Quinte Fishing

New here, but have read posts occasionally the last couple seasons. I've fished quinte almost weekly for 16years. 95% of my fishing has been in haybay as its rare for conditions to be suitable/safe for my small boat in bigger water. Comments here are my observations comparing fishing the last few seasons, to the decade before. Just currious if anyone else has noticed the same? Mudcat...what happened to them? Numbers used to be so high that they were a nuisance jiggin spring eyes with live bait, I've caught hundreds of them. In the last few seasons, a total of maybe 5. Shore spots that in spring, one could catch 30 plus in a day if they wanted, are now slim pickins. I never kept any, so I'm not the reason lol. Bass...seems there is still a healthy population in the bay, and for a long time, it just seemed to get better and better each year. I dont fish em as much as I used to, but a lot of my old honey holes dont seem to hold the same numbers, and 4lb plus fish have been extremely rare for me in recent years. Sheepshead...population is very good(too good?) 15 years ago, I would catch the odd one, average size maybe 6lbs. Despite a bunch of them washing up on shore dead a few years back, they seem crazy thick in numbers and size now. The past few years I have caught hundreds and more were over 8lbs than under. Weighed one this year at 18.1bs. One last year just shy of 20lbs. I have caught more sheep than eyes for 3 consecutive years now. Bad luck maybe? Walleye...spring walleye has always been hit/miss for me. But the last 2 seasons were just brutal. Skunked on the opener, the whole month of May I caught less than 10. Nightbite at shermans was phenomenal in mid June untill water temps hit 70. Skunked more often than not all summer though. Which brings me to fall walleye. Started fall walleye fishing in 2005, and man was I spoiled the first 7 seasons. I never caught a walleye less than 9lbs in the nov/dec months for 7 consecutive years. Most were 10-13lbs, and my best fish to date(Nov 2006) was 14lbs 9oz, 34". Followed by 14lbs 2oz(2006) followed by 13lbs 13oz.(2007)Average fish during those years was easily 11lbs. The last 3years, weather conditions(wind!) has put a dent in the time I was on the water, but most of my catches have been in the 6-9lb range, and I've only caught a few over 10lbs and none over 12lbs. This past Nov, I've been out alot, and have caught just 2. The biggest weighing 8lbs even. Tomorrow is another day though, and I'm going out. Have a feeling, its gonna be the day. Sorry for the long winded intro.

C.W............Welcome to the board. Great first post, some good observations and info. I'm interested to see how this year goes, and next spring. Last spring was my best Walleye opener in years, nothing huge, but a few seven or eight pounders and quite a few below that mark. Fished the West end, seen lots caught during the Trenton K's derby the past several years as well. Fish the West end in the summer a fair bit, catch the occasional Walleye, but mainly bass and the "occasional" muskie. As for mudcats, I too used to catch lots, not so much these days, maybe just the odd one here and there.

Welcome to the board, I have property just east of Thompsons and document lots of data as well. Not sure about the mudcats as stated but seen the same decline of them in Scogog over the years, and the walleye there are hurting. I once read there was a correlation between the two, with the mudcat young being a good source of food for the young walleye. The bass fishing has been relatively the same for over the years but would like to hear more about the quinte Muskie population. The walleye over the years has been good, in my opinion, but I still am not a fan of people keeping the 10lb plus walleye unless they are hooked deeply.
I think as with anything its very cyclical, with good/bad/mediocre years. Lets just hope it stays that way and we can fend off the Asian Carp, otherwise, the Great Lakes, the Kawarthas and the Rideau will all be a mess.

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O2BFSHIN

Caught my last Musky two years ago fishing the south west corner of the Bridge in Trenton. Fishing from shore, (Gold Reef Runner) , one of the boats came over from where they were Walleye fishing in the middle and helped net it, nice big fish, never weighed it. In Belleville, last opener, there were two snuggled up against the wall below Lotts Dam, also of substantial size . I do admit their rare.....Oh and yes, I know the difference from a Pike.(just warding off the inevitable comment ) If you search this site under Musky opener, there is a discussion of the topic from some years back ,under "Musky Opener".viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3596

No one really mentions it much,but the walleye fishing is definitely worse than 10 years ago CRANKinWALLY. Actually more than 10 years ago. If you remember, we used to always tie into at least 3 or 4 smallmouth bass either casting or trolling on any given day. They are virtually non existant in the bay... i did see one nice one this year, but nothing like it used to be. I don't know if you recall, but i remember going down to the waters edge, turning over a stone and seeing crayfish scurrying around. I think they are gone as well. This was a major foodsource for walleye and Smallmouth bass specially.

For the walleye, they pretty much came in the winter, spawned and all left before the season opened this year. The younger fish didn't even stick around which is a bit strange. I personally caught 5 this whole year...! but i know they were here as we cleaned up on the ice in the winter. So this just pretty much tells you that they may come to spawn, but leave and not stay for food during spring / summer. So when the MNR says the fish stocks are "stable" or "good" as they did this year, that doesn't mean they stay in the bay, they just take off due to maybe poor living conditions, lack of food, or more likely WAY too many sheephead. The bay is overrun with these things. You could only find Sheephead in very specific pockets 15-20 years ago, nothing like today. in the spring, they stack up on the shoals in the millions, where the walleye usually should be. I feel the exploding numbers of sheep have something to do with the imbalance in the bay. I also believe that is a direct result of the zebra mussels that have destroyed fish habitat and fish food for the younger year class. They have been really hard on the bay. I don't think its the fish populations, its the habitat and food sources that are not here anymore.

