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Walleye and Smallmouth Mayhem on Lady Evelyn Lake
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Mar 26, 2025
This Fish’n Canada episode has Angelo Viola and Pete Bowman heading up to Lady Evelyn Lake on a Walleye & Smallmouth Bass adventure. They start out on Walleye but quickly find the fish deep… VERY DEEP. So instead of dredging the fish and doing them harm, they decide to switch gears to Smallies, and all mayhem ensues! ► Subscribe http://bit.ly/youtube-fishncanada Don't forget to leave a COMMENT and give us a LIKE if you enjoyed what you saw. SUBSCRIBE for new videos and episodes released weekly! CONNECT WITH US -------------------------------- ► WEBSITE http://fishncanada.com ► FACEBOOK https://www.facebook.com/FishnCanada/ ► INSTAGRAM https://www.instagram.com/fishncanada... ► TWITTER https://twitter.com/angeloviolafnc/ One of Canada's longest-running fishing shows, Fish'n Canada travels from coast to coast in search of trophy fishing opportunities. First started by brothers Angelo and Reno Viola in 1986, The Fish’n Canada Show has been on the air for over 30 years. Today, Angelo is joined by lifelong fishing buddy, Peter Bowman, and the pair continue to travel across Canada educating anglers using the experience they’ve gained over the years
View Video Transcript
0:00
you are very lucky we're not in the
0:02
eaton mode buddy
0:05
[Music]
0:09
bye bye
0:12
you go big are you all home
0:15
yeah baby
0:17
see every one of these fish
0:19
is loaded with food
0:23
and they could catch probably 50 each
0:26
there's one spot i think we're gonna
0:27
have some fun here we're gonna have a
0:28
blast
0:30
the fish in canada show brought to you
0:33
in part by
0:34
ram trucks built to serve
0:38
princecraft boats dominate the waters
0:42
garmin plot your paradise reel him in
0:46
and ontario canada in partnership with
0:49
destination ontario
0:53
[Applause]
0:53
[Music]
0:58
hi everybody on today's fishing canada
1:00
show we've got such a unique experience
1:02
to share with you
1:03
you bird dog this episode is as much
1:06
about travel and destination as it is
1:08
about fishing
1:09
we're heading to a body of water that
1:11
fishes like a fly-in without the
1:12
airplane
1:13
we also have the option of bringing our
1:15
own boat
1:16
oh hey wait there's more we have to get
1:18
the boat too
1:20
so we brought along fnc one our 20-foot
1:22
princecraft
1:24
of course when toying the princecraft
1:26
boat on a road trip like this
1:28
there's always frequent stops know the
1:30
price tag of that gas one is gassing up
1:33
the truck and boat
1:35
and it's one we'd like to bypass but you
1:37
want to play you got to pay
1:40
and so the people
1:41
rejoice they agree
1:43
can do it yeah
1:45
and they voted for it now is it just
1:47
your voice
1:49
so if i say stop
1:52
recording gopro stop recording
1:58
and of course who can pass by a local
2:00
northern ontario tackle shop
2:03
without stopping in and buying all kinds
2:04
of stuff
2:06
that you'll probably never use
2:09
and then of course there's the sorting
2:11
and stowing of your new probably never
2:12
to be used
2:14
fish annihilating goodies
2:16
it's all part of the fishing road trip
2:18
experience
2:20
and then there's the best anticipation
2:22
of all arriving at the landing and
2:24
launching the rig
2:27
our unique destination today is garden
2:29
island lodge on lady evelyn lake
2:32
which incidentally is set in a very
2:34
solitary part of the north country
2:37
after a short boat ride on the montreal
2:38
and lady evelyn rivers we were picked up
2:41
that's our fully loaded boat and motor
2:44
at the bottom of a dam and trailered up
2:46
and over to the main lake
2:48
this is such an awesome experience and
2:50
one we've never done with a 20-foot rig
2:52
[Music]
2:54
from there it's a beautiful 20-mile boat
2:56
ride north to the lodge
2:59
and if you're anything like us it's a
3:01
quick unloading of the baggage and then
3:03
on to the fishing
3:06
[Music]
3:10
got one yep
3:12
not huge is it is it a netapp
3:15
uh i don't want to say seagull just
3:17
behind us and grab something too maybe
3:18
the dinners are starting is that right
