Cross-Canada III: Mountains

 Alex and I continued our cross-country journey and were headed up into the Rocky mountains. This time, we skipped the popular stops around Banff and instead took a southern route over the Crowsnest Pass. The views rivaled anything you would see in the national parks and we didn't have to share with the huge crowds.

Similkameen River

The first series of fishing stops were in the Columbia and Similkameen river systems in southern BC. There were a bunch of local sculpin and dace species I had yet to catch, species found nowhere else in Canada! It took a bit of searching, but I finally found some good Torrent Sculpin spots in fast water. It was cool to see how the different species occupied their niches; Torrent in the fast water, and Prickly Sculpin in the slower pools.

Torrent Sculpin

We also found some great spots for some sucker fishing in different parts of the Okanagan valley, with tons of Largescale Suckers hanging out in crystal clear water. It was a ton of fun sight fishing them on light tackle, but I never did run into the Bridgelip Sucker I was hoping for.

Largescale Sucker

We ended up staying in the Okanagan a little longer than planned, and only made it down to the Greater Vancouver area very late in the day. Which was probably a good thing, because the Chilliwack Walmart is not a great place to sleep. We had time for one last stop on the Chilliwack River where I could find another Sculpin species, the Coastrange Sculpin! It was a quick stop so I didn't wear my waders and soon regretted it in the freezing cold water. Thankfully, I was able to stay in the numbing waters long enough to catch this one small individual :)

Coastrange Sculpin

Photos taken and fish released, it was time to catch up on some sleep.

The next day, it was finally time to start thinking about some bigger fishes. Namely, the White Sturgeon, the biggest of freshwater fishes! First, we needed to catch some bait. I tied up a small slip-bobber rig and started drifting a small chunk of nightcrawler along the shore. It wasn't long before I caught enough small Pikeminnow to serve as bait. We also caught some cool by-catch, a rare Leopard Dace, some Peamouth, and the biggest Redside Shiner I've ever seen.

Redside Shiner

Peamouth

Leopard Dace

We then baited up some heavy duty bottom rigs and got to waiting for our real query to come by. A couple of hours later, one of the rods finally started bouncing! I picked it up, set the hook, and it quickly became obvious that this was a very big fish. For some reason, it seemed to be swimming towards shore so I quickly pulled back some line. Then, once it got to shallower water it turned around and went on a crazy run. It just kept going until my line caught on something and snapped. I never got to see that fish, but it had to have been a giant.

We also tried another spot closer to Vancouver with a fellow lifelister I met on Instagram. I never caught anything but he was lucky enough to pull in this beautiful specimen.

White Sturgeon

I fished hard until sundown, but I guess my sturgeon just wasn't meant to be. Better luck next time!

The next part of the trip was a lot of hiking with only a little bit of fishing mixed in. I'll spare you the details, but it was some of the best hiking I've ever done. The highlight was an arduous trek in Kananaskis country from the Tent Ridge Horseshoe through to Smutwood Peak.

Tent Ridge Horseshoe

Smutwood Peak

Sarrail Ridge

I did manage to catch one new species between all the hiking. We had finished our hike up to Garibaldi Lake early enough to drive back to Squamish and fish the Pink Salmon run. It didn't take long for me to catch this gnarly male.

Pink Salmon

We ended this portion of the trip in the Northern Rockies, with a helicopter tour of Mount Robson! Of course, I still had one last special fish to catch... another sculpin. The Spoonhead Sculpin is a species that is usually only found at the bottom of deep glacial lakes, but for some reason it also lives in the cold mountain streams of northern Alberta. I've failed at catching this species multiple times in the past and, as far as I know, no one has ever caught one on hook and line.

I wasn't going to give up without a serious effort though, and so I dragged Alex from stream to stream for hours. I poked a small chunk of worm under every rock I could find, and eventually I pulled up the fish in the picture below.

