Lakes Beyond Lakes

June 2, 2010

Our cabin is very simple and located on a scenic little beach on the north end of Pagato Lake. We have a porch that overlooks the water and that’s where I sucked down a cup of coffee while going over my gear listening to loons between 6 and 7 am. It was calm and sunny but cold as heck. The sun had literally been up since 4 am. This place is absolute heaven.

We started fishing at about 9 am. 9 am sounds incredibly late for fishing, but up here there is presently 21 hours of daylight. If you fish late into the night you won’t fish early. Late means fishing until midnight (what we did last night) and early starts at 3 am when there’s easily enough light to see. Although everyone would love to fish from 3 am to midnight each day, such hours would kill a few old guys like us.

We were eager to see what Pagato has in store for us so we decided to go to the opposite end of the lake and fish our way back until sunset. On the map we saw a river entering on the far end and knew it should be a prime area for pike at this time of year. The four of us cranked up the two boats and enjoyed a forty-five minute drive. The river dumped into a shallow weedy bay and we started catching little pike like there was nothing to it. Gradually the current of the river pushed us out into the lake where the depth increased. Because we weren’t catching any big pike in the shallows I felt like we were bound to hook up with a big pike out deep. Unfortunately the hammer handles kept showing up.

Bill and Steve are experienced fishing the waters of northern Canada and suggested we drive up the river itself to see if the big pike were hiding up there. We could see on our map that this river actually came from a small lake and thought that if we could get the boats up there perhaps we could fish that lake. We slowly motored up the river carefully avoiding the many submerged rocks and sunken trees. It was ideal fish habitat and occasionally we stopped and nailed a few more small pike. About a ½ mile up we hit a short rapid. My past experiences in the Minnesota Boundary Waters and the Quetico of Ontario are that these places hold numerous walleye. Sure enough we all caught walleyes on our first cast below the rapid on our big pike flies. The walleyes were humanely wacked and became an incredibly delicious shore lunch.

All anglers are explorers, so we actually drug the boats up the rapids and then motored into the small lake we saw on the map. There’s now doubt that this small weedy lake sees few anglers. It too had its fair share of entering creeks and the four of us went off investigating. The first creek Chris and I went too had lily pads throughout the entire bay. We each tied on weedless Dahlberg Divers and cast them deep into the lily pads. It didn’t’ take long before a wake appeared behind my fly destroyed it. It was a nice 27” pike. We proceeded to catch numerous pike from the lilies throughout the day, but we couldn’t break 30 inches. The dream 40 plus inchers were not around.

A huge thunder storm rolled in at about 7 pm. I hate sitting in an aluminum boat during a lightning storm so we tied to a dead birch tree and walked the bog and hunkered down in some willows. The wind ripped and the rain came down hard for a few minutes. Then as fast as the storm came it left and we were casting our Dahlberg’s again. It hadn’t been ten minutes since we were in the willows when I spotted a huge black bear sniffing the very ground we were just on. Likely the smell of fish from our waders lured the giant bear from the thick forest hoping for an easy fish meal. We watched him trace our steps until he finally got wind of us and ran back to the forest. Man I’m glad we were back in the boat!

Knowing we had a long way back to the cabin we each caught one more pike from the lily pads and then began the trek. The sun actually set at about 10:15 but it stayed light enough to see and fish till nearly midnight. Once within a mile of the cabin we did just that. We hammered walleye after walleye off a point with Warpath Jig Fly’s and Clouser's until we were too tired to cast. Although the big pike eluded us the numbers of small pike and quality walleye kept us happy.

Jeff Currier Global Fly Fishing web site

Frozen Gorgeousness

Entries have been far and few between this winter. It seems 2010 has been no fishing and all work. It’s been show after show and in between them, art projects and updating of PowerPoint demonstrations for the next weekend of presenting. But this last weekend, a trip to Texas to give a two day seminar was cancelled. Although a hit on my new business, this meant a chance to return home and catch up on some much needed rest and at last, go fishing.

It was in my sights to sneak in an afternoon of midge fishing on the Henry’s Fork to break up a day of working at home. That was until while on a big night on the town of Victor with Granny, I bumped into friends Andy Asadorian and Rick Schreiber. These two long time pals suggested I dig out my dusty ice fishing gear and join them for a little adventure they had planned.

