British Columbia Fishing Blog

Day two!

This morning the knocks on the door started at 8:30am again. Carlo and Shane greeted my sleepy eyes. I told them to get a head start. Nina and I took our time and didn’t reach the river until 11am. What’s the hurry? There are lots of unfished spots anyway. We pulled up to where their truck was parked and radioed them to find out where they were. They told us that they went upstream, so we decided to go downstream.

The first couple of spots were a bit shallow but should still hold some fish. After gaining no attention with my dry fly, I decided to switch up to a nymph. It took two casts to trick a nice fish that was resting in 2ft of water. Afterward, we continued downstream and I could see a nice looking spot ahead of us. It looked nicer and nicer as we approached it. Finally when we arrived, I was beyond excited because there were fish splashing all over the run. We had hit the hot spot. The timing coincided with a good hatch so the surface feeding frenzy was extremely intense. Dozens of fish came up repeatedly to sip down whatever they could fit in the mouth. I quickly changed back to a dry fly, the one that worked yesterday.

After ten or so drifts without getting a strike while fish were still coming up around it, I realized that the fly was too big to match the hatch. The second fly was smaller but still not small enough, so it also had the same reception. The third fly was the smallest one in the box so it was my last hope. A fish sipped it after a couple of drifts but I was too slow on the strike. A few casts later, another fish also went for it but it was not as lucky. Finally we had a connection. I carefully played the chunky westslope cutthroat and brought it downstream so it would not spook the others. After releasing it, I quickly came back up for fish number two, which fell for the fly after ten or so more drifts. Fish number three sipped the fly while I was not paying attention. I only realized that I had a fish on when I saw the floating line was pulled straight below the surface. These and a few misses were only a small percentage of fish that were in the run.

Our time was cut short when a thunderstorm rolled in quickly, forcing us to scramble back to the car for refuge. The storm passed after fiften minutes and we had blue sky above us once again, a pretty typical weather pattern in the Rockies.

The rest of the afternoon we explored a few new areas with only some success. No fish photos today, all actions will be available in a subscribers’ video soon.

Day three’s weather forecast doesn’t seem so enticing, so we may just take it easy and try a few spots nearby in Fernie.

There isn’t a better time to get away from the Lower Mainland for a fisherman, one just has to take a look at our discussion forum leading up to the sockeye salmon opening in the Non-tidal Fraser to realize that. We are spending this week in Southeastern British Columbia, targeting westslope cutthroat trout, mountain whitefish and bull trout.

The drive yesterday seemed to take forever from Richmond to Fernie. With four “quick” stops, it lasted just under 12 hours. I’ve done the Richmond-Fernie drive four times now and this was the most tiring one so far. Our stay for the week is the Red Tree Lodge, which makes things really convenient because it has a big shared kitchen lounge where we can do all the cooking after a day of fishing.

This morning we woke up to blue sky and a great view of surrounding rocky peaks. Nina and I took our time after recovering from yesterday’s trek, we didn’t arrive at the river until 11am.

There were lots of photo opportunities.

Some goofball kept jumping out and ruining the photographs as if we were fishing the Fraser River.

Actually, we had to put up with Shane and Carlo since they are our guides once again.

The four of us alternated and worked each run as we moved downstream from our meeting spot. The fishing? It was fantastic as expected!

The number of fish that I connected was no where near how many Shane and Carlo brought in, but I was more than satisfied. Two of my westslope cutthroat trout were the most exciting. The first one grabbed my dry after the other two had worked through the run repeatedly with their nymphs. The second fish, also grabbed my dry after I spotted it sipping down a hatch at the corner of my eyes when I was chatting with Nina during a break. Both fish were pretty big. 16in? 18in? No idea, didn’t measure them. All I know is that they were really chubby.

Day one done, lets see what day two brings.