Spoonhead Sculpin

I quickly messaged some friends for an ID confirmation, until I was positive of having caught the target species. It must be my favourite catch from the trip :)

Garibaldi Lake

Cross-Canada III: Prairies

 With limited options due to the covid pandemic, Alex and I set our eyes to the west once again. This time, we focused more on backroads and catching some of the few realistic fish targets I had left.As usual, the trip started with a crazy run to get us across Ontario and into the prairies where the fun could begin.

The first, albeit short, stop was at a small river in Manitoba where I had seen sampling reports of Bigmouth Shiner, one of the few remaining fish I had yet to catch from the prairie provinces. The stop proved successful and I quickly located a school of the Bigmouths mixed in with Common Shiners and Creek Chub. We had been driving for about 30 hours straight at this point and still had a few hours left to go, so I quickly took some photos, released the fish, and we were back on our way.

Bigmouth Shiner

Having caught the shiner, we continued on to the Saskatchewan border and made camp for the night. Over the next couple days, we blazed across the rest of the prairies and enjoyed some scenic backroads with incredible scenery and cool wildlife. We visited towns with crazy names like Manyberries, Vulcan and Climax, and checked out interesting protected areas throughout.

Red Rock Coulee

Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park

Pronghorn (Antelope)

Unfortunately, there weren't many more fishing stops before we hit the mountains. That being said, we did take the time to go back to Lethbridge to try for a stocked population of sterile Grass Carp. They are considered an invasive species in most of the rest of Canada, but are actually stocked in some ponds there for weed control. Last year, I fished the same spot and actually found some fish, but couldn't convince any to actually bite. This year, they were still shy and spooky, but I finally made something work after a couple hours of chasing fish around, resulting in this beautiful specimen. It was one of the harder fighting fish I've come across and probably pulled me halfway across the lake!

Grass Carp

I'm gonna skip over our travels through the Rockies for now, and keep all the prairie adventures together. We didn't visit too many more scenic areas on the way back, but I was able to take some time to go fishing in the Assiniboine River in Manitoba. I maintain that Manitoba has some of the best roughfishing in Canada, and this session was no different.

Bites came quick and I was soon experiencing the best Shorthead Redhorse fishing I ever had. Size was nothing crazy, but the shear numbers was awesome. There were other species mixed in too, such as Goldeye and Channel Catfish.

Goldeye

Shorthead Redhorse

The roughfishing was great, but I will admit I was really here for a shot at two new lifers: the Flathead Chub and the Silver Chub. I was using small hooks and I was given some local intel that both species should be present. I was getting lots of small bites and eventually I managed to make one stick, my lifer Silver chub!

Silver Chub

I never was able to catch a Flathead Chub, making it the third trip across Canada without success for this species, but there's always next time! I'm not sure when I'll have time, but I'll get some blog posts up from the AB/BC portion of our journey soon.

Pebble Beach, Marathon

Lake Whitefish Spawn

 I've spent a good amount of time reading up on the fishing regulations for my home province of Quebec, and I've always been drawn to a couple of "exceptions" written into the rules for a few select fisheries. In the past, I've taken advantage of the spring dipnetting season for Rainbow Smelt, but I've always wanted to see a Whitefish run. Now when I say Whitefish, I mean the salmonid, not Fallfish or any other random silver fish folks call "whitefish".

Well, this fall, I was finally prepared to make it happen. I kept tab on water temperatures and made my way to the nearest legal netting river when the time was right, which just so happened to be Halloween night. The nearest run happens on the St-Francois river in the town of Disraeli, only about an hour and a half away. It was rainy and the water was a bit dirty, but I hoped I'd still have a shot at a couple fish.

We waited for night to fall, and before long, I was donning my headlamp and waders and headed into the current. The dirty water made it hard to see much of anything, so I focused on the shallows for a while and ended up accidentally catching this Mottled Sculpin which was kinda cool.

Mottled Sculpin

Unfortunately, the Whitefish clearly weren't hanging out in the shallows. So, I made my way into deeper water and found a slack area just upstream of a riffle where I could just see to the bottom in about 2' of water. After a good while of searching, I finally saw the shape of a larger fish lazily making its way up river. I scooped it into the net and had my first ever netted Lake Whitefish!