To the surprise of many, I have been an ice fisherman my entire life. I grew up tip-up fishing the lakes and ponds of Massachusetts and New Hampshire for panfish, bass and pickerel to name a few. I purposely went to college in Northern Wisconsin and Minnesota to fish for northern pike and walleye. It didn’t take but “first ice” to realize that ice fishing for these species was about as fun as it gets. Then, upon arrival to Jackson, Wyoming in 1987, I found a whole new ice fishing world – jigging for big lake trout. Turns out, catching a big laker through the ice was one of the hardest fishing challenges I’ve had to crack, but in winter of 1995-96, I did just that. I landed 20 of North America’s super charged char over 10lbs, four of which were over 20lb and one monster of 26-pounds. Not bad for the south of the Canadian border!

These days, I find little time for the ice. Working the show circuit is a great way to make living and fly fishing expeditions to foreign lands is hard to beat. But I spend many a moment wondering how thick the ice is on my old haunts. So when Andy and Rick reminded me of just how dusty my ice gear was, without any hesitation, I was in.

In winter of 1995-96, I’d leave my house at 3:30 am and spend both my days off on the ice. I was in my early 30’s back then. Today, I met the boys at 10. In fact, I ran a little late from doing errands so they left without me like they should. I arrived at the trailhead at about 11am, clicked into my backcountry skis and began the trek to catch up with them. Winter in the Tetons is spectacular to say the least. I’m usually the first to bitch about winter, but get me on my skis in this frigid wonderland and I’m in Heaven. Today was no exception. Jackson Hole received a dusting of snow last night and the lodge poles and aspens were glistening with fresh powder.

The ski in is about two miles. It is nearly all up hill to the lake. This can be a grunt but makes for an easy and enjoyable ski out. Today I was lucky; Andy and Rick already busted a track through fresh snow in so I barely worked up a sweat. In fact, I got to the lake only minutes behind them. Rick was just dropping his jig to bottom and Andy was making the last few turns with the ice auger on his hole. The ice was thick. Andy was struggling to make these last few turns because there is about 3 feet of ice!

Looking for action rather than a trophy, I dug my hole in 55 feet of water and tied on a small jig with a Palomar knot. Normally, if I was in search of a big laker I’d bring my fish finder and set up in about 120-feet of water. I’d fish a 7/0 jig with a dead 6” long sucker rigged with a trailer treble hook. I’d jig all day and hope for one bite. Big lakers don’t come easy and many times the day ends with a big fat goose egg. Today was about catching fish.

By the time I dropped my jig, Rick had already broken a fish off on the strike and Andy iced an 18”er. It didn’t take long for me to join in on the fun. I felt my jig reach bottom. I reeled up three cranks of the bait caster and began to methodically swim my chartreuse fat gitzit jig. Trust me, there’s a knack to this. Within seconds I had a touch and I do mean a touch. Lakers often grab softly and those new to the sport often don’t notice. If they do feel it they usually reef on the rod. Rather than hastily set the hook, you must literally try to feed the jig to the fish. And remember, you can’t see what the hell is really going on down there. I like to raise my rod tip gently and than let the jig slowly flutter back down two inches at a time. When I see my line go slack the fish has it and I set the hook firmly. You need to set hard in order to compensate for any stretch in the line which does happen in over 50-feet deep. When chasing big lakers over 100-feet deep I use braid that does not stretch.

After teasing the fish below me for about a minute, the slack line I was waiting for happened and I struck. The laker was on and after a decent battle I iced my first laker of the year – a 21”er. That was all it took to realize it’s time to spend more time on the ice. It’s some of the most peaceful fishing time you can get. We had an entire lake to ourselves. It was dead quiet. No sounds of distant traffic. There was no sound of human life other than a chat with my friends. Just a distant coyote howl and ravens chatting about what lake trout remains we might leave behind to provide them a special meal. What a magnificent day to start the 2010 fishing season.

Today it’s back to work. I’m doing a little art, packing for the Amazon (leaving March 3rd) and preparing for some seminars I’ll be presenting in Boise, Idaho this weekend. The show should be great fun as I’ll be working with old friends Pete Erickson, Phil Rowley and Jack Dennis. Although this is fun work, I’m excited to say that I go nearly straight from Boise to Manitowish Waters, Wisconsin for four days of ice fishing for walleye, pike, crappie, bass and many other warmwater species. The fishy blogs are back again!

Jeff Currier Global Fly Fishing Web Site