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Sunshine, calm winds and crazy wildlife on Longbow Lake
September 26, 2014
The weather was absolutely perfect for a last-minute solo canoe trip, 24 degrees celsius and sunny with very little wind. In fact, the weather for the past five days was nearly identical, with zero wind most of the week prior to Friday and temperatures far above normal.I wasn’t sure if my wife was okay with me leaving the family for the entire weekend, unplanned, so I accompanied her to drop off our daughters at school in the morning and then we agreed that I would leave for two nights of camping when we got home. By 10:15 am, I was packed up an on the road, arriving at Kearney Community Centre around 12:30. After picking up my camping permits, both nights at the same site on Longbow Lake, I was at the launch and out on the water by 1:00 pm.
The trip down the meandering Tim River was uneventful, and I didn’t see any wildlife to speak of. The river is slow-moving here and quite marshy. I saw one other canoeist, another solo middle-aged man, launching at the same time but he was heading north to Big Bob Lake, while I was heading east into Rosebary and then onto Longbow Lake.
I arrived at Longbow by 5:00 pm and checked out the campsite by the dam where the Tim River flows out of Longbow, but I wasn’t happy to see that it was right on the portage down to the river. I wouldn’t have any privacy and I didn’t want to worry about my gear while I was out exploring and fishing. Plus, I find waterfall campsites far too loud for anything longer than a short stop. Therefore, I ended up on the campsite east of the falls, which was a nice point of high land overlooking the narrows and oriented west to the setting sun.
By the time I set up camp, collected fire wood and boiled water for tea and rehydrating curried lentil soup, it was getting too late to explore much so I settled in and watched the sun set and the moon and stars emerge.
Just before dusk, I heard grunts and bellowing from some moose across the lake on the north side. They answered back when I called to them but never showed themselves on the shoreline. The sky was perfectly clear and the waxing moon was just a sliver and set beyond the trees to the west shortly after becoming visible, making for a dark night with lots of stars visible.
I didn’t sleep well. I never do the first night of camping since I’m awake all night listening for wildlife and I haven’t yet settled down into the natural environment. Because it's completely calm, I could hear every movement of the small animals, mostly mice, but there wasn’t much activity to speak of near camp. The moose at the narrows between Rosebary and Longbow got a little frisky in the middle of the night for a few minutes, but that was all.
[url=]Day 2 – Frisky Moose and Magnificent Trout…
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Fantastic report Shawn, great shots, and a great read . . . Longbow (and beyond) looks like a nearly dead end route, probably quiet relative to how busy the rest of the lakes around access 2/3/4 seem to be now . . .
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Awesome stuff. What a beauty moose!
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Great report Shawn thanks for sharing. Is that a Huron cedar canvas canoe your paddling?
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stunning photos,, great report,
i have your site on my favs,, i can explore your insights
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Thanks guys,
A burg, from what I can tell, it's a Carrying Place Bob's Special, but I don't know for sure. Went out for a great paddle with it today, and it was such a pleasure that I wish it was lighter and better for tripping. It floats on air, not just water!
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Great picture and a beauty canoe glad to hear it paddles so nice I'm in the process of attempting to restore one very similar to it
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Haha Shawn your blog post just came up as a sponsored post on my Facebook feed, not a context in which I was expecting it, and my eye recognized the bull moose picture it used before I made sense of the text around it... so for a brief moment there I was like wait a minute, is some advertiser scraping your photos or what's going on...
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LOL. Bloody Facebook. They convince you to create a page so people can follow your status, and then they don't show your posts to any of your followers unless you pay a couple of bucks. I may have to figure out how to chnage it back to a personal account.
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Just to clarify, I'm not a follower (I wasn't aware of your facebook presence until this morning). You have to pay, presumably, for non-followers to see your content as sponsored posts. I've never created an organizational/commercial style "page" on facebook so I don't know how that works but I would have thought you don't need to pay anything if you just want those who've liked your page to see your stuff?
Last edited by DanPM (11/16/2015 10:10 am)
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Not to get picky about a fine trip report but I didn't like to see the shot of those speckles with spawning colours. Realize the season was still open but nailing 2 spawners like this so close to the end of the season on such an easy access lake seems a pity .
Tend to prefer this pic froma fall solo excursion as well. Released with out a net or touching the fish.
Last edited by Antman (11/16/2015 5:18 pm)
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Antman wrote:
Not to get picky about a fine trip report but I didn't like to see the shot of those speckles with spawning colours. Realize the season was still open but nailing 2 spawners like this so close to the end of the season on such an easy access lake seems a pity .
Tend to prefer this pic froma fall solo excursion as well. Released with out a net or touching the fish.
I don't disagree. I'm not worried about the male, but the hen was injured and I knew she wouldn't survive if I released her. Fishing pressure is relatively low in this area and one spawning female removed from the population shouldn't have much of an impact on such a productive river.
However, I totally agree that we must be aware of our impact at any scale and attempt to find balance between sustainability and over-exploitation. I believe that reasonable, controlled harvest of all wild edibles creates deeper connection, Gaia, and therefore desire to protect. My love of all flora and fauna originated, and continues to grow, as a result of this pursuit.
Last edited by My Self Reliance (11/16/2015 7:09 pm)
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Self Reliance ,
What's your setup like re single hook fishing ? You may notice I am using single hooks and have been for decades. A deep set hook has the shaft cut with a pair of mini side cutters.
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All of my barbs are pinched, and some of my lures have been changed to single hooks with more to come. It depends on what species I'm fishing for, and whether or not I'm trying to catch dinner on water that doesn't give up a lot of fish and I need all of the help I can get.
I've said it before, and I don't want to start a new controversy, but I believe that we shouldn't be catch and release fishing if we aren't okay with killing some. I could have released her and convinced myself and anyone who would listen that she would survive, but it wouldn't change the outcome.
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hi shawn not to be picky but I also don't like to see dead trout, here is a much better picture and I am a much better person, as you can see this trout is alive and happy and singing a little song and also there's no treble hook, and also it's not hooked, and also it's not a trout, please outline your system for catching zero trout like I have been doing for decades
Last edited by DanPM (11/17/2015 8:11 pm)
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Fully laughing out loud!
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DamPM,
Hah we need more fisherman like you in the park Dan. Maybe I could recommend pike or bass as a pursuit. More at your level of expertise.
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