THE
REEL THING January
1994
Sheila
and I would like to wish all our members and their families and friends a
super year in 1994 and hope that all your personal endeavours are successful.
The
past year included many notable happenings in our club, not the least of
which, were our Milliken Park summer activities; the Scarborough Open, the
Ontario Open and of course the regular Wednesday evening practice sessions.
The summer was topped off there by the addition of our beautiful, new
casting dock. Those of us who
were fortunate enough to get out to Milliken on a fairly regular basis last
summer can hardly wait to get back to honing their skills on our lovely new
facility next May.
On
the tournament trail, beginning with the Sportsmens' Show last March, our club
garnered over a hundred medals and trophies, including a number of awards and
medals in the North American Championships by Sheila and me.
Other noteable medal winners were Dave Collins, Paulo Conceicao, Roger
Harwood, Pete Durnford, Irene Johnston, Rod Sills, Scott Purcell and Ron
Bolton. There must be others who
should be mentioned here as well. The
improvements in the casting skills, competitive and otherwise, in all our club
casters in 1993 was quite an eyeopener for the folks in the 'other' clubs in
Ontario. 1994 should be even more
spectacular!
Fishing-wise,
there were many reported successful outings (but, disappointingly, very few
with enough details to write about) by our anglers, including Leon, Fred,
Dave, Pete, Paulo and others. A
trip to the exclusive Franklin Ponds, courtesy of Bernie and Dorothy Ennis,
several weekend trips to A/B Lake and stream fishing trips were the highlites
for most of us. Dave Usher, of
course, made us all jealous with his successful junkets to the Arctic and
Costa Rica. Jack Wilkings, when
he was well enough, made a dent in the trout up in Temiskaming on Blue Lake. Rod Sills caught bass, pike and pickerel all summer when he
wasn't working on the dock or cottage on the French River and finished the
season there with quite a bang, but I'll let Rod tell you about it, himself,
"I
had the thrill of my life, last fall, while still-fishing for bass, with a
worm and small hook. I thought I
had caught a small one, but after setting the hook, all Hell broke loose!
About a hundred feet of line went out, then after ten minutes, or so,
the fish finally jumped clear of the water.
Another twenty minutes passed and we were able to get him to shore (too
big for the net). There, it was
finally identified as a 47" long muskie, weighing approximately 35 to 40
pounds. Believing in 'C.&
R.', I cut the line and watched my '93 highlite slowly move back into the
French River - probably heading for the safety of Georgian Bay."
It
would be nice if we could get more written reports like Rod's for our
bulletins this year - thanks Rod. The
North American Casting Championships will be held in Toronto this year
(August), along with three or four other tournaments. We hope that our club
will be properly represented in all these competitions.
I know that we already have the talent in our club to shake people up -
so let's do it, eh! We will
probably be hosting the big one ourselves in 1995, so we should all sharpen
our skills accordingly.
1993
saw several bamboo rods completed, with Scott Collins producing two of these
gorgeous wands himself. Our fly
tying sessions have improved along with the tyers' personal skills and both
the rod building and fly tying sessions should flourish in 1994 as well. Irene and Rod hosted our annual Xmas party and as always did
a bang-up job. From all of us,
once again, thanks guys!
We
were disappointed that the proposed banquet and trout opening ice fishing trip
to A/B did not come off as planned, but maybe there is anough enthusiam out
there to re-schedule both of these activities.
Now is the time to begin thinking about participating in the club's
annual spring ice-out trout trip to A/B. Speaking of which, the speckles are
fat and saucy in A/B this year. Dave
Collins, John Alexander and I hit the lake for opening day last Saturday and
took enough beauties for a few feeds. HOWEVER,
Dave let his enthusiam get the better of his good judgement for a brief moment
and it cost him dearly. I'll tell
you what happened, briefly, because Dave is writing a summary, himself, for me
to include in the next bulletin. He
was tending the campfire on shore, only fifteen feet from his buzzer when it
beeped and in his excitement he leaped to the ice to get there quickly, but
slipped and went down like a ton of bricks - breaking his ankle.
Not too much fun, with a fairly long skidoo run to get out of the bush,
but with his leg up on a couch and in a cast, he has plenty of time for now to
contemplate just how 'dangerous' this sport of fishing can become!
We
have a couple of new members to welcome to our club: Rick Matusiak (already a
super angler) and Brad Brown, who was the recipient of a membership as a
Christmas present: nice idea!
*Here
are a couple of different trout streams for you to check
out this year. Let us know how you do so we can share the results
with other members.
D'Aubigny Creek
Whitman's Creek
Skunk Creek
Cold Creek
Bear Creek!
Mad River
Upper Sydenham River
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