Fishing

[JD Spydo]

Hey I've got a question to ask any of you guys who have fished up north in parts of Canada. A dad of a really good friend of mine used to go to British Columbia and Northern Manitoba and in the Northwest Territories and over the years he fished up in those regions a lot. He told me before he passed that the two best eating fish from those northern waters were "Grayling" and "Arctic Char".

He used to bring us some of the best Walleye and Northern Pike from Minnesota and places in Canada. This guy was truly a fishing fanatic and I tend to take his word for his recommendations. I've never gotten to eat either "Grayling" or "Arctic Char" but I've heard others over the years say the same about those two northern, cold water fish. I'm hoping that some of you might have tried either one of those cold water fish.

I know one fish from up in Alaska I dearly love to eat and that is "Halibut". But at $28 a pound I don't eat it very often.

[SaltyCaribbeanDfly]

That’s funny because I went out in the Kayak last week and caught a handful of those species. It was a big multispecies day.

Didn’t catch a catfish or walleye though. If there were walleye in that lake, I probably would’ve caught one. It felt like everything was eating that day.

What a day!!! Beautiful looking water and the photos are stellar

[SaltyCaribbeanDfly]

Hey I've got a question to ask any of you guys who have fished up north in parts of Canada. A dad of a really good friend of mine used to go to British Columbia and Northern Manitoba and in the Northwest Territories and over the years he fished up in those regions a lot. He told me before he passed that the two best eating fish from those northern waters were "Grayling" and "Arctic Char".

He used to bring us some of the best Walleye and Northern Pike from Minnesota and places in Canada. This guy was truly a fishing fanatic and I tend to take his word for his recommendations. I've never gotten to eat either "Grayling" or "Arctic Char" but I've heard others over the years say the same about those two northern, cold water fish. I'm hoping that some of you might have tried either one of those cold water fish.

I know one fish from up in Alaska I dearly love to eat and that is "Halibut". But at $28 a pound I don't eat it very often.

I’ve never had grayling or char but I concur with you on the halibut

[Mushroom]

The Coho run has started. We went yesterday and my buddy caught a 12 pound Coho twitching in the dark, which is unheard of. We caught nothing else, so drove 80 miles to a different river and my other friend caught this 25 pound King (that's me netting it). I was shaking while netting it - just a monster of a fish. We let him go, as he was worn-out from the spawning thing and would have been a not-so-great dining experience.

A funny positive - three of us are on the same pool team and had to play that evening after getting up at 2:30 a.m. and fishing until 3:30 that afternoon. We all three won our matches and two of us had an 8 on the break. Just proving that fishing generates good karma.

Wow, that’s an awesome fish! That is a monster, very impressive!

Did a little fishing today. It's the time of year where fishing my "local" trout stream is practical. It's really only good in the cool seasons after a good freeze. In summer it's extremely overgrown with vegetation that makes it entirely unpleasant to fish, not to mention the bugs are atrocious. Today the wind was ripping, there was a dreary rain/drizzle falling, and temps were around 45F. Stream was a bit high and stained from 2 days of rain. I managed a brown and a few rainbows, only fished for about an hour and decided it was best to return on a better day. Fish were not super active but I did move a decent number of fish given the conditions. They were not committing to biting a fly all that well so hooking up was a bit tough.

Beautiful colors on that brown! Makes me want to get out to the local trout ponds but I haven’t been able to get away from the Cape Cod Canal! The fall striper migration is still going strong, so I’ve been taking advantage of that as much as I can.

Actually caught a couple nice ones last night. I forgot my headlamp and had to rely on my phones flash to get pictures, so they’re not that good but better than nothing I guess.

Didn’t measure either one. Tide was low and I didn’t want to run up the rocks with the fish just to measure it. I just snapped a few pictures and released them.

[HolySteel]

Wow, that’s an awesome fish! That is a monster, very impressive!


Beautiful colors on that brown! Makes me want to get out to the local trout ponds but I haven’t been able to get away from the Cape Cod Canal! The fall striper migration is still going strong, so I’ve been taking advantage of that as much as I can.

Actually caught a couple nice ones last night. I forgot my headlamp and had to rely on my phones flash to get pictures, so they’re not that good but better than nothing I guess.

Didn’t measure either one. Tide was low and I didn’t want to run up the rocks with the fish just to measure it. I just snapped a few pictures and released them.