Lake Whitefish

I only ended up catching one more, but I had accomplished what I had come for and felt like I had a pretty good idea of what this unique fishery was about. It wasn't a spectacular run with the river absolutely filled with fish like I expected, but still very cool!

How to Catch Carp

Common Carp are arguably the top gamefish in Quebec, but remain very underappreciated. They fight hard, require a lot of skill to catch consistently, and are pretty photogenic. However, many anglers seem to turn their noses up to them, perhaps because they are too difficult to catch or maybe because they don't make great table-fare. Admittedly, they don't taste very good (in my opinion). In an attempt to solve the first problem and make them a bit more accessible, here's a beginner's guide to catching carp.

Common Carp

The Spot:

We'll keep it simple for this part. Like many other fish, Carp move around depending on the season and can relate to many different structures and parts of a water body. However, I've found one of the most consistent places to catch them is in a bay of a medium to large river. Look for a bay that is wide enough to provide shelter from the current, but not so wide that it becomes shallow and choked with weeds.

This is just a random spot I found on Google Maps, I have no idea if it's productive or even accessible.

I like to position myself on the upstream point of the bay, where I can most easily present my bait on the current seam. This seam is where many fish stay so they can conserve energy out of the main current while food is pushed right to them. In this case, it also has the advantage of moving the scent of your bait into the bay so it can bring out hungry fish.

Finally, there is no need to cast far. In fact, it is more important to cast accurately to ensure your rig and bait is being placed into the same spot, slowly drawing more and more fish to the area. If the spot allows, I only cast 30-40 yards, just enough to get to deep enough water and past any weed lines.

The Bait:

The next helpful step is to pre-bait, or chum, your spot for several days to get the Carp used to feeding in your chosen area. This isn't necessary and can be skipped if you don't have the time, resources, or dedication to do so, but can really increase your odds of having a productive day. If I do choose to pre-bait, I will typically chum with 1-2 cans of sweet corn every day for 1-2 weeks. Hardcore carp anglers will generally use feed corn and use a lot more bait, but I've never felt the need to go through that process.

Using the rig I will describe below, you will also need to make some pack-bait used to bring fish to your hook-bait. My preferred pack bait recipe is listed below, and I also like to use it as chum the day I'll be fishing. I generally chum 1-2 handfuls every 15 minutes for the first hour of fishing, then once every hour afterwards.

• 1 can of sweet corn
• 1 packet of strawberry Jell-O powder
• 1 box of panko bread crumbs
• Enough water so the mixture can be squeezed and formed into a ball

Pack-bait

The Rig:

This part is important! You'll want a specific rig designed for carp fishing, called the "hair rig". I would explain it here, but there's no way I'll do a better job than the video linked below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjact22m6Bo

You can ignore the boilie hook-bait used in the video, save these for when you have a bit more experience with carp fishing and are looking to experiment. For North American waters, 2-3 sweet corn kernels will work most of the time and give you the opportunity to catch other species as well! The only specialty gear I use is a piece of fake Styrofoam corn used to float the bait just off the bottom. It gets threaded onto the hair same as any other hook-bait.

Hair Rig

I also prefer to use a method feeder sinker, which allows me to pack my pack-bait directly onto my rig for an accurate presentation to bring in fish. These work exactly the same as a sliding sinker and slip right onto your mainline.

Method Feeder

The Gear:

Finally, here's a list of the more specialized equipment that can be useful, but not necessary, for carp fishing:

• Baiting needle (or straightened out hook)
• Bait stop (or piece of tiny plastic)
• Pop-up fake corn (or small piece of foam)
• Method feeder
• Chumming catapult
• Bucket for mixing chum
• Rod pod
• Bite alarm
• Landing net
• Landing mat
• Pliers for hook removal
• Comfortable chair/cot

Just remember, it only really takes minimal gear and just a little bit of knowledge to catch one of the strongest fish in QC, so get out there and give it a try!