3:20
yeah oh i lost my minnow babies hey
3:23
they're just starting to fight look the
3:24
birds are out
3:25
exactly what i'm saying
3:27
the canoes show up they know when they
3:28
can come here and the fish are biting
3:31
we needing a net do you think i don't
3:32
know i haven't seen him yet i mean it's
3:34
a walleye for sure
3:35
yeah i'm gonna be ready i'm gonna be
3:37
ready ready
3:40
there he is
3:42
hi little guy little wee guy those nice
3:45
little fish though little guy you have
3:46
to net him because otherwise it'll break
3:48
the line
3:51
come here
3:54
or not he's a jumper
3:58
hey all right that's
4:01
now what is the slot here
4:02
that's a great question
4:04
if you're keeping your fish most of
4:06
these places now in ontario have a slot
4:08
limit or a lot of them do maybe not most
4:09
of them you know you got to know your
4:10
slot limit you got to you keep one the
4:12
wrong size and you could get busted big
4:14
time so it's funny it wasn't that long
4:16
ago it was unheard of to have limits and
4:19
slot limits and all that you come up to
4:21
places like this and you just
4:24
keep fish after fish right especially
4:26
walleye that are so tasty
4:29
but uh
4:30
didn't take long
4:32
for everybody to find out that that's
4:33
not a very
4:34
successful way to grow a fishery
4:37
color now yeah it's cool neat they're
4:39
really dull look at this tail look at
4:41
the tail on them yeah i'll split it up
4:44
that wasn't from us that's uh assures
4:46
you that these fish are lit very lucky
4:47
we're not in the eaton mode buddy
4:50
[Laughter]
4:56
look at the size of that minnow he was
4:57
using folks
4:59
to go bigger go home
5:01
[Music]
5:06
now here's a tip for anglers that are
5:08
fishing the lake for walleye and
5:10
smallmouth bass
5:11
try using the drop shot technique it's a
5:14
phenomenal way of locating and catching
5:16
both species quickly
5:17
if you're a walleye fanatic you can
5:19
start out with live bait like minnows
5:21
worms or leeches depending on the time
5:23
of year
5:24
the trolling motor's not on okay good
5:27
you're okay good and you're in 48 feet
5:28
of water right now so you're uh oh there
5:30
he is not that big boys
5:33
not that big that's a nice walleye yeah
5:35
he's done
5:37
he's down deep he's done yeah
5:40
look at how pale that fish is in
5:43
look at that great color right
5:46
here's not that big that's a nice fish
5:48
he's nice
5:49
that is a nice look at the green
5:51
background yeah what the heck look at
5:54
the size of that minnow he was using
5:55
folks
5:56
you go bigger go home he's got the
5:58
greenest colored back yeah
6:00
that's almost a blue if you look if you
6:02
look through his back
6:06
bye bye
6:08
if you look through the
6:10
that had a blue hue on them it was a
6:13
weird one yeah
6:14
we started out looking for walleye in
6:16
one of lady evelyn's most popular big
6:18
fish areas called the dome after ants
6:20
caught his first couple of fish we had a
6:22
quick chat and decided that since the
6:23
lake was so close to the fall turnover
6:25
period making the bike tough
6:28
and these walleye were extremely deep
6:30
that we'd look for something shallower
6:32
this would also give us a chance to look
6:34
for some of the great smallmouth bass
6:35
that this lake has to offer
6:38
our garmin chart showed us a large
6:40
complex hump that bottomed out at around
6:42
30 plus feet
6:43
exactly what we were looking for
6:51
[Music]
6:57
there's one
6:58
you got him yeah nice coming up must be
7:15
we mark perfect so those were small
7:17
those were small mouth out there nice
7:19
you want the net that's uh
7:21
okay you're gonna get him i think so we
7:24
came in here and we just saw it loaded
7:25
up with fish but now we're getting here
7:27
and it's like smallmouth
7:32
we don't mind we'll take you know we'd
7:33
love to have walleye too but and they
7:35
were deep end
7:36
they were deep end uh
7:38
nice
7:40
come here big fella
7:42
hooked nicely fat fish bud like i'm not
7:45
fat big big smallie buddy
7:49
nice
7:50
oh yeah he wasn't getting off
7:53
perfectly hooked on the drop shot that's
7:54
nice
7:56
fat eh
7:58
fat look at that thing
7:59
and it's just