Great-looking fish. I love fishing at dusk and dawn, but since I can't see even with sunlight, I really can't tie set-ups when it's dark.

Funny - I had not even had a strike. My friend who caught it had also not had a strike and we had been fishing for about 10 hours. He says: "I'm going to catch a fish and then I'll hand you my rod and you can catch one", and then he immediately caught this one. He handed me his rod and I continued to not get any strikes. But he really is an expert salmon fisherman - he knows when and how to change his set-ups, how to feel strikes, set the hook, etc. I really do not know much, so I really on really, really stupid fish.

[Mushroom]

What a day!!! Beautiful looking water and the photos are stellar

Thanks! I love how clean the water is in this area too. I like this pond in particular because of how many species it supports and how clean the water is. It’s actually a migratory herring pond, so the Bass thrive here. There are also about 50+ Mute Swans that have taken up residence in the pond but they’re getting close to the point of being a nuisance. They’re protected in Massachusetts though, so until the state does something about them the population will just keep growing.

On the days when the Bass aren’t biting, I like to look for the bluegill and I’ll usually end up finding them and little bit of everything else with them. On a light setup, I can get just as much fun out of fishing that way as I can fishing the canal with my 11ft heavy setup. If it wants to bite my hook, I’ll be glad to reel it in.

[Mushroom]

Great-looking fish. I love fishing at dusk and dawn, but since I can't see even with sunlight, I really can't tie set-ups when it's dark.

Funny - I had not even had a strike. My friend who caught it had also not had a strike and we had been fishing for about 10 hours. He says: "I'm going to catch a fish and then I'll hand you my rod and you can catch one", and then he immediately caught this one. He handed me his rod and I continued to not get any strikes. But he really is an expert salmon fisherman - he knows when and how to change his set-ups, how to feel strikes, set the hook, etc. I really do not know much, so I really on really, really stupid fish.

Thanks! Dusk and dawn have been my best times for catching striper but recently the bite has turned on just after sunset. I’m hoping the new moon tonight will move a lot of bait through the canal.

On slow days like that, I get just as excited to see my buddy catch a fish as if it were me! I get to fish vicariously through him for a couple minutes! LOL

[HolySteel]

Great-looking fish. I love fishing at dusk and dawn, but since I can't see even with sunlight, I really can't tie set-ups when it's dark.

Funny - I had not even had a strike. My friend who caught it had also not had a strike and we had been fishing for about 10 hours. He says: "I'm going to catch a fish and then I'll hand you my rod and you can catch one", and then he immediately caught this one. He handed me his rod and I continued to not get any strikes. But he really is an expert salmon fisherman - he knows when and how to change his set-ups, how to feel strikes, set the hook, etc. I really do not know much, so I really on really, really stupid fish.

Thanks! Dusk and dawn have been my best times for catching striper but recently the bite has turned on just after sunset. I’m hoping the new moon tonight will move a lot of bait through the canal.

On slow days like that, I get just as excited to see my buddy catch a fish as if it were me! I get to fish vicariously through him for a couple minutes! LOL

Absolutely. I was shaking all over netting that King - we were fishing from a steep bank, so it took a little work. Earlier I netted my other friend's Coho and had to chase it up on a gravel bar (different river) when the hook came out. Both guys are on my pool team so I commented that I'm their netter, as they are my rack boys :)

As an aside - these nutz up here consider bass to be purely sport fish, and unfit to eat. So I look forward to bass fishing with them, and taking home their catch.

[Mushroom]

Great-looking fish. I love fishing at dusk and dawn, but since I can't see even with sunlight, I really can't tie set-ups when it's dark.

Funny - I had not even had a strike. My friend who caught it had also not had a strike and we had been fishing for about 10 hours. He says: "I'm going to catch a fish and then I'll hand you my rod and you can catch one", and then he immediately caught this one. He handed me his rod and I continued to not get any strikes. But he really is an expert salmon fisherman - he knows when and how to change his set-ups, how to feel strikes, set the hook, etc. I really do not know much, so I really on really, really stupid fish.

Thanks! Dusk and dawn have been my best times for catching striper but recently the bite has turned on just after sunset. I’m hoping the new moon tonight will move a lot of bait through the canal.