Last week, we spent several days fishing around Merritt for rainbow and brook trout. The Thompson-Nicola region offers what some may consider as world class lake fly fisheries for these species. The Freshwater Fisheries Society of BC releases fish when they are yearlings each year and due to the abundance of food source in these lakes, their weight usually reaches several pounds after a couple of years. Several strains of rainbow trout can be found in different lakes. The streamline body shape of Pennasks and Blackwaters allows them to perform multiple high jumps, while Fraser Valleys always use their broad body to perform furious deep dives.

Our visit was a bit late, these fisheries typically start in early May and taper off in mid June as the weather warms up. This spring’s unpredictable weather has kept fair weather fishermen such as myself at home while stillwater fanatics such as my friend Carlo were out getting their double digits as usual.

Our first two days were rather unsuccessful. The wind was howling, rain clouds were passing through at times and the cooler temperature was keeping anything from hatching. Adding my inexperience on top of these challenges, we brought no fish to the boat and had to settle with a couple of light bites. Being her first trip to the Interior Lakes, Nina remarked, “So far this does not impress me.”

On a more positive note, the wildlife along the lakeshore in this area is always very impressive. Being able to submerge in the sounds of many different song birds while we awaited for a tug on the line is a delightful contrast to the fast paced lifestyle in Vancouver.

Sensing that we were in trouble, I had to call for help. That evening I chatted with Nick Basok from Chilliwack Dart and Tackle to see if he had other suggestions. A former hatchery staff at the Freshwater Fisheries Society of BC and an experienced angler, Nick has decades of knowledge on salmonid fisheries across this province so his advices are very valuable. I was excited to find out that he was making a day trip to where we were. The next morning, we finally woke up to sunshine. We met up at the chosen lake at 8:30am, which was still somewhat early because hatches do not usually happen until later. This is what I like about lake fishing, early birds don’t necessarily get the fattest worms.

We arrived at the lake after a short drive through some rough trails, which always makes the trip more interesting. The lake setting was breathtaking. One could not ask for more than glassy lake water, green field and blue sky. During my last visit to this lake, I had to settle with one fish while watching Nick boating two dozen rainbows, so I was determined to do better this time.

Nick explained that the action does not really start until 11:00am, when sedges emerge on the surface. He gave me a few dry flies and told us to try one out once we see some feeding action on the surface.

We began fishing by using a leech pattern and blood worm under the indicators, but that  was unsuccessful. After one hour of waiting, a few fish started rising around us. Nina decided to cast a spoon out with her spinning rod while I vowed to stick with fly fishing. It took no time before she felt a light tap, perhaps a small fish it was. On the following cast, she received another strike but it was no small fish. Once she set the hook, her arms were bent from one side of the body to the other as the fish bolted. The drag screamed while this fish displayed the typical strength that Pennask rainbow trout possess. It never jumped, but it circled under the boat, refusing to come up to the surface. Nina kept the rod high and away from the boat, doing her best to keep the fish away from the anchor ropes. Eventually the fish was tired and slipped into the landing net without much trouble. You can see the video of her first Interior rainbow trout on this page.

Nina did not end at her first. She proceeded to catch another and lost one more bigger fish that spat the hook while it jumped several times. All these hook-ups were making me anxious, I suggested that we should make a move to where more fish were seemingly feeding on the surface.

I found myself surrounded by feeding fish once we anchored at the new spot. At one point, I could clearly see a large rainbow trout slurping down a sedge in slow motion. I casted the dry fly that Nick had given me and slowly stripped the line to create the same skating motion on the surface.

It took about ten minutes before I finally tricked one. While being distracted by nearby rising fish and having my head turned away from my fly, I heard a splash behind me and my instinct made me instantly pulling up the rod at lightning speed. The kicks in the rod are very welcoming after so many fishless hours. My next challenge was to keep this fish away from two loons that were circling around the boat. At one point, the fish certainly took a fast dive. I was not sure if it had been captured by a loon or was simply using all its strength to swim away from it.

Eventually it managed to survive through all the chaos. I kept it in the net while it regained its strength in the water so it would not be chased down by loons when it swam away. After the first fish, two more fell for the same trick. The second, which was a much smaller fish, was not as lucky. One loon took advantage of its size and gulped it down after it was released.