The 401 - Southern Ontario

So this summer Alexis and I decided to plan a lifelisting trip into southern Ontario to track down a few species we had yet to catch. As road trips in southern Ontario tend to go, we essentially planned a road trip down the 401. I didn't take many scenery photos (there isn't much to see), but here's some of the fish we caught!

The first stop was in Guelph where we met up with fellow lifelister Ken to try for some new darter species in a local river. The water was cold and clear, and micros were everywhere. We easily caught Rainbow and Blackbanded Darters, and then spent some time focusing on the more picky Greenside Darters. Eventually we caught all our target lifers :)

Blackbanded Darter

Greenside Darter

Rainbow Darter

Alexis also caught his lifer Fantail Darter, River Chub, and Mottled Sculpin. A productive spot, to say the least!

Next, we hit up a couple random spots and added two more new species, the Western Blacknose Dace and the Striped Shiner. Both were pretty quick to catch once we located them.

Western Blacknose Dace

Striped Shiner

We continued picking our way west as night fell, and settled into some night fishing near the spot we planned on fishing in the morning. There weren't really any lifers available for me, but Alexis managed his first Yellow Bullhead and a cool Stonecat!

The next morning, we made short work of getting ready for the day so we could start fishing as soon as possible. The first target of the day was the White Crappie, a neme-fish of mine. Alexis ended up catching two in short order, but I struggled to catch anything that wasn't a sunfish. I worked my way around the spot and finally, right before we had to leave, I caught my Crappie!

White Crappie

From there, we pretty much zipped as far west as we could without crossing borders, to fish for some rarer species out around Windsor. Quickly, we caught some non-lifer, but always beautiful Lepomids.

Green Sunfish

Northern Sunfish

Tiring with the sunfish bait-stealers, we changed focus to our real target: the Spotted Sucker. It didn't take long before we spotted 3-4 of them rooting around in the weeds. They seemed to zone in on a particular clump of weeds, before losing interest and moving on. Despite our best efforts, making an adequate presentation was difficult and they seemed completely uninterested in our baits. After following them around for a good while, Alexis finally had one up close and feeding! He presented a small redworm perfectly, and the fish took the bait! A very difficult and rewarding lifer for him.

After he released the fish, I noticed it was acting a lot less finicky than the other individuals. It was a bit cheesed, but I was able to present my bait to it quite easily and re-catch his same fish for my lifer!

Spotted Sucker

Both thrilled with our catches, we moved on to our next target in the area: the Orangespotted Sunfish. Unfortunately, this species, and most of our other targets for the day, were not to be. We spent the day bouncing between spots with muddy water an generally catching nothing of interest. In the evening, Alexis spent some more time targeting catfish and caught his lifer Black Bullhead.

We slept on the shores of Lake Erie and woke up early for our third and final day. We met up with another lifelister, Kevin, who is an Ontario fishing specialist. We only had one target: the Grass Pickerel! A species I had failed to catch many times before finally catching it's close cousin the Redfin Pickerel.

We hopped spots along a stream we knew was supposed to be full of the Pickerel, but saw little. Finally, at a particularly nice-looking spot, I hooked up on the Esox using a small panfish jig. Of course, the fish popped off on the bank and flopped back into the water before I could get my hands on it. However, we kept fishing the same stretch of water and eventually Alexis had some luck with a spinner and got his lifer. I continued with the jig and caught one shortly after as well!

Grass Pickerel

Kevin wasn't so lucky, and we soon had to leave to make it back to Montreal at a reasonable hour. We said our goodbyes and wished him best of luck. Turns out, he caught his later that very same day.

That pretty much sums up our short jaunt into southern Ontario, with only a quick stop in Gananoque left on the way home. We were looking for invasive Tubenose Gobies, but could only find tiny juveniles that we dipnetted. No hook & line lifer, yet!

