thousand islands

[fisherman21]

Head up to the thousand islands next week, and am hoping to get into the smallmouths. And tips would be great

[Kevin J Legg]

Smallies have moved off the beds and are spread out over various depths. Try fishing shoals with varying depths. Try shallow early and move deeper till you find the right depth. 15-35' not a bad starting point. I've picked up quite a few in 35 fow trolling for walleyes. Lots of bait in 30-60 fow. Drop shot rig a good technique.

[YodaMage]

I always liked the rocky drop offs at the edge of weed beds that are common up there. Dewolf and Lake of the Isles area is where I'd focus and I'd put one rod in the water with a minnow suspended in the middle of the column then I'd jig the bottom 6 feet right down drop. 

 

Nice part of this is you might get a smally on the drop, you might get a large mouth closer to the weed edge and you never know when that minnow is going to get Musky or Pike smashed for fun. (Yup, don't forget your 6" or 8" leaders).

[Kevin J Legg]

I caught some beauties yesterday trolling shad raps in12-22 fow.

[MadPerry]

you'll get a lot of different answers, all of them correct.  depends on the individual and the way  they fish.  last year at this time we were nailing them on kvd square bill 1.5's in a bluegill pattern especially, ran in the shallows and along ledges.  crawfish imitating jigs and wacky rigged senko's/trick worms/etc worked off ledges.  a daredevil spoon also netted some BIG pike and smallies.  I bet the water is really flowing up there this year with all this rain!

[kwatchi]

Any reports from Carelton Island neighborhood?

[fisherman21]

Well ended the first day with 2 smallmouth, a largemouth, and 3 pike. Not bad, hoping to get into better bass tomorrow

[panfisher]

Hey man, while your up there, even if you're not specificaly targeting them, hope you nail your first musky, and a good one at that....... !

[fisherman21]

Got 5 smallmouth and a pike today, that's what I'm talking about

[panfisher]

Don't know what you're using, but several years ago, we went nuts reeling in smallie after smallie, with EELS mixed right in with them, using ........nightcrawlers weighted with half oz sinkers on the bottom in 35 or so fow (8lb line). Don't usually fish with live bait, but this was a rare time to do so and we were not sorry. Both fish fought superbly with this still fishing style and we did not mind roasting up some of the eels on the fire on the shore of the "larry", as they would normally make a nest of our terminal ends with their writhing action when fighting........

[Chas0218]

jigs with worms are deadly in that area.

[Grady95]

Was up at Wellesley Island all last week.  Caught smallmouth every trip on drop offs along shorelines, sunken humps out in the water and current breaks between islands.  Also hit lots of largemouths along sides of islands and again, in between small islands where there are current breaks.  We all had Province of Ontario fishing licenses so we spent most of our time in Canadian water.  I almost always find the best bass fishing to be there.  All week I had two rods working.  One rod was rigged with wacky rigged Senkos in almost any color and the other had a 1/8 oz brown haired bucktail jig that I tipped with a very small piece of worm.  Originally, this was supposed to be a perch rig but the bass were just killing the thing so I just left it on all week and caught tons of bass!

I usually boxed out very quickly every day, so if you are looking to fill the freezer, get up there now!  This is a great year for bass on the river.  I bet even my brother could catch fish this year!

[panfisher]

Well before 9/11 and border security issues, when it was no big deal crossing back and forth from/to Canada, we fished from out of some place on the American side where we rented a large motored canoe and fished without even worrying about Canadian licenses and what not. We camped at a Provincial Park southwest of Brockville and did not even think of an issue of being hassled about stuff from the authorities. And we caught many dozens of smallies largemouths and northerns, plus panfish, mostly in Canada. The tons of readily biting smallies (with some eels too) were the main show. Ahhh.... If only we could make a time machine and go back to those easy going days of fishing having fun and few hassles from governments and such......Then bottle the essence and sell it.... ....!

[Kevin J Legg]

Eel are not legal now in the river. We use to catch them often fishing smallmouth but haven't caught one in years. The smallmouth fishing is good and I'm hitting a few when I troll for walleyes. Mostly fo 10-35 fow but some deeper.