On slow days like that, I get just as excited to see my buddy catch a fish as if it were me! I get to fish vicariously through him for a couple minutes! LOL

Absolutely. I was shaking all over netting that King - we were fishing from a steep bank, so it took a little work. Earlier I netted my other friend's Coho and had to chase it up on a gravel bar (different river) when the hook came out. Both guys are on my pool team so I commented that I'm their netter, as they are my rack boys :)

As an aside - these nutz up here consider bass to be purely sport fish, and unfit to eat. So I look forward to bass fishing with them, and taking home their catch.

I might be one of those bass nutz! I fish primarily for sport as well and pretty much only catch and release. I have nothing against anyone taking home a bass to eat it… as long it’s not a trophy sized fish! Any little one to two pounders are no problem though. Actually, I think it’s necessary to take some of those smaller bass out to help give those real trophy sized bass less competition for food.

[HolySteel]

I might be one of those bass nutz! I fish primarily for sport as well and pretty much only catch and release. I have nothing against anyone taking home a bass to eat it… as long it’s not a trophy sized fish! Any little one to two pounders are no problem though. Actually, I think it’s necessary to take some of those smaller bass out to help give those real trophy sized bass less competition for food.

I'll eat any salmon I can catch legally. Today I got a 14+ pound chum and also a 9 pounder. Chum are not the greatest salmon to eat fresh, so these will get smoked tomorrow. The sad thing was watching the Coho jumping right in front of us, but none would strike. Everyone is fishing with salmon eggs and bobbers, but I was lazy and just tossed in some Wicked lures. No one else along the river where we were caught a fish, so sometimes laziness does pay off.

[HolySteel]

40 lb of Salmon fillets brining for smoking. We are going to have to buy a bigger smoker.

[Mushroom]

40 lb of Salmon fillets brining for smoking. We are going to have to buy a bigger smoker.

Awesome, thats a great harvest! Those are some cool colors on those Chum too. Really makes me want to drive out to one of the reservoirs where they stock Atlantic Salmon here in Mass. Apparently fall is a good time to target them from shore. Id definitely keep any legal salmon I caught because that’s why they put them in there.

[HolySteel]

Awesome, thats a great harvest! Those are some cool colors on those Chum too. Really makes me want to drive out to one of the reservoirs where they stock Atlantic Salmon here in Mass. Apparently fall is a good time to target them from shore. Id definitely keep any legal salmon I caught because that’s why they put them in there.

The ones with the stripes are spawners - more time in the river, more pronounced the stripes are and also their teeth start getting big and nasty.

The one I showed earlier was a 14-15 pound male spawner. Here's a smaller chrome female that has not been out of the ocean very long - you can barely see her stripes. She was the only fish I caught Thursday.

[SaltyCaribbeanDfly]

Wow that’s so good eating right there

[HolySteel]

Wow that’s so good eating right there

I'm not sure about River Chum. Ocean Chum are prized by Japanese for Sushi, best salmon caviar (Indians used to sell it for export to Russia), best fishing eggs, best cold-smoked salmon. This one's fresh out of the ocean so I'm cooking a fillet today and making curry out of the other. If the test works I'll continue to keep them, as Chum runs are just getting going. If not, I think 50 pounds of smoked is plenty.

I'll be shipping most of it to relatives next week, so maybe the next time I visit them it will take longer for me to start smelling like fish!

[Mushroom]

Fall trout stocking was light this year, mostly small rainbows. Better than nothing though and they’re a lot easier to catch than bass this time of year!

Caught a few small rainbows yesterday.




The last one had some cuts on it that look, suspiciously, like the size and shape of an overzealous Chain Pickerel’s mouth!

[MacLaren]

Nice job, Sir Nicholas!!
Very nice

[Pacu0420]

Caught this beast last September. I hadn't gone fishing for nearly a year. Very nice way to get back into it! I put the Mule Team next to it for size reference.

BTW, Mules don't make the best fillet knives, lol

[MacLaren]

Awesome! Pacu0420

[SaltyCaribbeanDfly]

Fall trout stocking was light this year, mostly small rainbows. Better than nothing though and they’re a lot easier to catch than bass this time of year!

Caught a few small rainbows yesterday.




The last one had some cuts on it that look, suspiciously, like the size and shape of an overzealous Chain Pickerel’s mouth!

Heck yeah Nick …those stockers look bigger than ours down here…I always say catch what what you can when you can…