8:01
i mean this is the rest of the season
8:02
has got
8:04
one on buddy you got one too yeah oh he
8:06
just broke beyond no
8:08
what are we a pike do you think maybe or
8:10
oh might have been although it felt
8:12
smallmouth
8:13
really i think we're gonna have some fun
8:15
here buddy we're gonna have a blast
8:18
he's killing me
8:20
not that big he's got a big hump on his
8:22
head though which is kind of cool
8:26
looks like one of those mean fish
8:29
oh he's got belly
8:30
look at that
8:33
get some chunks oh mine just broke off
8:35
the tip too that's good good diving
8:38
holy mackerel look at you
8:43
well there it is
8:44
this is insane we have found the mother
8:47
lode right on our way
8:49
what uh
8:50
i mean what a great bonus eh
8:52
absolutely great without a doubt
8:56
fantastic that's why we came up great
8:57
walleye and smallmouth yeah right
9:00
there you go baby
9:02
i'll trade places with you
9:04
they're fat fish they're not real long
9:06
but they are fat they're fat aren't they
9:08
oh my god yeah
9:10
gorgeous
9:11
it's a nice light colored one the last
9:13
one i had was dark
9:15
we're probably sitting on who knows how
9:16
many we're sitting on right now we
9:18
haven't even run the live scope here and
9:20
out here no i think if we run that we'll
9:21
go crazy we'll go insane
9:24
we could probably just sit here for an
9:26
hour and just drop like we're getting
9:28
these literally off the same side of the
9:29
boat and right there
9:31
not even casting out or anything when
9:32
you're drop shotting like this and
9:33
you've tied that knot a lot of cases the
9:36
hook isn't sitting straight down below
9:37
and all you have to do to make that
9:39
the hook change its uh its position is
9:42
just to put a loop
9:43
around the shaft and when you pull down
9:45
on it sits straight down which is the
9:46
way you want it like that
9:49
there's speaking of visibility my
9:51
colleague has a fish
9:53
look at how old that fish is like
9:55
there's an old northern ontario
9:56
smallmouth right there
9:59
[Music]
10:09
give me an indication of
10:11
that's one pound two pound three pound
10:13
four pounds oh no no maybe maybe a half
10:16
of that
10:17
look at that thing digging oh even a two
10:20
pound spally though you gotta admit
10:23
they're incredible best fighter
10:25
and bluegill oh man imagine if a
10:28
bluegill got that big that'd be nice
10:30
he'd kick his butt yeah a little better
10:31
smallie oh he's not bad yeah
10:34
yeah baby
10:36
i got his baby brother tapping me right
10:38
now
10:38
oh my god he's not very big at all
10:42
ah he got up
10:43
like i mean tiny
10:45
well you know what we could probably get
10:46
these things uh on plastics drop
10:48
shotting plastics i'll bet your shad
10:50
shape will work
10:51
right now we'll beat them up
10:52
all right not because the middle but
10:54
pretty good yeah let's try it
10:56
[Music]
10:59
yeah those must be all smallies that we
11:00
marked on the way in no wonder eh yeah i
11:02
want to see what they are not deep in
11:04
the 30 plus that's that's the
11:07
i think the show is loaded with
11:08
smallmouth though by the looks of things
11:11
if the fishing's hot or you stumble onto
11:14
a whack of smallies on live bait
11:16
you can then switch over to plastics and
11:18
totally reap the benefits of the drop
11:20
shot rig
11:24
concept there is that
11:25
the bait is always off the bottom which
11:28
is important right especially in the
11:29
rubbly this is all rubble and rock and
11:32
all kinds of garbage so if you had your
11:34
bait at the bottom like on a jig head it
11:36
would be buried most of the time away
11:38
from from the vision of the fish but by
11:40
having your weight at the bottom
11:42
your bait is always up off all that
11:44
rubble and always visible
11:47
there's speaking of visibility my
11:49
colleague has a fish
11:50
[Laughter]
11:52
some weight there buddy
11:54
he's right under the boat so i'm gonna
11:58
want motor off it's off i think
12:01
and i got one he's not fighting like a
12:02
small there's a double
12:04
mine's not fighting like a smallie
12:05
that's all
12:06
if if our theory is right that i picked
12:08
