Tag Archives: Christmas

Wrasse The Night Before . . .

December 14, 2009
A BIT OF CHRISTMAS STUFF
There's Some Catching To Do
empty streams beckon

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.. The neighbors love the Christmas season. There's a bit of snow and the fishing is grand. Holes in the ice are spewing forth fish like never in recent memory and the ice-clogged Madison River, (a rare occurrence,) sends them to the short stretch between the lakes.
.. Our sleepy little village is gearing up for the boisterous arrival of holiday merry maker's. The skiers and sledders and photographers and fishers and gawkers are arriving. They trickle in in droves.
.. The neighbor kids play "count the shivers" as lowlanders slide around looking for garments to augment their designer togs. 'Tis the season to be jolly."
.. We've adopted the Christmas Wrasse, (Halichoeres ornatissimus,) as the fish of the season. It reminds us of the Hawaiian surf and the fine fly fishing available on the reefs there.
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.. We stumbled across a list of the "20 most absurd Santas from 2008" and thought we'd share a couple with you.
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.. The catching has been good between the lakes. A small dip in the temperature has kept all but the neighbors from fishing in the glory holes of the Madison River between the lakes. Even the pros eschew the nuisance of frozen toes and the ice clogging of rod guides. They haven't learned that precision casting of a six-foot leader on the end of another six feet of fly line is about all that you need. Stealth, guile, and precision stalking will out!
.. Big nymphs, (6 - 10,) and small streamers are doing the job. Winter has finally decided to stay and the fishing is superb. WAHOO!
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First Ice Fishing Trip of the Year!

December 12, 2009
Yesterday afternoon I very bravely stood on the dock and sent Justin out on the ice to fix an aerator. When he came back alive and dry I just knew we would be able to drill some holes early this morning before the sun came out. That is exactly what we did, and boy was it alot of fun!!

Half of the lake has about 1.5 inches of ice on it, but on the eastern shoreline out to about 50 yards or so we had a whopping 2.85 inches of solid ice. My dad, mom, Chad, and Justin were all up for the little adventure this morning before starting our days task of building the hatchery pond and cutting down a whole bunch of trees for some fish structures.

Before I got all the poles set up, dad hooked up with the first fish!




About 5 minutes later and Justin was battling a nice trout as well!



Mom was holding a pole for me while I was fiddling with something and as she was reeling it up the biggest trout of the day nailed her tiny waxworm.



I think my trout actually gave moms trout a run for its money on weight, but me being the extremely humble guy I am I decided to just let her keep the undisputed big fish honors for the day.


Chad posing with his little, but beautiful golden trout:


We kept 6 fish today to turn into smoked trout dip for Christmas! To make the fish dip, I saute the fish in butter and then mix up a whole bunch of cream cheese, chives, shredded cheese, liquid smoke and anything else I can find in the kitchen all together in a bowl. Hows that for a recipe?

Anyhow here are some fun pics of the trout to cap off our first ice fishing trip of the season!



I cant wait till we actually get some safe ice and start guiding this year. This is going to be our best ice fishing season to date!! Not only are our fish looking great, but we actually have more guided fishing trips booked to take people ice fishing on their own lakes, than we do to take folks fishing on our lakes! For the most part we are booked up until mid-January, but I still have a couple weekdays available between now and then.
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Christmas Gift Certificates

December 11, 2009
Are you looking for a unique Christmas gift for the fisher in your life? Why not consider a Clearwater Adventures gift certificate for a walk and wade outing or a drift on the Bow River? Give us a call for more details. Christmas Gift Certificates is a post from: Clearwater Adventures Fly Fishing

Christmas Gift Certificates is a post from: Clearwater Adventures Fly Fishing

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Tractors, Turkey Shopping, and Construction

December 3, 2009
Well not much happening in the fish world lately, but there seems to be quite a bit happening in the real world! I have been building houses for my dad and brother most days and taking care of all our pond stuff and online shipments every spare moment. Also been working on lowering our 33 acre lake for the winter. 

We also did a great job at spending all of our extra summer money already and some. We are the very proud new owners of a 2002 caterpiller skid steer and a 2006 kubota kx 121 excavator. We are not only building our own hatchery ponds, but will be building several forage fish ponds for clients as well!



