British Columbia Fishing Blog

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.

Since Dave from Currie Artworks, who resides in Whistler, informed me that Alta Lake was ice-off in early April, I have been eager to visit it. Despite of the mild winter, spring’s weather turned sour. It has been either windy, rainy, or both. It kept this fair weather fisherman at home whining for weeks. At last, some consistently warm days have arrived. Nina agreed to drag the boat out to Alta Lake yesterday, probably just to rid the cabin fever and shut me up.

We started fishing at Alta Lake in 2006 and have been back a couple of times each year. It is definitely one of my favorite lakes to visit. Many friends have questioned why that is the case, because a trip to lakes in the Thompson/Okanagan region would yield some stronger, bigger rainbow trout. Alta Lake’s rainbow trout rarely grow larger than 14 inches long, while its cutthroat trout lack the fight that you would see in an interior rainbow trout. I do not really have a good reason for liking it. Perhaps Whistler’s scenary appeals to me, perhaps I simply enjoy looking at cutthroat trout that are completely covered in fine spots. For whatever reason, I’ve returned year after year regardless whether the fishing was good or bad.

We decided to arrive at the lake just past 1:00pm and fish until the sun set behind the mountains. It was a rather late start because in the past, I’ve found that it tends to get breezy in the afternoon before calming down in the evening. Too often we arrived in the morning, only to be pounded by white caps after a couple hours of calmness. Wind is one element that can suck all the energy out of a fisherman on the boat. On those days, we usually ended up leaving before the evening bite.

It was almost 2:00pm once our boat was set up. The sky was clear with a few small patches of clouds that did not seem threatening. As expected, it was a bit breezy, but it seemed to balance very well with warmth from the sun.

I decided to bring Nina to a spot where we have caught numerous trout during most outings. Still not too familiar with flyfishing, she chose to use a spinning setup for this trip. I outfitted her with a tiny spoon that we picked up in Denmark last winter. The entire setup was rated 4lb test, perfect for everything that swims in this lake. Meanwhile, I chose to use a 4wt setup with a clear intermediate sink line. The fly of choice was a brown wooly bugger, which has been successful for both rainbows and cutties in this lake.

It really did not take long before we found some action. After a bite slipped through me, Nina had the first hook-up. The subsurface fight indicated that it was a cutthroat trout. The yellow flashes soon confirmed our guess.

After releasing her first fish, it only took fifteen more minutes before the second fish attacked her lure just several feet from the boat. This fish dove deeply, the bend in the rod suggested that it was a good sized fish. Nina kept the tension on the line while the mysterious fish circled below the boat. When it surfaced, both of us were screaming with excitement. It was what we had come for, a solid, long, spotty cutthroat trout that I estimated to be around 18 to 20 inches long. The absence of scars and firey orange cutthroat mark made this a perfect specimen, not to mention it was Nina’s first large cutthroat.

Despite of her instant success, I failed to produce. I proceeded to miss a couple more bites and briefly hooked onto a small fish. It was time for a move.

We shifted two more times without anymore bites. Maybe it was a bad idea that we moved in the first place. Never move from a spot where the fish are biting, lesson learned. Nina managed to connect with one more cutthroat trout and a very small ambitious rainbow trout, but overall we were not feeling many bites. At 5:30pm, we decided to give the original spot another go.

It was indeed the hot spot! Once anchored, a fish grabbed my fly after a few casts. It also escaped before I could touch it. At this landing rate, my day was looking bleak. That frustration quickly evaporated when I hooked up again. I took my time to ensure that it stayed on the hook this time. At last, a sigh of relief was let out when the cutthroat trout was scooped up by the net. It was dwarfed by Nina’s early catch, but I’ll take it!

There seemed to be a school of them. After releasing the first fish, the second fish came within a few more casts, followed by the third fish. All of them were in the same weight class, suggesting that they were congregating and feeding at the same place.

In total, both Nina and I caught three cutthroat trout each, but her giant catch earlier in the trip stole the prize!

If you ever wish to try out a Lower Mainland lake where catch and release is mandatory, then Alta Lake can be a very good option. Give it a go, you just might be pleasantly surprised like us.