up one that was chasing pete's they
12:10
should be
12:12
kind of identical in size what happens
12:14
is that they they predate in schools
12:16
these smallies so when one fish gets
12:19
something the other
12:20
pack members are like wolves they want
12:22
to take it away from that fish oh mine's
12:24
giant whatever it is big hinge like i
12:26
mean
12:27
big we got to get the net on this guy
12:29
thing okay honestly
12:30
i thought he was bigger than that but
12:31
he's a good one look at how old that
12:33
fish is like there's an old northern
12:35
ontario smallmouth right there
12:37
watch your raw dance please sorry
12:41
get out of here you knew when you set
12:42
the hook and it pulled drag on the hook
12:44
set and you
12:45
had something of some weight there fish
12:47
coming in and i saw the width of it this
12:48
way
12:49
down the back you say oh god look at how
12:52
every one of these fish is loaded with
12:54
food
12:56
like it's incredible they have a feed
12:58
bag on right now
13:00
and you can tell they're a little slower
13:01
too and i think it's because they're so
13:02
fat and yeah honestly because the
13:04
water's not cold yet so good looking
13:05
back some light colored some uh really
13:08
dark
13:12
we
13:13
have definitely got an advantage today
13:16
um on a lake like this with our own
13:18
equipment there's no doubt we were
13:20
totally surprised we said
13:22
we thought it was a drive-through lake
13:24
we said oh we get to bring our boat in
13:25
yeah he says yeah no problem we'll get
13:26
you in there he said what do you mean
13:27
we'll get you in there and
13:29
mike said the lodge owner and he says we
13:31
just got to lift you up over the dam
13:33
and that's what they do they have a
13:34
homemade trailer with an old truck and a
13:36
guy that charges the lodge a fee for you
13:38
know bringing boats in if you want to
13:40
bring your own boat in
13:41
it's the most unique thing we've ever
13:42
done with this boat i think ever
13:47
they are a little bit of a unicorn in
13:48
that in it truly is a flying experience
13:52
with your own boat yeah it's fantastic
13:54
absolutely outstanding great
13:56
in our case we get to cover so much more
13:58
of the lake than we normally would if
14:00
we're just in campfire you've got a camp
14:02
boat with a 9.9 or a 15 horsepower you
14:04
got this boat with 300 horsepower
14:06
there's a bit of a difference
14:08
power
14:11
and i rely strongly on our fishing
14:13
electronics pretty much every time we're
14:15
on the water
14:16
if you're at all familiar with our
14:17
approach you know that we are absolutely
14:19
nuts about garmin's live scope forward
14:21
viewing technology
14:23
on this day however we honestly had so
14:25
many fish around our boat that we went
14:27
old school and kept a split screen of a
14:29
map on one side and our traditional
14:30
cylinder on the other
14:32
as long as we kept seeing hooks and
14:34
arches around our boat we were
14:35
constantly setting the hook
14:40
[Music]
14:44
this episode's hot spot is an underwater
14:46
hump on lady evelyn lake the waypoint on
14:48
your screen puts you right there
14:50
for this trip we found smaller fish on
14:52
top of the hump while the bigger fish
14:54
were in the 25 to 35 foot range as with
14:57
many deep structures similar to this one
14:59
in northern ontario there were both
15:00
smallmouth and walleye mixed together
15:02
here
15:03
we used small shad imitating plastics on
15:05
a drop shot setup
15:07
either a straight light fluorocarbon
15:09
line from the reel to the weight or a
15:11
light braid to a light fluorocarbon
15:13
leader work fine for us
15:15
remember that if you're fishing deep
15:16
water like we were and there's a strong
15:18
wind up sizing to a heavier weight will
15:20
help which is key to fishing areas like
15:22
this
15:23
bay color didn't seem to matter but
15:25
shades of green were a good base to work
15:26
from
15:27
for more hot spots like this one check
15:29
out fishingcanada.com
15:34
[Music]
15:36
yes
15:38
nice nice nice jump
15:43
[Music]
15:49
the electric motor with the anchor lock
15:52
on it to me now it's a must how would we
15:55
fish this without it
15:57
