fishpro

Just got back yesterday from 3 weeks of living out of a minivan and fishing through Northern BC. I had a fantastic time fishing the Skeena and Kitimat systems, tons of fish, incredibly strong Chum run on the Kitimat this year, especially early on in the trip, and once that died down I turned my attention to fishing for steelhead, ended up fishing them for a total of 6 days, and spent one day on a charter out of Prince Rupert. I went up there excited to simply spend 3 weeks fishing as much as I possibly could, and also wanted to catch my first steelhead. I thought it would be cool if I could get the grand slam - steelhead plus all 5 salmon species, and in the end I did! My first steelhead: 22 lb chinook: Large Chum: This is what catching numerous large salmon can do to tackle, the spool of the reel actually came apart into 2 pieces:

Could it maybe be an Arctic Char from the bunch that escaped into Lott Creek? Does anyone know if any were caught after they escaped?

Yesterday my girlfriend and I went for a drive through Banff Park, and on our way back we stopped for lunch at a lookout point, only to notice lots of people taking pictures of something down the hill. We went to look, and there below us was a black bear and her cub feeding on the hill side. As everyone was getting pictures, the cub stayed down lower but the mother came right up the hill and had no fear coming within 10 feet of everyone as she was feeding on the grass. It was an unreal experience, and is probably something I will never have the privilege of seeing again.

I think those are some great ideas and I would sign the petition for sure. However, I wonder if maybe we should keep some quality lakes with the regs they currently have, and try new regulations on others to see if it makes a difference, rather than changing the regs on all of them.

So in about a month I'm heading out to the Skeena and Kitimat systems for 3 weeks and was looking for some general info about fishing and etiquette. I know some of the stuff with busy rivers, give steelhead a minimum of a foot of water when landing them, etc. but was wondering if there's other things I should know. -Are there any lesser known etiquette rules I should know on busy waters other than "no low holing" and starting at the head of the pool and working down at the same pace as the other anglers? -Any tips for landing large salmon on your own, particularly with a spey rod? -How dangerous is it to be seen fishing a bead? LOL -Any tips or suggestions I should know? I've done lots of research, but am just looking for some insight from those who have been there. Thanks guys!

Thank you all for managing this forum and keeping things civil as well as maintaining a group of people who care deeply about the sport and the environment.

Has anyone ever taken a spey rod as their carry on luggage? I know that 4 piece single hand rods in tubes are allowed, but was wondering about the longer spey tubes? Thanks

The little guys are tons of fun, but wait until you start getting pike in the 40-50 range that push 6 inches of water in a big v-wake as they charge your fly - it's unreal!

Do you have any sort of a boat? I learned how to fly fish when at that age mostly by trolling sinking lines for stocked trout, and then a bit of casting here and there. Worked well for getting me into fly fishing, however I was completely hooked on fishing by that age anyway.

What's your life situation like outside of work? Do you have a family or long term significant other that you'd have to leave behind for periods of time? How much do you have to lose from taking the job up north? On the other hand, if you're not giving up a lot from here outside of work, it may be worth it. You say you can live paycheque to paycheque now - are you happy with that forever or do you have travel dreams for your future? My advice would be to consider everything in your life besides your work. If what you have now outside of work is your dream life, then I would stay here in Calgary. If you see room for improvement, then I'd go to the oil sands. Going up north would essentially be a form of investing in your future, just like how many people go to university for years to become engineers or doctors, it may not be ideal but they know the pay off will be a lifestyle that they enjoy.

If you can hit a lake with drakes they can be great on the dry. Sylvan is great for that in the evenings around late June - early July.

My guess is that it's due to a lot of tradition, and people are just used to the imperial system. Plus a lot of young people who were taught the metric system in school were probably taught imperial by their parents or grandparents that taught them to fish. Imperial has a way of hanging around and getting instilled into a lot of the younger generation, I'm only 23 but my entire life I've heard people refer to their height in imperial, including my parents as I was being raised, so I now think in both methods, and use one system or the other in different situations - imperial for day to day life, metric for anything more scientific.

Although it's not quite as thin as the fluoroflex, head down to Wholesale sports and get some Maxima fluoro in the 200 yard spools. It's tough as nails and has way higher shock strength than any fly tippet.

I've always found this confusing. I do know that if you slow down a bit it will create more wake, but what if you slow down a lot? It seems to me it would be like trolling in a boat, when the speed is super slow there's almost no wake. Is it different with jet boats on a river? Just curious as I've heard your argument a lot from people.

Should be good now and the fishing will pick up through May. The ideal will be when the water temperatures hit the low to mid 50s and the fish enter their post spawn mode. I'd say Badger is your best bett out of the places you mentioned, I've seen on google maps that it has a lot of nice bays. I've got a spot I've heard is really good and I've seen a few big pike pulled out of, if you want to meet up and head out there send me a pm. Also, see if you can still get a copy of Barry Reynolds' book "Mastering Pike on the Fly, Strategies and Techniques". I have it and there's a ton of good info in it.

Wish I could be in town for this, there's nothing quite like catching and releasing big pike on the fly!

Cool, thanks!

Do you have a link to the info you found? Sounds like an interesting topic.

Up until now it's been a limit of 3 fish over 30cm. In the right conditions cutthroats can easily reach 20 inches, maybe not a lot over but they will regularly hit that 20-21 inch range. I fished a large mountain lake this summer that produced many large cutthroats, including probably 1 in 7 fish being 20 inches or larger. It'll all be in how the lake is stocked relative to the food source.

Just saw the new regulations for 2012 and the regulations have been changed to now allow only one fish over 50cm to be kept. Great work to all those on the forum who got behind this initiative and played a role in making it happen, and thanks in particular to Dekkard and Beedhead for running the petition and all the work they did. These lakes already produce some great fish, it'll be exciting to see what these lakes can turn into in the coming years!

I've never heard of a fish that big coming out of Elbow Lake. However it's a great lake to go to if you want to get a bunch of little trout in a day, and even the biologists recommend keeping your limit as the fish are overpopulated in there.

Here's a net that I built last winter, along with a nice Crowsnest rainbow.

If you're considering the SPOT I would look at the products made by ACR. They do cost more, but they have a way more powerful signal and you don't have to pay the $100 per year subscription fee. When I was looking to buy one I found lots of bad reviews about the SPOT, couldn't find anything bad about the personal locator beacons from ACR.

What size are you tying them on? I'm going to the Skeena this summer for steelhead and salmon and am wondering about how large of flies I should be tying. I have lots of flies tied up, but most are quite large, probably 2.5-5 inches.

I'd be in. It would be great to get something like that going.