Pike TR: Edmund Lodge

Hi. I’ve been popping in and out of the ng for the last 10 years, or so,
and this is my first attempt at a trip report. So a little background
first. Over the 15 years that I’ve been fly fishing (started too late
while in my early 50s), I’ve gone on about 25 fly fishing trips. As I
don’t tolerate the cold (I hate it, it causes my fingers to go
numb—slight Reynauds Syndrome), my trips have been to warm, southern
climes in search of sight casting to inshore species and for “action”
top water fishing (a la peacock bass) in the Amazon and Venezuela.
However, as I love top water pickerel fly fishing here in NJ, and
figured that northern pike would be outrageous, I decided to bite the
bullet and go to northeast Manitoba (Edmund Lodge-less than an hour’s
float plane ride east of Gods Lake) just after ice out to fish for these
great predators.

At Edmund ice out is usually during the middle of May; however, as my
luck would have it, this year ice out was 5 days before my arrival
(fished 6/5-11). And, furthermore, the first three days of fishing
mornings started at 30-32F and ended at 40-50F. Talk about not
tolerating the cold, the way I was dressed, glacier gloves and all, I
could hardly move, let alone feel the rod or the line. All the other
guys at the lodge were conventional fishermen, so they had no sympathy
for me. Nonetheless, there were fish to be had and that got the
adrenalin flowing enough to keep me in the game. OK, here we go…

First three days were cold and overcast, with occasional snow flurries
and cold rain/drizzle. And, two of those days had winds (with gusting)
in the 10-20 mph. Fishing was from 8am to 5pm, with shore lunches (if
wanted), and the opportunity to go out with your guide from 7pm to 9pm
for another $20 to the guide. Needless-to-say, I didn’t go out, but
others did and they caught fish.

When the fishing is good, I quickly lose count of the numbers caught, or
I simply just give a lying guestimate. Furthermore, no one really keeps
count of fish under 30”. Most attention is paid to fish in the high 30s
and in particular, to fish 41” and over (all considered as trophy fish).

As I only had experience with the pike’s smaller cousin, pickerel, I was
expecting to be able to do a fair amount of sight casting and to also
have spectacular top water action. Well, the waters were certainly clear
enough, but given the continued cold weather after ice out, the fish
were hanging deeper than normal for this time of year. That is, it
wasn’t until the third to fourth day that things warmed up a bit, so the
fish took their own sweet time in getting into the shallows. Also, even
when they were in the shallows, due to the wind, sighting them at any
distance—more than 15-20’, was difficult. I caught a lot of fish by
sight, but it was only at short distances. A disappointment, but I did
catch several big fish and a trophy by “short” sight.

Given the cold and wind, I was reluctant to top water fish as the fish
were taking small flies slightly below the surface. For whatever reason,
I only fish floating lines and don’t take any conventional tackle with
me on my trips; so I first had the guide cast some top water baits to
see if there was any action. At times, he would catch them on a very
slowly moved/twitched zara spook, but my Dahlbergs and poppers didn’t do
the trick. So, for most of the trip I and my trusty 4-piece, 9 wt Sage
RPLX (Cortland WF9F Pike line) stuck with small streamers (3.5 to 4”
red/black and orange/black tarpon bunnies, and red/white and
black/orange kinky hair flies). Actually, I didn’t make any new flies
for the trip, but brought 3-4 pounds of peacock bass flies and poppers
along with the bunnies. As the guides said that at this time of year
small flies were best, I simply cut down the peacock bass flies and top
waters from 8” to 4”. The guides were right and I’m glad they were as it
certainly made my 1000+ casts/day a lot easier on my arm, shoulder and
wrist.

Although I gave a general description of the flies/poppers used, I
really think that color doesn’t matter all that much. I’d catch fish on
something red and white and it would make no difference in catching rate
when I would switch to an orange and black during the same period of
time. Poppers and Dahlberg’s did work one morning when it was calm and
the fish were feeding in the shallows with emerging weeds (cabbage, s
they call it). Although nothing big was caught, there was plenty of
action. In my passion for top water, I’ll take one on top over every 10
subsurface…stupid me, eh?

The last three days of the trip, the weather did warm appeciationably:
40s on awakening and 60-70s during the day. But the wind was up—white
caps on the open parts of the lake and good ripples everywhere else.
Didn’t have to fish in the white caps as there were plenty of good
sheltered spots. So even with the better weather, I can’t really say
that the fishing got all that better. Actually, as a beginner, I’d have
to say that for me, it was pretty good all around and I was a quite a
happy camper. Why? Although I can’t give exact numbers, I caught enough
fish every day to feel that there was plenty of action and that if the
weather had been as expected, I would have truly died and gone to pike
heaven. I did manage to catch about 15, or so in the 30”-40” range and
three trophies (any pike 41” and over), with one sighted: 42”, 43”, and
46.5” (19” girth). The latter fish was the largest caught so far this
year, and the three were out of a total of 22 trophies caught during my
week. Not to brag as this was a “blind cast fish” and merely a matter of
luck, but to give you an idea how to rate the quality of fish, Manitoba
(and I think all the Provinces) award Master Angler certificates for
trophy fish. For 2002, 3380 trophy pike were caught, ranging from
41-55”. Fish 45” and over were in the top 10-11%, whereas 46.5” and
above were among the top 2% of trophies caught…and released. By the way,
Edmund Lodge had a banner year last year with somewhat more than 400
trophies registered. Interestingly, although the weather was normal for
that year, they really have no idea why they caught more trophies than
any other lodge.

Lastly, the food and accommodations were good and nothing was lacking.
The guides were friendly and helpful, and they really seemed to help
each other without any signs of negative bragging competition. IMHO,
this is a world class pike fishery and I’d have no trouble going
back…first making offerings to the gods that this time the weather would
be more moderate.

Adam

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Adam wrote:
Hi. I’ve been popping in and out of the ng for the last 10 years, or
so,
and this is my first attempt at a trip report.

.... and a good one at that, thanks ...

Your numbers for trophy pike caught at the resort, and certificates are
interesting. Where did you find those numbers?

The resort I go to on Great Slave Lake hasn't been recording trophys,
or setting up clients for the certificates, so their numbers aren't
included in your Canadian numbers.

Thanks,

Chas
remove fly fish to reply
http://home.comcast.net/~chas.wade/w...ome.html-.html
San Juan Pictures at:
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Chas Wade wrote:

Adam wrote:


Hi. I’ve been popping in and out of the ng for the last 10 years, or
so,
and this is my first attempt at a trip report.



... and a good one at that, thanks ...

Your numbers for trophy pike caught at the resort, and certificates are
interesting. Where did you find those numbers?

The resort I go to on Great Slave Lake hasn't been recording trophys,
or setting up clients for the certificates, so their numbers aren't
included in your Canadian numbers.

Thanks,

Chas
remove fly fish to reply
http://home.comcast.net/~chas.wade/w...ome.html-.html
San Juan Pictures at:
http://home.comcast.net/~chasepike/wsb/index.html




Hi Chas. The statistics come from an annual magazine that is published
by the Manitoba gov't. It contains a listing of all trophy game fish (by
species, size in inches, name of angler, date, where caught, and if it
was released) that have been caught in Manitoba for that given year
(2002). I didn't see the magazine for 2003, but Edmund's net site
accurately states the number of trophies caught last year.
Adam

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