yeah
15:58
basically the old days you have to
15:59
anchor you'd have to anchor of course
16:00
when you anchor you're going to drop an
16:02
anchor down there you're going to
16:03
disturb that whole environment where the
16:05
fish are holding and so
16:07
you throw an anchor down everything's
16:08
gone after you throw the anchor down
16:11
not doing much
16:14
not doing much
16:16
feels good
16:17
they all feel good yeah they do
16:20
you're right
16:22
could be something following that thing
16:23
too oh yeah i'm waiting to see
16:26
that is true
16:32
that's a big fish easy
16:34
that is a big fish
16:37
here he comes now he's going to show us
16:39
what he is anyway coming up how big he
16:41
is i think we know what he is but
16:45
there he is
16:46
nice nice nice jump nice perfect fish
16:51
he's got a friend with him that's what
16:53
yeah exactly
16:56
nice nice that's nice you want the net
16:59
if you can get it it'd be great yeah
17:00
i'll get it sure
17:03
keep him in the water he's fat
17:07
and there you go
17:09
coming around
17:10
easy
17:12
nice yup in the net that's all that's
17:14
got a bit of weight to it oh buddy
17:17
he's all right
17:18
dark too eh oh my god is he ever dark
17:22
that fish was pinned so nicely
17:24
if you want to catch all your
17:27
all your small hook like that it's right
17:29
past the teeth and
17:31
just in there where you gotta have a bit
17:32
of a problem pull it out when
17:34
eventually it comes yeah that's a hefty
17:35
fish
17:37
nice smallmouth just what we were saying
17:38
they were shut down yeah good northern
17:41
ontario small good looking smallie man
17:43
wow
17:44
i love it
17:46
you buddy you deserve to go home
17:49
[Music]
17:52
that's a great backup fish i'll tell ya
17:54
angela could catch probably 50 each on
17:57
this one spot today
17:58
maybe more so it's a great backup well
18:02
you know the other thing too you come to
18:03
a place like this as far as just sport
18:05
fish goes you're not going to beat
18:07
smallmouth
18:08
and and then get a feed of walleye and
18:10
have some shore lunch and stuff but but
18:13
going after trophy smallmouth like this
18:15
wow and you're in in northern ontario a
18:17
lot of the
18:19
the operators are keying in on walleye
18:21
while a lot of the consumers are keen on
18:22
walleye but but any place where they've
18:24
got smallmouth which is pretty much all
18:26
of the lakes in northern ontario it's a
18:29
great fish to target it's just and i
18:32
don't think it gets enough fishing
18:34
pressure no
18:35
look at this world-class
18:38
one single fishing spot on a huge body
18:40
of water
18:41
that we're the only boat on it we're the
18:43
only the only what we've seen today this
18:45
is land you can you can sit here for
18:48
like i said how many how many fish could
18:49
you catch in a trip you stopped here
18:52
every day for two or three hours and it
18:53
was on fire like it is now you know
18:56
hundreds of fish at the end of your trip
18:57
yeah hundreds of smallmouth per guy at
18:59
the end of your trip as bonus fish on
19:01
top of your walleye
19:03
[Music]
19:08
to get to today's great fishing ange and
19:10
i first drove north on highway 12. we
19:12
next traveled north on highway 11
19:14
through north bay and tomogame from
19:16
there we turned west on 558 which is
19:19
also called moet landing road we next
19:21
launched our rig at moet landing and
19:23
headed out on a short ride on the
19:25
montreal and lady evelyn rivers
19:27
we were then trailered up and above the
19:29
matawapaka dam and were launched into
19:31
lady evelyn lake from there it was about
19:33
a 20-mile boat ride to garden island
19:35
lodge on the north portion of the lake
19:39
the fish in canada show brought to you
19:41
in part by
19:43
yozuri fishing lures fish the best
19:46
mercury outboards go boldly
19:50
and outdoor canada canada's only
19:53
national fishing and hunting magazine
19:56
closed captioning for this episode is
19:58
brought to you by fishingcanada.com the
20:01
gateway to your next fishing adventure
20:06
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20:17
in canada
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