEATHER TO WARM TO MAKE GOOD ICE
Those that have found November ice fishing success have done so on smaller waterbodies and they are finding their chosen species in the same locations and on the same underwater structures where they left them in mid to late October. However, at the time of this writing, the weather forecast for central and southern Alberta was calling for a high of +6 degrees and only -3 degrees for overnight lows and this has been the common forecast for the past three weeks. I don’t put a lot of faith in the weatherman/women but it’s not hard to see that it has been a very mild November. Anglers that are venturing out need to use extreme caution regardless of the water body they are planning to fish.
Personally, I think I will continue to focus on my wife’s “honey to-do list” and wait until after Christmas to start my ice fishing season.
BC FISHING REPORT-DAVE SHYMR
Salmon are being caught between 80/120 feet of water dragging flashers with spoons /cranks near the bottom. A slower speed is critical slower then we fish in summer and fall. We don’t use bait much at these depths as small light bites are hard to detect with that much line down on a down rigger ball . Green skinny spoons and Green Bagley Rumble B’s have been the ticket. It is still critical to fish the tides properly. The best time is as the tide is filling up as much as you can. That’s when salmon stack up in numbers tight to the shelf. With the tide going out it often scatters bait and the fish.
WES DAVID
Our thoughts and prayers are with the residents of British Colombia. Especially hard hit are those in Merritt BC and the communities along the Fraser River. Many are coming together to help and support the evacuated residents from flooded communities,. Those include many of the fishing guide companies who are on the water rescuing people and their pets. They are also along with picking up people’s personal belongings before they are washed away by the floodwaters.
ABOVE AND BEYOND
All these people that are going above and beyond to help and support others in need. They are doing this not for glory or fame, they are doing it out of kindness and because it’s the right thing to do.
Those of us in the hunting and fishing world have always known that hunters, anglers, farmers, and ranchers, are some of the best conservation-minded people in their communities. They continuously go above and beyond for fisheries, wildlife, domesticated animals, and those in need.
God bless.