Targeting species

[MuskieBait]

My experience...

Largemouth Bass - heavy vegetation, plastics, weed edge

Smallmouth Bass - rocky areas, tube jig or drop shot in lakes, bottom bounce worms, minnows, leeches or crawfish in current seams or breaks in rivers

Carp - shallow, muddy, weedy, look for mud plumes and bubbles, active fish feeding on bottom, corn on hair rig, chum sparingly but in small focused area

Channel Catfish - cutbait or worm, pools or current breaks, low light hours, lots of scent, sliding sinker rig, short leader

Bullhead (Brown or Black) - muddy, splitshot rig, chunk of worm, shallow margin areas, spring, low light hours

Mooneye - late spring to summer, current seam, bottom bounce worms or flies

Pike - low light hours, fall, winter, spring, weed edge with immediate access to deep water, minnow under a float, crankbaits or spoon or spinners

Walleye - assuming southern Ontario...spring, summer, fall, rocky areas of lakes or rivers, weed edges, jig or bottom bouncing with worms or minnow, current seams or breaks, bottom 12"

Resident stream trout - without bait ban: split shot, 4lb fluorocarbon leader, 1/2 nightcrawler, pools; with bait ban: nymphs and dry flies (I often outfish people using small plastics, spinners and crankbaits)

This is all so very general though... I can fish one headwater stream where Elk Hair Caddis reign supreme 80% of the time...while another headwater stream where beadhead nymph takes most of the fish...and yet another stream where there is no bait ban and most of the fish are caught on nightcrawlers. If I fish at a time when there is a Trico hatch, forget everything else because the trout are feeding only on Trico and nothing else. So how do you target fish for resident stream trout?