Cutthroats, rainbows and cryfish, oh my!!!

[caddisguy]

We got our spring bear early this year (close range on headcam too... footage will come out sometime in the near future) and though my fiancee still has a tag, our freezers are pretty full and we're pretty hunted out (hiking, ticks, butchering bear until 1am--my first time and everything went wrong--with other bears and critters too close for comfort, carrying meat, cutting, vacuum packing, etc) so last weekend we decided to just relax 100% and do a little fishing/crayfishing at a local lake. It's a bit early for crayfish at said lake, so we only got a couple, but still fun! We kept some trout for a couple meals. Sitting at home today and going through some raw video--seems we have many many hours of raw video I need to catch up on--and last weekends fishing trip seemed the easiest to edit, so here it is.

[Wrj]

Nice work! Didnt know people ate crawfish...might have to try some!

[300H&H]

Nice work! Didnt know people ate crawfish...might have to try some!

If the water is clean then they taste great, just like scampi.

[caddisguy]

I started several years ago... once or twice a year we'll get our traps down somewhere and they fill up... we take the biggest ones to make up our limit and have a feast. Garlic butter and a little lemon!!

Snorkeling for them is fun too. I know a few good lakes with crayfish that are really clear, so we'll be doing some underwater video, probably sometime between mid July and mid September. I find August to October are the magic months. I imagine the lakes and creeks on the Island are full of them too, so you shouldn't need to venture too far!

[Sofa King]

oh the fish hunter.
that's the unit my dad had rigged right out.
he made custom seats and mounts and the whole works, it was a great little fish-catcher.

[caddisguy]

oh the fish hunter.
that's the unit my dad had rigged right out.
he made custom seats and mounts and the whole works, it was a great little fish-catcher.

We've definitely got some great use out of it. I've had it for about 8 years. It's been out on hundreds of voyages around the LML, Merritt, Kamloops and the south cariboo. Other than getting splashed a little, it has no problem when big lakes like Harrison or Lac la Hache kick up or windy lakes like Tunkwa, Helena, etc... though if wind is really bad we often wait it out since fighting the wind does wear down the batteries.

Popped the floorboard my first time out by sitting on some pliers, but it patched up nicely, and thus she is named "patches". Had some of the plastic clamps for the motor mount crack but my friend was able to 3D-print me new ones. I don't know how the vinyl is still holding up... I stay pretty close to shore when lakes are freezing though. I know we'll end up going for a little bit of a swim one day. I have a spare boat here still in the box when this one packs it in.

I love that everything (boat, paddles, life jacket, pump, anchors, etc) pack up into one roughneck rubbermaid container. Carrying it into lakes isn't too bad either if you leave the batteries behind.

[Sofa King]

dad made a solid plywood floor that popped in, it really made it so much better.

[caddisguy]

dad made a solid plywood floor that popped in, it really made it so much better.

I bought the floorboard from sevylor and used it for the first year or two because I was worried that sand/pebbles under boots, batteries, etc. would pop it pretty quick. Then my brother ended up getting a fishhunter rig and I saw how he'd beat the crap out of (never cleaning the rocks out, dragging it around on gravel) ... his rationale was... "How much extra time do you spend packing around and installing the floorboard each trip?" ... "how much time do you spend cleaning the rocks/dirt doat, drying it etc?" ... "ok now how much does a new boat cost and what is your time worth?". Since then, I've probably saved a couple hundred hours by not "taking care of it" by using the floorboard, cleaning or drying it before storage. The floorboard did have one advantage though... if I wanted to throw down a couple anchors to make the boat perfectly still, I could stand up to cast!!

Tough little rig for sure. It feels cheap/fragile but 8 years of use and a lot of abuse, leaving it under the sun at 35+ degrees, dragging it up on rocks, driving into stumps, against jagged ice, never cleaning, throwing heavy batteries in. For the last couple years, I figure every trip might be its last, but it continues to survive... bonus each time!!

[ruger#1]

Nice work! Didnt know people ate crawfish...might have to try some!

Just make a dip out of mixing Miracle Whip, And ketchup together until it turns pink. Dad and I used to catch them with a fishing rod and a Eulachon tied to the end of the line. We also used cage traps. It was a family thing. We would boil them on the spot.

[ruger#1]

I started several years ago... once or twice a year we'll get our traps down somewhere and they fill up... we take the biggest ones to make up our limit and have a feast. Garlic butter and a little lemon!!

Snorkeling for them is fun too. I know a few good lakes with crayfish that are really clear, so we'll be doing some underwater video, probably sometime between mid July and mid September. I find August to October are the magic months. I imagine the lakes and creeks on the Island are full of them too, so you shouldn't need to venture too far!

Try the big pool below the Hayward dam. Told by
someone who dives, That there are ledges that they like to sit on. Nice clean water.