Lake Nipissing is well known for its great bass fishing, and smallmouth bass are the most sought after fish in the lake when it comes to tournament fishing.
Some days you can you cross the lake in a paddle boat dragging a line behind and catch all kinds of bass, and the next day seven foot waves will terrorize anybody who dares to take on the lake (I’ve seen Lake Nipissing do it in two hours) and yet most bass anglers love the rush and the thrill and yes, even us old fools love it too.
This would be the case when the team of Mike Gifford from Sudbury and Howard Gifford from Ottawa came to the scales with 19.26 pounds (lbs.) of smallmouth to take first place on August 29 at the Temiskaming Smallmouth Bass (TSB) tournament based in Sturgeon Falls.
The team said Lake Nipissing looked fairly calm at blast off, but once they got going full speed to get to where their fish were they ran right into the wind and waves. But this did not stop the team from getting their fish, and they said it was worth the ride.
Next up to the scales would be the team of Chris Sheffield and Sean Strang from Rutherglen. The team decided to save parts of their body and go after largemouth bass in back bays which have been winning in the last few years. Largemouth bass are a bigger profile fish but their actual weight can be deceiving, and even though the fish looked big the five fish weighed in at 18.36 lbs. which would give the team second place.
Brian Milne and Greg Gilson from North Bay is another team that loves fishing Lake Nipissing and they came to the scales with a mixed bag of largemouth and smallmouth, meaning they fished largemouth until the lake settled down and then went after smallmouth. The team weighed in 17.34 lbs. and took third place plus the big fish award with a nice 4.60 lb. smallmouth.
Next up on September 25 and 26 on Cassels and Rabbit Lake in Temagami, the 2010 TSB Classic where anglers will fish for almost $40,000 in cash and prizes including the free draw for a boat motor and trailer, and of course get a few laughs out of you know who.
Stay safe, have fun.