When the invitation to be part of this year’s Great Salmon Send Off arrived in my inbox last month, I accepted it without much hesitation. Like the Fingerling Festival, this is another community based event that has generated plenty of interest among residents of Burnaby.

When this tradition started twenty years ago by local resident Jennifer Atchison, Stoney Creek, a tiny tributary of the Brunette River, was void of salmon. Today, spawning salmon can be seen returning each fall, thanks to countless hours of hard work by volunteers of the Stoney Creek Environment Committee.

Stoney Creek is just one of many streams in the Lower Mainland that are overshadowed by both residential and industrial developments. Each day, it faces threats from dewatering to accidental dumping. Unnoticed, its survival depends on programs such as the Great Salmon Send Off. The goal is not just to revive the salmon runs that once exist, but to make sure visitors become part of the solution at the end of the event.

At 11:00am, the release began when Fisheries and Oceans Canada’s community advisor Maurice Coulter-Boisvert opened up the holding tank. Several thousand juvenile coho salmon circled as they emerged from the dark, eager to start their long journey. Hundreds of parents and kids lined up patiently to receive their bag of fish. Once given, they were carried down to the edge of Stoney Creek where they were set free.

Our participation today included setting up a flytying workshop where each kid had a chance to tie a fly with the assistance of my friends Shane and Carlo. We were pretty overwhelmed by the amount of enthusiasm and interest! If you did not have a chance to tie a fly or pick up our fish identification cards, don’t worry because we will be at several more events in June and July.

More photographs from today’s event can be viewed on this page.

To be honest, fishing for bull trout in the Tidal Fraser River has been pretty tough for me so far this year. Unlike other years, after numerous blanked outings around my house, I gave up before freshet was even in full swing. Perhaps they were simply not excited about the usual lures and flies that I offer, or perhaps they were simply not at my usual haunts. It has been frustrating to say the least, but this is what targeting predatory species in the Tidal Fraser River is all about.

Seeing that we are finally getting some nice weather, we went down to one of the local beaches this afternoon so we could soak in the rays and make a few casts. Although the Fraser River is now pretty muddy due to freshet, you can still catch bull trout. The best method to do so is by bait when water condition is poor. It is not a technique that we use often, because using bait on a catch and release fishery seems to be a waste. Secondly, bull trout have a tendency to take the baited hook too deeply. We avoid this by not letting the fish biting on the bait for too long. Although completely legal, it is something that we choose to do once awhile so our impact on these fish is minimized.

The moderate westerly breeze from our back and the sun in front of us made it very comfortable. We had a great view of the river and our rods that sat firmly in the holders. Sea gulls hovered and rested on the pylons, celebrating after so many miserable spring days in April.

The bites came on pretty quickly, but it was the wrong species. The little twitches on the rod tip told me that sculpins were hungry. It did not take long before we brought one to the beach. These common sculpins can be a nuisance when bait fishing for bigger species, but we always release them with care because they are an important food source for bigger fish and birds.

The tide turned at 1:30pm. From past experiences, I have found that the bites come on soon after flood tides. Today was no different. While reeling in one rod, I spotted a couple of big tugs on the other rod. I called out for Nina to grab the rod. She pulled and the bend in the rod suggested a bigger fish on the line. The line suddenly became slack as she retrieved, but the fish was not lost. It was simply swimming toward us. One minute later, it emerged from the silty water and we were delighted to see a bull trout on the line.

Once it was released, it did not take long to hook the second, third and fourth fish. There was definitely a school of hungry bull trout in front of us. The largest fish of the day did not even want to wait for the bait to settle on the bottom before grabbing it. It was a solid fish, which probably has been feeding on plenty of salmon fry that are travelling down the Fraser River.

We decided to end the trip after two hours while the fishing was still pretty good. In total, we brought in five bull trout and lost a couple more, definitely not a bad way to start our weekend. Tomorrow we will be attending the 20th Great Salmon Send Off at Stoney Creek. We will be doing flytying workshops, arts and crafts for kids, as well as handing out reading material on both fresh and saltwater fisheries in the Lower Mainland. Be sure to come by for a chat!