Just when we thought the fishing was going to be fast and furious for the rest of the day, the feeding stopped. For the rest of the trip, we could not entice anymore fish despite of trying every technique. Nick also experienced the same. Beside catching the same amount during the short window of opportunities around Noon, he also came up empty handed. “Slow fishing.”, he said. If the expert was having difficulties, then I could not feel bad about the poor fishing.

Although this four-day trip only produced several fish, it was still a learn experience. one can only hope the frustration will be rewarded in future trips now that I have gained some more knowledge. It would have been nicer to fool a few fish with the chironomids that I had tied, but catching them on dries at a lake is an exciting first that I will not soon forget.

Our trip to Alta Lake in early May produced a few nice cutthroat trout but the fishing was not exactly fast and furious. We decided to pay it another visit last Tuesday, hoping the warmer weather would bring more fish to the surface. We were not disappointed at all. Both rainbow trout and cutthroat trout fed actively on the surface and there was not a shortage of hookups. This ten minute video blog shows how we did with a simple strike indicator and a sink tip setup.

Nina and I made our annual trip to St Mary Lake on Salt Spring Island last weekend. We normally do a trip in late June, when smallmouth bass fishing have been excellent in the deeper water columns. Two years ago, we did a trip in the first week of May and the trout fishing was excellent while the bass fishing was slow. This year, we decided to give late May a try so we could possibly target both smallmouth bass and trout successfully.

This spring’s weather has not exactly been fantastic, so we were not too surprised to be greeted by mist and dark clouds when we sailed away on the ferry from Tsawwassen. We stayed at our usual cabana at Lakeside Gardens Resort, where we could park our boat just several feet from our doorstep. The cabana is equipped with stoves, a fridge and a double bed. It is almost like camping, but comfortable enough after a long day of fishing.

Rain clouds hovering above gulf islands.

Cooler weather also brought out other local residents.

Although the rain dampened most of our four-day trip, the fishing made up for it. Soon after our arrival at the resort, I decided to throw a fly out from the floating dock because we have always caught some big bass from there. After four casts, a hefty fish grabbed the fly and gave me a good tussle. It spat the hook just prior to reaching my hands. A second fish, around the same size, also fell for the same leech pattern soon after. In spring months, large smallmouth bass take over the shallow portions of the lake to nest and spawn. They are territorial, predatory, so anything thrown at them usually works right away.

Not bad from the floating dock.

Beside flyfishing for them, the reliable spinner did not disappoint again. Large aggressive fish never hesitated as I sneaked up to the reed beds with the electric motor and threw the spinner over them. The bites were explosive, usually resulted in some surface thrashing before diving deeply. It is a rather exciting way to fish on the light spinning rod.

The magic spinner does it again!

My largest bass of the trip came on Sunday after I spotted it thrashing something on the surface. The distance between us was large, but it was worth a shot. I threw the spinner as far as I could and it landed just short of where it was. There was still a chance. After two turns on the spinning reel, it pulled the whole rod violently and sent the drag screaming. The fight lasted several minutes in the rain before I could grip it firmly with both hands.

Say ah!

Another spiny-ray species that we regularly encountered was yellow perch. This invasive species in British Columbia is known to take over and ruin a lake fishery due to its aggressive feeding behaviour. At St Mary Lake, they don’t seem to be as widespread. These perch, only grow up to 10 inches long, were actually pretty entertaining to catch on the fly rod when nothing else was biting.

Yellow perch.

The rain intensified on Sunday evening and so did the fishing. Right in front of the resort, I spotted a patch of water where dozens of fish were feeding. For two hours until I could not see my hands, I casted and stripped the fly with the clear intermediate sink line, hooking one bass on almost every cast. This is what has kept us coming back each year.

One more for the camera.

Overall the fishing was a lot more challenging than previous years, mostly due to the cooler weather. Although we encountered less fish, there were bigger fish, which is always a good trade-off. Now that our first road trip of the year is finished, it is time to plan the second. In the next few months, we will be visiting many other remote fisheries across British Columbia as the weather improves.