Of course, someone will always say they are catching something somewhere, but this is just my take on what has happened having lived and fished here since the early 80's. Doesn't make me an expert, but just my observations. On a lighter side, even in current conditions, i had some pretty good luck in the Belleville to Deseronto area no less than 3 years ago from opening to late spring. They don't stick around for long though. Summer they are gone.

A lot of good points Biff, I'm somewhat surprised with the little amount of crawfish! you would think there would be lots. I will look for them along my shoreline next spring/summer. I checked twice this summer and never found any. As for smallies I remember talking with Dan over summer and he stated that they were struggling to establish a population in the bay. I can't remember the reasons, maybe he can chime in here.
With walleye populations possibly going down(do not know for sure) it would not be a surprise. When you have one species that is the preference to be eaten at some point it has to affect the numbers. We all catch bass/pike and let them go, but walleyes keep getting taken. With that being said, the limits are put in place to somewhat protect the fish, and I am not against people taking their limits.
I agree with the increased amount of sheephead! They are everywhere, I also noticed a lot of bowfin this year.

Thanks for the link littledog!

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O2BFSHIN

To find out what is going on or where the fish have gone I think it is more important to look into the food chain. Look at what holds the food of the predators? What changes have happened to the aquatic vegetation? What is the difference between the good times to now with the aquatic plants?
Once the difference is identified then we can figure out what is needed to be addressed.
With the angling population increasing and the tools fine tuned to enable us to have a successful day the pressure on the fish is increasing exponentially. If this continues here we may see more bodies of water void of good quality fish. Just look at Collins Lake. A bass factory for years, then something changed the aquatic vegetation and the bass population disappeared soon after.
I don't think that we can sit back and say oh well maybe next year, well not for too much longer

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Leave a Great Legacy Behind
Practice Fishing C.P.R.
Catch Picture and Release

WELL YOU GUYS MAY THINK I AM NUTS BUT THE ICE FISHING DOES NOT HELP. I LOVE TO ICE FISH BUT THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE WHO CAN GO OUT ON THE ICE AND CATCH FISH JUMPS ABOUT 1000%. YOU GO OUT TODAY AND FISH,COUNT THE NUMBER OF BOATS OUT THERE THEN COUNT THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE OUT ON THE FIRST FEW WEEKS OF THE ICE SEASON. THERE ARE DEFINITELY OTHER FACTORS BUT THIS ONE MUST BE IN THE TOP 5

hard to say. I personally don't believe ice fishing has anything do with it as you can only keep 1 over 24" now. Which means most spawning females are sent back. The smaller males are kept to eat; there are far more males than females you will notice if you watch them spawn in the rivers. I feel there are other external factors at play such as exploding sheep populations, lack of food sources for younger class fish that used to stay in the bay all year.

Lets see what next year brings. Maybe it was something else this year that we don't know, but it was a brutal year. Places that were proven year in and year out produced nothing for me. I could see catching less, you would chalk it up to just a bad year, but finding nothing but sheep in every place is troubling.

I would like to know where all the crayfish went. If i ever see an MNR officer, i am going to pose this question.

I think water colour plays a a big part In the lack of finding summer walleyes we had water that looked like pea soup from like two weeks after bass opener till the middle of early October when I stopped fishing the bay I know the bass will still eat but I don't believe the walleye will stay in that ugly water I believe they all pushed out into the deepest clean water they could find I also seen a lot of bait this year from pickerel park all the way to Belleville there was bait all over. I did have a decent spring ripping buck tails for eyes in healthy green weeds in 9-13 fow tried trolling a few times but I know nothing about it and after getting skunked a few times I just stuck to the buck tails and bright jig heads with gulp 4 inch smelts nothing massive but quite a few 3-5 pound fish with that being said. The large mouth population in the bay is doing great a lot of fish 3-4+ pounds with the chance of a 5 or mabey even a 6 I don't think there's another body of water around you can catch the number of big largies you can get in a day then on Quinte. The small mouth are there but if you find them one day they are gone the next I don't know if that's them being caught in a tourny and grouping up togather as they head back out to lake O or not. Hope to meet some of you out on the ice this season if we get any lol



Jesse Van Niedek

As mentioned above I don't believe there is anything wrong with the walleye population. With the changing conditions over the years, water temps, zebra mussels, vegetation, water clarity etc... I'm thinkin the walleye are just not where they used to be. Maybe time to change your fishing techniques to locate fish as they may be in different locations now. I don't fish the Bay for walleye in the spring/summer, but on the Lake that I do fish, I've noticed the same thing over the last 5-6 years. Very few boats are trolling now. Shallow weedy areas say 12' or less is where most guys are fishing and catching. I'm no walleye expert, but if your fishing methods aren't working time after time, try something different. You never know what may happen!!

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There's something wrong with that rod.
It has a bend in it!!!

I've fished the bay for a long time. The first big change in walleye was when the Zebra Mussels made the water clearer.

Now, I think the biggest effect on the bay is unregulated commercial gill netting by Tyendinaga First Nations.

I don't think any body of water can support unregulated commercial fishing.

Perfect example is Lake Nipissing

So how can the ministry claim that the walleye fishery is self sustaining, when the commercial fishing is unregulated and my guess, unmonitored for data. How can they accurately collect data to make this claim? Or is this an excuse for not increasing stocking because Katie Wynne cut the MNR's budget to plug bigger holes at Queen's Park? Sorry, don't mean to turn this into a political rant.

The Mnr unit at Glenora is very involved. They do net studies and counts several places and times a year. Everyone needs to relax. The fall has been a tough fall but fish are still being caught on shoals on the lake that normally would be empty by now. It's possible the migration is very late. Fields are turning green that have been plowed. Everything is messed up.

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Bob MacMillan
Owner/Operator
Kingston Sport Fishing
https://kingstonsportfishing.ca/