2020 Hunting And Fishing Play by Play

[warnniklz]

New year/new decade... let's see how this pans out.

This year has started of cold, as everyone knows. Friday night was fighting my mother's furnace... guess you gotta service it a little more regularly than once every 6 years. So got that all fixed Saturday morning. Then my step nephew Brickles and my brother decided we were going on a road trip to Quesnel for the day. Then Brickles' brother Young Jakey came up Saturday afternoon from Kamloops. Well that means we were going ice fishing on Sunday.

So last November this happened

...

Sunday we decided we may as well head out hunting anyways because that's what we came for. Headed up the Coquihalla into the snow... found a road that looked like it went up into some decent country. Not even a kilometer down the road, CV lets go... no more 4 wheel drive. We tried climbing the mountain, but it wasn't happening in 2 wheel drive. Short hunting trip and we got drive back to town in 2 wheel drive...

So turns out it wasn't the CV, but the transfer case is pooched. Apparently there's two types of transfer cases for a 97? tacoma. Electronic and J-Shift... needing the J-shift, they've been tough to find. So the go-to war wagon has been out of commish for a bit.

Sunday we had intentions of going to either "Dewar" or "Dugan" lake. We were about 2 or 3 kilometers from the turn off and the road was now longer plowed. We tried plowing through, but between champagne pow and lack of clearance, we weren't getting in to the lake. I was willing to make the 10km hike to the lake, but the other two weren't keeners.




We headed out and made our way to another lake. It's not a secret lake at all... so I've never fished it. Been there enjoying the outdoors by other means, just never with a fishing rod. But Young Jakey has always asked to go there, so we figured we'd may as well give it a go. Our uncle has spoken of this lake as well.

By the time we got there it was 12:30. We drilled some holes and got set-up. It was half hour before my brother seen a one pounder come swimming by his hole. Half hour later, we started thinking "maybe over by where people have been set up before might be better?" Plus we wouldn't risk losing a fish in the submerged trees.



Young Jakey clearing a spot




Thinking the fishermen before us knew something we didn't, we went and punched a new hole. We got set up and we were ready. Nothing. It was about an hour after that, we finally had a quarter pounder with cheese do a fly by of our hole. We didn't have much daylight left to work with. Another one moved it and started messing with my bait. He swam away with the hook and and did a couple head shakes. Went to set the hook and the fish just swam away. Missed him. Right after that my brother hooked into a fish.

[warnniklz]

Now big holes are nice for big fish... but when your hole is 24 to 30 inches wide, smaller fish get tricky. I pulled a rookie move and grabbed the line and tried to beach the fish. No luck. I tried grabbing it by the tail and slipped out of my hand. So I went in with two hands center mass... squirrely little thing slipped out again. As it went to swim under the ice again I reached under one handed and hauled it out. The first fish of 2020.

Don't know how to embed FB videos...
http://<a href="https://www.facebook...004534074/</a>

Tried weighing him, guess my battery in my scale is dying. He's somewhere between 1oz and 24lbs according to my scale.


Shortly after we had another quarter pounder with cheese messing with my bait. Then all of a sudden he turned and hammered Young Jakey's hook. He got his feet shoulder width apart, toes pointed slightly out, knees bent and slight lean forward. I got his drag set and he beached it like a salmon. We had enough fish for dinner that night and were done for the day. Jakey was a little concerned with how the fish would taste considering the lake smelled like swamp ass. But it was a cold deep lake.

My brother got the bigger one


Baked them up. Did one fish in traditional salt, lemon pepper and dill, one fillet with a greek blend and one with a cajun blend. Sided with ceasar salad and roasted carrots followed by strawberry rhubarb pie with vanilla ice cream.

Not a terrible way to kick off 2020

[srupp]

Hmmmm well done guys..good writing style..hmmm can't understand 10 kms into Dewar..or Dugan..oh well glad Moms furnace got fixed..your not just great hunter..fisher..even can fix furnaces..
keep your adventures coming..enjoyable.
cheers
Srupp

[warnniklz]

...hmmm can't understand 10 kms into Dewar..or Dugan...

"Dewar" "Dugan"... code names lol

[adriaticum]

Awesome trout!

This year I did my first ice fishing.
We didn't catch anything but I think I could learn to like it.
My buddy had one of those underwater cameras.
Nice to see what goes on down there.

[bottles]

Nice start. Hoping to hit the ice this weekend.

[HikerHunter]

LMAO! "anywhere between 1oz and 24Lbs"

[warnniklz]

LMAO! "anywhere between 1oz and 24Lbs"

I'm going to say each of them are 9.2lbs lol

[warnniklz]

His drag was loosened right off and he was quietly reeling away and not really getting anywhere. I watched in surprise for a half second before I could say "dude you got a fish on". B-Rad came running over looking down the hole... grabbing The One They Call Darrick's line. It made me wince a little watching B-Rad grabbing that line. I got The One They Call Darrick's drag set properly and he made short work of fighting the fish.



[photo taken by Bond]


Obviously I had to ask him what bait he was using... turns out The One They Call Darrick wasn't using any bait at all, but just a lure... a glowing wedding band. Schmyle was making fun of me because all my ice fishing rules were being broken...

1 - No Bait (if you aren't allowed bait, what's the point of ice fishing?)
2 - Using a trolling lure (a wedding band!? Ice Fishing?! Really?)
3 - It was warm out (Should be about minus 20 or colder to catch big fish)

Shortly after my rod had line peeling out, however I knew it was a lost cause right away as the fish had the bait in it's mouth and not the hook. As soon as my fish was gone, Smashlee's rod started to vibrate. I think my fish left me for Smashlee. She wasn't able to get her hook set either.

It had quietened down again, and I was shoveling snow just because.


B-Rad had his rod laying down next to his hole. B-Rad quickly grabbed it and had a fish on.

[warnniklz]

The group of us ended up killing 4 fish that day. I'm not sure of the weights as my scale was still reading all over the map. But you can see the line just in front of my reel seat, from that line to the tip of my rod is 50cm.



I'm still not sold on the lake yet, even though B-Rad loves it. He complains about how much money he has to spend on fuel to get out there, but... there's gotta be lakes closer to his place with bigger fish. That are edible. Yeah Dragon Lake is close, but yeah...

There's fishing derbies popping up everywhere, but me and B-Rad are going to give the Sheridan Lake derby a go next weekend. I've never ice fished it, only soft water, so should be fun to have a neutral lake for both of us to ice fish.