jpinkster

My latest is up: Alberta - The Best Backyard in the World http://pikepinksterab.blogspot.ca/2015/02/alberta-best-backyard-in-world.html

Plenty of other fisheries to focus on in the Fall. October caddis on the Highwood....

I'm not able to address every single point you made, but I'll try to shed some light on some of my experiences: - Cut the river into thirds. You'll have left bank, right bank and the middle. If you conceptualize the river like this, it won't be nearly as daunting. - Fertile waters like the Bow spread the fish out. While you should find fish in 'fishy' areas with great structure, you will often find fish in the strangest of places (like an 18" brown hiding behind a rock in a foot of water - Get that rig to the bottom! If you aren't fishing the bottom with a streamer or a nymph rig, you are missing out on opportunities to catch fish. Add one more split shot than you normally would; the longer you are ticking the bottom on your float, the better chance you have to hook up I know this doesn't answer all of your questions, but hopefully this helps!

Floating down the river on an ice flow is on my angling bucket list. But seriously, keep your eyes upstream when the weather gets nice. Getting hit in the back of the knees by even a small hunk of ice can be a religious experience.

It is an angler's responsibility every time they wet a line that they know what the regs are for a given body of water. Signs would be very helpful, but there are plenty of people who still chose to ignore those. We met a CO on the river last year that told us there are two dedicated officers that cover the Calgary City Limits to the Bassano Dam...that's 200 km of river. These new regs are a step in the right direction, but holding anglers accountable is still going to be very difficult.

I'm really supportive of all these changes. Anyone that keeps something out of the Bow probably regrets it once they fry it up. While I love October floats, I'm happy to sacrifice them if it means more protection for the Browns. There are plenty of other fisheries to hit up at that time of year anyways. I'm glad to see they are finally doing something to address McGregor and Travers. I knew things had gotten bad there, but I didn't realize it was that bad.

Thanks! I'll have something new with a bit more of a serious tone up tomorrow!

So...since fishing is pretty much my favorite thing to talk about I decided I should make a blog. My fishing partner, Guide Dionne, calls me Pike Pinkster due to my sometimes unhealthy obsession with pike fishing. Needless to say, it has turned into a decent moniker. Let me know what you think! http://pikepinksterab.blogspot.ca/2015/02/building-better-fishing-party.html

I wish I could get a camera guy to follow me around and watch me tangle myself up and mistime hook sets.

I'm going to preface this entire debate by outlining that I am solely a catch and release fisherman since I'm a man child that doesn't eat fish for some strange reason. I've always thought Alberta did a poor job of keeping our fisheries sustainable. I'm not going to pretend to be a biologist for even a second here, but I think there is a better way to handle catch limits: Currently we run on length minimums which I have always found bizarre. I'll cite the regulations for Clear Lake near Stavely: 1 Northern Pike over 100cm I've talked to plenty of fisherman that suggest that the meat from fish this large is often poor in quality and there are far fewer of those fish available. Most fisherman would way rather keep a pike in the 40-65cm range since the meat is generally better and there are more fish in that size bracket. Keeping those larger spawning fish in the population is so critically important, yet our regulations encourage fisherman to take the brute stock out of our favorite fishing holes. There are other provinces that run a length maximum or even explore slot sizes for keeping fish. This seems like a way more intelligent option as it keeps large spawning fish in the water and thins the herd of those cookie cutter fish we all catch on such a regular basis. Is there a way to get the best of both worlds here? I appreciate folks that are out to harvest, but I feel the pain of fisherman that are out to catch and release trophy sized fish of any species. I'll defer to some of you folks that know more about this kind of thing than I do, please enlighten me!

Look at those colours!

In unrelated news ERSD has now announced that they will be dumping all road kill into many of your favorite lakes and rivers across Alberta in an effort to entrench Alberta as a world renowned trophy fishing destination.

Just so I'm understanding this clearly: A shallower lake has the potential to hold larger fish? Never thought about that before.

Echo Slanter's statement above. Those smaller high altitude lakes just don't have the food supply to yield large fish. You'll find plenty of long skinny ones, but pretty rare to stumble upon a football up there.

I didn't buy it, my roommate did. I am more than happy to tag along as first-mate

What a great season! Mad props to the guy who takes a picture of a sucker AND a whitey!

And because I'm his free loading roommate, I was able to read it and never had to buy it!

I had the most remarkable fishing season of my life in 2014. This was only my second every year slinging flies, but I'll never forget this year. Below is my year in photos. Hoping for a few more memories before the snow flies! Bow Prior to this year I had never floated the Bow. My roommate went and bought a boat and that drastically changed. Here are some Bow highlights: Big big cold water pike. This is still my favorite fishing experience, and I'm sure all of you are sick and tired of seeing this photo. Not remarkable from a size standpoint, but look at the fantastic colors on this brown! So great to see so many healthy browns in the river this year. My big brown of the year. Picked this 22" beauty up on a streamer in the middle of the river. Oldman/Livi After another season of adventure I am now convinced that this is probably my favorite area in the entire province. Great season of Bulls and Cuttys again. Not even close to the largest Bull we saw this year, but my most memorable fight for sure. The Bull picked the streamer up right as it hit the surface. Once hooked this gorgeous fish tried to jump up the falls that we were fishing. Heli Fishing - Lake of the Falls Not just an amazing fishing experience, but an amazing life experience. The fishing was average, but we could have gotten skunked and still had an amazing weekend. Let's hope 2015 is just as special!

Reminds me of something similar that happened in July when I was on the Livi. Was floating a parachute adam's through a pool and saw a small cutty slowly come off the bottom to come take the fly. The cutty got about a foot below the fly and got pulverized by a very large bull before it even realized what was happening. I counted it as a refusal and quickly tied on a different fly.

That'll get the heart rate up!

I've lived in Calgary for the better part of 25 years. I'm used to regular sightings of pelicans, loons, mallards, hawks and even the occasional owl. This year I have noticed a new addition to my bird watching collection: cormorants. It seems they like to congregate around Inglewood bird sanctuary and the Southland dog park. I've heard they can be quite destructive to fish populations, but I have yet to see one feeding. I don't remember ever seeing a cormorant before this year, but now they seem to be all I see. Am I alone here, or am I just not looking up enough?

We've had some great luck in the fall as well. I'll be down at Keho this weekend hoping to get into a few gators. I find that you need to get out there 2-3 weeks before the ice comes on. Some cooler temperatures will kill off a good chunk of the weeds and the bigger fish begin to move into the shallows again.

Seeing a comment like this makes me appreciate where I live that much more.

As well as being a top notch guide Kevin is also freaking hilarious.