Tubenose Goby

How to Find Wild Brook Trout

Nothing has people asking me for spots as much as posting photos of wild back-lake Brook Trout I search out every spring. Unfortunately, these are some of the only fish I won't share my spots for because I think finding them is half the fun. Having the spot given to you really ruins the adventure and the whole point of this fishing. So instead, here's the method I use for finding these fish, with an example from a random area in QC.

1. Choose the region you'd like to fish.

Basically, you need to start somewhere. I usually choose this based on preferred driving distance, some local knowledge, or most often, simply curiosity. Some good regions that are within a day's trip reach of Montreal include the Outaouais and Laurentians.

2. Find a more specific area.

This could be one of the harder steps, and local knowledge can go a long way to help stop you from "guessing and checking". In general, use satellite imagery such as Google or Bing Maps to find an area with lots of lakes away from main roads and highways. Avoid anywhere with national and provincial parks, ZEC's, etc. Try to find an area with plenty of crown land.

https://www.google.ca/maps

https://www.bing.com/maps/aerial

Generally, the further you get from the city, the better. That being said, I've caught some very respectable fish about an hour away from Montreal. The more you explore, the more ideas you'll get for areas to seek out!

This link takes you to QC's crown land map. It's a bit clunky but gets the job done once you get familiar with it.

https://appli-s.mern.gouv.qc.ca/Rde/Info/CarteInteractive

3. Pick out the "head lakes".

Use a topographical or altitude tool such as the one linked below to choose all the lakes at the highest altitude within your desired search area. The actual altitude value isn't as important as choosing the highest lakes around. These generally have colder water, fewer predators, and are more likely to hold native trout.

https://www.freemaptools.com/elevation-finder.htm

At this point, I'd recommending using Google MyMaps to start marking down all the lakes in question.

https://www.google.com/maps/d/

4. Try to identify deeper, smaller lakes.

Next, you'll want to identify all the lakes that appear deep enough to sustain a trout population. Use satellite imagery to look for lakes with solid dark colour in their centers, and steep drop-offs. It is sometimes helpful to check on both Google and Bing Maps to see which offers a better image resolution in your chosen area. Remove any lakes that appear too shallow, especially if you can see a large amount of weeds.

I also like to remove all the larger lakes, say anything more than a few kilometers across. These lakes can also have very good fishing, but generally take longer to figure out and are not in the scope of most of these trips.

5. Check the shore access, if applicable.

If you won't be portaging in any sort of watercraft, try to select the lakes that appear to have open shoreline, or boulders/cliffs to cast off of. A lake completely surrounded by dense tree makes the shore fishing much harder. Also check if there are any camps on the lake, which you would want to avoid. Delete the waypoints that don't correspond to good lakes.

6. Check for and formulate your access plan.

Find the nearest roads and plan your route for accessing the lake; Google Maps directions won't always be your best friend here! Choose the best-looking road that gets you closest to your lake, and keep an eye out for any smaller trails or creeks that could help you hike in the last bit.

You want to choose a lake that isn't so far into the bush that your life will be hell, but also isn't so accessible that it will be fished out. Assuming we're talking within a 3-hour radius of a big city, I wouldn't choose anywhere that has a road or ATV trail leading directly to the lake shore. a 300-1000m bushwhack seems to be the sweet spot for me.

7. Have a backup plan!

These lakes don't always work out! In fact, I find I have about a 50% success ratio on finding fish for every lake I explore using this method. Between unexpected private land, difficulty of access, wrong species, lakes being fished out, and just plain old tough fishing conditions... you can't expect to hit gold every time. Try to choose a couple lakes with different accesses to have as backup plan so your day isn't shot if your first choice doesn't work out. It's happened that I try for three different lakes in one day.

8. Final Check

Finally, make your plan of attack for the actual fishing, selecting the fishiest parts of the lakes. Don't forget to enjoy your adventures out in the woods, and hopefully you'll be rewarded with some beautiful, wild, native, backwoods fish!