Fish-Hawk.Net

Decided to do an evening flyfish, wading the Rideau at Carleton U. I was wet wading with my sandals which was probably a mistake as those rocks are pretty slick and slimy. Later in the evening I would regret the sandals.

Picked up 5 or 6 smallmouth which were fairly small (all under 12 inches) however even the little guys fight pretty good in the current. Lost a couple of jumpers too. These guys were feisty ... leaping all over the place and for some, they earned early release.

So, on my last cast of the night, I picked up this fish, which I think is a fallfish http://www.thejump.net/id/fallfish.htm. Kind of surprised me, first one i've seen in the Rideau so I took a pic.

All fish we caught on a bead-head black wooly bugger tied by me which means most people would not be able to identify it as such.

Me with the fish...


and a closer pic at the fish


So, as you can see it was getting dark and during the time I took to take pics it got darker - my walk out on the slippery rocks was an adventure in itself. Had some close calls and some of my butt has that distinctive Rideau River smell but in the end, a full dunking was avoided and I made it out mostly dry.

Thanks for the report jsdx.

I have caught many of those little buggers in the Barron River canyon (Alqonquin Park) and in Lac Macaza in Quebec. But none really on the Ottawa river.

I refer to them as "Sisco" (sp?) but no idea if that is correct.

Neat. I've never seen those on the Rideau.

Definitely a fallfish. I had never seen these before until I was fishing at my dads on a part of the mississippi and caught alot of these just below a set of rapids in a deep hole. I actually get some good sized ones to and they can fight. I dont mind catching them. Very soft mouths too.

I refer to them as "Sisco" (sp?) but no idea if that is correct.

Me too but after googling around a bit, they are indeed different species. The Cdn record for a fallfish is just over 2 lbs and a cisco is over 7 lbs.

I have caught more than a few of these fallfish on the fly in the fast water near the place the whitewater rafting tours begin. They are quite aggressive and will hit a fairly big fly. When I catch them, I always kick myself for not chucking a minnow bucket into the boat to keep a few as mega-catfish bait.

Those things are in the Tay River up by Christie Lake too. I always thought they were just huge minnows. Fun to catch on a light flyrod.

jsdx,

Nice to see that you're having fun on the fly. Had you waded upstream yesterday you would have run into around 10 of us fly fishing the Hog's Back to Carleton stretch. From Baseline bridge downstream is pretty clean, though above the upstream razorback the rocks are slick as snot! One chap nearly took a dive but luckily only got two thirds soaked.

As for your fallfish, they like the fast water and can get big. My largest was in the 17" range on the Mississippi.

Cheers,
Todd

jsdx,

Had a little evening swim did ya? A little rock surfing?

I've never seen that fish. It's cool to catch something you're unfamiliar with.

W.

Fallfish catch for sure. Largest member of the minnow family in this province I believe. They are caught here all summer long and in my opinion per inch put a better struggle on the end of the line than a walleye of equal size. Catch them most often during the dog days of summer in skinny riffled waters. I seem to catch them mostly right on the seams of eddies but more to the riffle, in water 1-4 feet. Last trip out kept 4 of them ranging 5-12 inches, have a few more in the freezer too. Great pike bait come winter.

interesthing stuff.

thanks

i never caught one..but its nice to no there some in there.

i was looking at this link,,and they do say something about fallfish..if you look into the minnows the last one....jee if you look at the map,,there is some in a lot off sector in the region.

http://www.briancoad.com/ncr/species_accounts.htm

http://www.nature.ca/rideau/b/b2a-e.html

joco