So then Thanksgiving comes around and I eat my usual whole pecan pie and leftover turkey and potatoes for the next few days! And also I do get up at 3 am on black friday and buy a ton of stuff. We buy gifts for my dad's company christmas party every year on this day. He has 26 employees that we buy apprx $200 gifts for each of them for their party. Since we dont provide alcohol, we have to have some incentive to get the guys to show up!! This year we got GPS's, Netbooks, Lithium Power Tools, TV's, Nintendo Wii's, Ice Fishing Shanty, and a few other miscellaneous items. My mom, Justin, and Katy camped out at Walmart all night, fought the hoards of people at the 5 am mad dash and got everything on their list! My dad and Dave waited in line at Sams Club and got served coffee and Breakfast and also got everything on their list.
Lee and I waited in our truck at Sears at 4 am and when they started letting the line of people go in running and grabbing, we just slip in at the end of the line and go straight to the computer on the left side of the store. While everyone is scooping up the doorbusters and waiting in a checkout line that wraps around the store after 3 minutes, We just have the sales associate ring up our item numbers from the catalog, pay $900, and let merchandise pick up fellas load up our loot. At 4:20 am we are done and headed to the breakfast diner- We have the system nailed down to a tee!!! After a hearty breakfast we meet up with my dad and dave for the made dash at Home Depot at 6 am! We got everything on our list at Home Depot and had $5000 spent by 6:30 am!

Noah decided to run out of our apartment the other day and by the time I looked out he was on top of the minivan! Instead of grab him right away I took my time grabbing the camera and took this pic. By the time I was done, he was so cold that I dont think he will head outside without much clothes on anymore. Sometimes I can be considered a tad bit cruel, but there really is no better way for a kid to learn stuff than on his own.


So the real cold weather is about to set in. Ice is starting to form just a tad bit. One more weekend of deer hunting and then hopefully we can be icefishing before Christmas.
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The Perfect Gift for John Gierach-anistas

November 17, 2009

Every John Gierach fan absolutely will want one of these for Christmas.

And no – no need to thank us. At the Underground, we’re all about fostering obsessive behavior among fly fishermen (as if that was hard).

Why would any Gierach fan ask for anything else?

Why would any Gierach fan ask for anything else?

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Great Fall Bass Fishing Tackle & Gear Sale!

October 16, 2009
Hey anglers, time to stock up this weekend! 20% off of Bass Tackle Depot is like saving 25-30% over your local retailers, free shipping over $50, no sales tax and no gas spent driving around. Get stocked up for next season or get your Christmas shopping done early! I am pretty sure I am going to order one of the new Skeet Reese rods!

http://www.basstackledepot.com/fall09.aspx
Great selection of rods, reels, hard to find swimbaits and tackle.
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Is there anything handier?

September 18, 2009
Really, is there anything more handy then a good multi-tool on the boat or in the field. This past spring, I picked up a Leatherman Blast, and I think with a roll of duct or electrical tape and my Blast, I can fix anything I need to on my boat. It's light and compact enough to always carry in your tackle bag or box and takes up less space then a bunch of specialty tools.

The pliers can tighten nuts, like your battery terminals which need to be checked often. The screwdriver saved my bacon when my front depthfinder mount came loose during a tourney on Lake Michigan. I also have used my knive to cut lures free from underwater ropes that i have hooked, which when throwing a $16 japanse crankbait, the blast can pay for itself very quickly!


So if you don't have a multi-tool get one for your fall fishing and hunting excursions, or think about getting one for your outdoors hubby for Christmas!
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The Big Freeze

January 12, 2009
More than a month without a blog entry - says it all really doesn't it? Sub-zero temperatures have gripped the country for almost all of that time and the pike have been SO hard to catch even in the deep water. That's not all mind, the flu bug took it's toll on me, then there were the Christmas and New Year festivities to get over as well so we haven't been fishing much.

Joe and I have been out a few times but only had a few low doubles for our trouble, Joe getting the biggest at 16lbs 7oz on a deadbait. The surface temperature of the big lake has been dropping steadily, 6.5 degrees one week, 6 degrees the next and just 5 degrees a week later with ice forming in the sheltered areas. Meanwhile the conditions have been very still with only a gentle breeze and often, bright sunshine for most of the day. Ordinarily I wouldn't mind the sun but it's been very noticeable that the fish have all come very late in the day when the sun was low in the sky or even absent from it. We stayed out until well after dark one evening to see if they were coming on the feed at night - they didn't!

The few runs we've had have all had something else in common too - they were all in deep water. Not a single bait has been picked up in less than forty feet and some were quite a bit deeper than that. So what's been going on?

When times are good I can usually find the pike using the echo sounder. They show up as nice big arches, usually a foot or two off the bottom and usually, they are close to shoals of bait fish. Find a big shoal of bait fish and there's almost bound to be a pike or two nearby. Just lately though the bait fish have been absent. Those shoals that I have found have been small and tight and always in deep water and it's been a rare event to pick up an obvious pike on the sounder. I suspect the prey fish have been away somewhere very deep and in a big lake where most of the water is very deep, that presents a headache in terms of location. It also means that the pike are going to have a lot more water to hide in, difficult water to fish too since anchoring up over 100ft or more presents its own problems.

Things have changed this week though. We had a stormy weekend with strong southerly winds and a big rise in temperature to over ten degrees. There's been a lot of rain too and this combination is certain to have had an effect. The water is unlikely to have warmed up very much but as it would have been very close to 4 degrees by the time the winds came, there's just a chance that the lake will have turned over, bringing the deep layers to the surface.

