YUKON, A FISHING PARADISE

 

Roberto Ferrario

                                    

Little Atlin Lake… my Rapala Skitter Walk was slowly working in no more than 40 centimeters of gin clear water when suddenly a big wave materialized behind it; and it seemed a submarine. A few interminable seconds and my lure disappeared in huge gorge and in hundred of scales. A good size pike of over 7 kilos was at the end of the line. A great battle  followed and the fish got near to the boat ready in order to be released.

- “Giovanni, do we should take a photo?”

- ”No, no, too many pike photos for today. Some other few casts and we  shall go back home, it‘s late, it’s 8 o’clock and with your last pike now we have counted 85 fishes, I think that'all for today - it’s more than enough!!”

I went pike fishing in Canada several years ago, in Saskatchewan to fish in the wonderful Wollastone Lake for big pikes and trout and that trip was a great experience. There I caught a huge quantity of fishes. So the temptation to go back to Canada for another great hunt of pikes had never left my mind.

The problems are always the same: time and money! For the time with a little bit of organization you can try to save a week or more, some months in advance; as for the money part, it is another story.

Canada isn’t to close to us Italians -  one needs an intercontinental flight to get there and it is very expensive. Usually, to fish in so remote areas you have to choose a well- equipped fishing lodge, usually a five stars, and it can be reached only with small private planes and there you always find super professional guides. The services of these luxury lodges can cost an average of 400-500 euros per person a day!

During my past experience I went there with an American friend of mine that fortunately was a great friend of the owner; so we obtained a great discount.

The dreams to go back to North America near the Polar Arctic Circle for a great pike trip disappeared for several years, until, thanks to the web, we found the possibility to rent, for an affordable price, a small cottage and a boat without charge on the Little Atlin Lake in the Canadian region of Yukon

This lodge was visited by other Italian fishermen in the past years and all went back  there enthusiastically. Here, we wouldn’t have the help of a professional guide, but after more than 10 years of adventurous fishing trip in “fly & drive”, my friend Giovanni and I were ready for a new adventure.

LITTLE ATLIN LAKE

Little Atlin Lake is one the most renowned lake for pike fishing in all Yukon, but it must be reminded that there are many good ones in that region. The particularity of this lake is that the 80% of the waters are very shallow with an average of 2-3 meters and, with the extensive weed beds, it creates a perfect habitat for those predators.

The deepest zones of the lake are only two, very wide, but well delimitated and it is right here that we will find the lake trout. Pike are also found, in particular in zones near the lodge; zones with aquatic vegetation, drop off and close to the school of whitefish that is the main prey of the predators.

Usually, it is in deeper open water that you can find the best huge pikes, but anyway it isn’t a rule for we caught several pikes of over 7-8 kilos in very shallow water while we were catching small pike of no more than 2-3 kilos.

The fishing pressure on this lake is almost close to zero because the few local people here fish only for trout, trolling in the middle of the lake and totally ignore the pike population.

On this lake, about 11 year ago, it was built the Little Atlin Lodge that is composed by two small comfortable cottage immerse in a pine wood close to the shore and the big house of the owner Andy, a Swiss citizen that decided to move there with all the family in order to run the business. Every cottage can accommodate 5-6 people, they are very rustic but there you will find every comfort you need. There is no electricity and everything works thanks to the propane (lights, fridge, and kitchen) and for heating there is a big wood stove.

You have to have in mind that the nearest city is one-hour drive away, so you have to buy all the food and all you need to stay there one week  in total isolation.

The boats at our disposal were made of aluminum and its length about 3.5 meter, equipped with a 15 hp outboard motor; they are very stable and fishing in two you have enough space to fish comfortably. The fishing spots aren’t no far than 15 to 20-minute boating.

Unfortunately Andry isn’t a passionate angler, but, anyway, he will surely help to find ou the best spots of the lake and  teach you how to catch a great number of fishes and  he will give you all the necessary advice to spend a great week over there.

A great difficulty we found was to find the drop-offs, namely the zones that from shallow water suddenly go down deeper. Because those zones were situated at 200 meters or more from the cost so it was very difficult to have any point of reference. When the sun was on and the lake was flat, it was very easy to find them, but with a cloudy sky and waves it was nearly impossible to find the right hot spots. Surely that a portable GPS would have helped us a lot.

So we thought out a very easy solution for the problem; when we found a good action of pike near a drop off we placed on the water a plastic bottle connected with 3-4 meters of rope at a stone. With this method we were able to come back to the same spot the day after or use it as a point of reference to fish in the nearby zones. So after few days, the names of our fishing spots were: Pepsi, Sprite, Coke, 7UP, etc.

This solution provided us with the opportunity to catch a great number of pike and trout either while trolling or with the spin-ishing technique; I can assure you that when the weather conditions were bad it was also very difficult to locate those bottles. Obviously, on the last fishing day we removed all these plastic bottles from the lake.

Due to the long wait to make this trip and the long travel to reach the place, we decided to optimize all our fishing days at the maximum. So at 6.30 in the morning we woke up, we made our breakfast, we prepared tackle and sandwiches for the day and before 8.00 o'clock we were on the lake. We generally came back every evening at 8.00 pm. So no less than 12 hours of fishing per day! The impossibility to keep casting all those hours every day was evident, so we decided to spend 2-3 hours a day trolling over the drop off or near  the rock edges in order to have some time to relax a little bit and have the possibility to eat our sandwiches. So, we were also able to explore new areas while moving from one spot to another.

With that technique we caught either pike or trout. Trolling in deep water was excellent for trout;  the fishes weren’t suspicious and we caught many while we were using 14 centimeter pike lures and 60 lb steel wire leader. Sometimes we also caught  trouts in shallow water in the same spot we caught pikes.

Andry, our host, was surprised at the quantity of trouts that we caught because usually they are rarer; probably the water was cool enough for them. In fact, in summer these fishes tend to stay and feed in the deeper part of the lake and not close to the surface as we found them out.

This lake is surely full of fishes, but I can assure you that isn’t so easy to catch them. In some spots we saw them in good number and in good size, but they simply didn’t want to eat; probably they were fed up. Every day we had to find the right spot, where, with the right lure and color we were able to get a good number of attacks.

Anyway, there were some delimitated zones, for example 200 square meters where in less that 2 hours we caught more than 40 pikes of good size. The average size of pike we caught ranged from 3 to 6 kilos, and the average number of fishes per day per boat  ranged from 80 to 90, with out best day catching 104 pikes. In the six days of fishing, we totalized 496 pikes and 18 lake trout and the best fish was a pike of over 11 kilos.

This trip was tiresome but it surely was one of the greatest experience we have ever had in our fishing life. .