T Minus... 1

That's right! Hat-trick! One more fish to go! Yahooooo!

Today, Hedrik and I were joined by Ed Sanford of the Ottawa club. Ed has been adamant about getting out and we've been tag-teaming the river recently, but actually getting to fish together has not occurred. Until today! We three muskie-teers hit the Ottawa this morning in good spirits.

Our first task was picking which spot to fish. This is always the most important decision to make during the day as the feeding windows have been typically occuring in the morning. Our best spot produced no action for us - either from muskies or any other fish species - the last time we fished it, but after letting it rest for a day or two we chose to try it again today.

We made one pass over our little weedbed and about half-way up our second pass... WHAMO! My topwater is OBLITERATED by a big fish. It actually harpooned the bait and was subsequently hooked beneath the jaw. I wasn't sure how well she was hooked, but after a short tustle we had fish #27 in the boat! She taped out at 48 inches, and beautifully marked to boot!

After tracking her for 10 minutes, we resume fishing for a bit until our next tracking session. No sooner do we begin fishing when I hear the spine-tingling, adrenaline pumping, "I got one!" Hedrik was tied into a scrappy little 36 inch male, making this our 28th fish of the study.

Now we had our hands full juggling the tracking of two fish. We finally found time to make a few more casts, but soon it was time to track again. As I said to Hedrik and Ed, "OK, time to track." Hedrik belts out another "I GOT ONE!" I scramble for the net and swiftly scoop up our 29th fish!

After that, the wind picked up and our two hour feeding window closed. We are hoping to catch our 30th fish tomorrow morning or possibly Saturday morning and reach our goal of 30 fish for the season. We are already planning on celebrating the "milestone"! Hope doing so doesn't jinx us!

Stay tuned... :)