The prey fish are the key, I'm sure of that, and if the change in conditions has moved the prey fish, it will have moved the pike. Let's see how I get on next time out.
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Upper Squamish River Conditions – Dec 20, 2008

December 20, 2008
Frozen Sidechannel

Wow! Has it been cold. The average daily temperatures have been well below the freezing point in Squamish for over a week. Itching to get out, I decided to take the family on a winter outing to the Upper Squamish River to look at bald eagles and river conditions. Knowing the kids would get hungry I packed us a small snack and the ever-so-needed thermos of hot chocolate. We bundled the kids up and packed them and the two dogs into the Jeep. Minus 9 read the thermometer when we pulled out of the driveway.Winter Hike

The kids had a blast pulling the toboggan and looking for eagles in the trees while we walked along a piece of the river with our two dogs.  Our final count was 4 eagles, quite a few less than I have seen in the past. 

The dogs sure enjoyed searching out the dead salmon carcasses that litter the forest floor. We realized, once they got into the truck and warmed up, that it may not have been a good idea to let them play with the dead fish ....yich.
River Conditions: The river was frozen in a lot of places with ice flows all over the place. I have not seen the river quite so icy.  Squamish is usually fairly mild even in the winter and rarely do the temperatures stay cold enough to freeze  the river to the extent I saw today. Unfortunately I also observed high and dry frozen areas where I had observed salmon spawning this past fall.  These conditions will surely result in the demise of the eggs in those areas.   

Below are a few shots of the Squamish River from the road taken today (Dec 20, 2008).  As you can see there is a lot of ice.  The weather report also suggests that we may receive up to 20cm of snow overnight which means that the road will become too snowy for safe truck travel.  If the temperatures do not increase to above zero for a significant amount of time, we will not be back up the road until spring. Thank goodness we have the Cheakamus and Mamquam rivers as options throughout the winter as well as some lower reaches of the Squamish.

Merry Christmas and see you on the water when it is warmer! Brrrrr.

Tight lines,

Clint

Bridge to Ashlu RiverPearing into the still water of a side channel we noticed some dead chum carcasses on the river bottom.  The water was very clear and very cold.

Clear River Channel with Dead chum salmon - they're white

Icicles Hooray!

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Fun in the Fog

December 9, 2008

Woe is me, I'm down with the flu. What's worse is that I'm ill at a time when I've got a fortnight's break from work so all my fishing plans have gone out of the window.

Last time out was at Blithfield for the second of our four visits this season. It was a bitterly cold weekend and to be honest I didn't much fancy the thought of casting all day in freezing weather. casting with braid and a multiplier tends to throw up a lot of spray which, naturally enough, covers your fingers making them very cold very quickly. In the event it wasn't as bad as I had feared. It was cold right enough but the absence of any wind meant that there was no wind chill factor and we were able to keep on casting.

It was completely obvious where the fish were going to be, we knew it and so did everybody else so it was going to be a scramble to get to the hot area first. Joe and I loaded the boat up carefully so as to get maximum speed - most of the weight being up at the bow end and we waited expectantly for the "off". When it came, we were away from the landing stage before you could say "jerkbait" and found ourselves ahead of the pack by a good way. All except for one boat that is. A certain Mr Fickling somehow had permission to launch a little further along the bank, stealing a hundred yards or so on the rest of us and he and his boat partner were ahead of us. We gained on them fairly quickly (because of the way we had loaded up) but in the end it didn't matter. It seemed they were the only boat not headed for the hot area.

It was foggy, very foggy and I know how easy it is to get lost in the fog in a boat. The only way to keep your bearings is to keep the bank within view but if I had kept the bank within view I would have to go the long way round and risk losing our hard won advantage. I hatched a plot. I realised that other boats were keeping the bank within view so I decided to rely on them and keep them in view instead. It worked a treat and we made the swim well ahead of the other boats.

We found our spot and anchored up as quickly and as quietly as we could, absolutely certain that we were going to catch - and we did! I clipped on a slider and Joe his trusty Burt which he's done so well on at Blith and after just five casts Joe was into a fish. "Only a jack" he said. "Doesn't look like a jack to me." I told him and I quickly set the net up. We soon had her aboard and sure enough it was yet another Blithfield twenty to Joe - that's five in just seven days fishing! 22lbs exactly.

We should have packed up and gone home there and then for it proved to be a very tough weekend. We scratched around after that for a handful of pike up to 13lbs or so and we each had a rainbow trout, Joe's was on a Shad Rap and mine, at 6lb 7oz on a bright orange slider of all things.

Well that's all for now, hopefully I'll shake this awful virus off before Christmas and try and get out to catch a fish or two.
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