Arctic Adventures

Burbot Under the Ice Oren and I went fishing on Saturday at the Pit. I caught a few trout, but the highlight of Oren's day was the Burbot under the clear ice. There were 5 or 6 groups of the fish. It seemed that the further we went down the river, the bigger the Burbot got. While I was going for trout Oren was exploring on the clear ice "looking for fossils." He started yelling that there were fish. I figured he was just seeing old, dead salmon through the ice, but my curiosity got the better of me and I went over. Sure enough there were Gobies and small Burbot scooting around in the 2 inches of water under the ice. Oren chased them around for a while. I gave up fishing for trout and started exploring with him. The farther we went down the river the bigger the Burbot got. The biggest one we saw must have been an easy two feet. I was really wishing that I had brought my ice spud to see if I could spear them after chipping a hole in the ice.  Big One

 Ice Skating on Nuvruuqpaaq  See the Trout?  Like a Fish Tank I finally got out fishing a couple of Saturdays ago. I tried a few different spots before I made it to the spot in the photos above. I had this spot in the back of my mind from fishing earlier this year and I had a feeling it could be good. It was ridiculous. I had to park the honda and walk to where I thought the fish would be. Before I left the honda it looked like I would have to fish through the ice so I just brought the jigging rods and spud bar. After a half hour of bushwacking through willows I got to where the ice was and it was a 1/2" thick. I could have cried. I ended up cutting down a willow and using the line from a jigging rod. It actually worked pretty good.  I could see trout just hanging behind salmon waiting for eggs.  I threw some more salmon eggs out there and the trout just came from everywhere. I ended up with 28, and easily could have filled up a couple of sacks worth. I had no des