First pickerel on the fly (walleye for youse 'mericuns)

From: rw

Pickerel are a southern fish. They don't range into Canada. Therefore,
the Canuckistanis have no name for them.

I'm pretty sure someone's going to call me on this.) :-)

Consider youself called. According to A.J. McClane's Fishermen's Encyclopedia,
the Chain Pickerel is found from Eastern Canada through the Lake Ontario
drainage sothward, east of the Appalachians to Florida, and also in the
Mississipi Valley, as far south as Texas.

IIRC, in Canuckistan they are sometimes called "jacks".


George Adams

"All good fishermen stay young until they die, for fishing is the only dream of
youth that doth not grow stale with age."
---- J.W Muller

rw wrote in message om...
JR wrote:

Yes, all that's clear. The question was, if Canadians call walleye
pickerel, what do they call pickerel?

Pickerel are a southern fish. They don't range into Canada. Therefore,
the Canuckistanis have no name for them.

(I'm pretty sure someone's going to call me on this.) :-)

Close, Esox niger (chain pickerel) and Esox americanus vermiculatus
(grass pickerel) barely make Canada with their northern ranges. Of
course, we call them chain pike and grass pike -- what else?

Peter

rw wrote in message om...
JR wrote:

Yes, all that's clear. The question was, if Canadians call walleye
pickerel, what do they call pickerel?

Pickerel are a southern fish. They don't range into Canada. Therefore,
the Canuckistanis have no name for them.

(I'm pretty sure someone's going to call me on this.) :-)

Close, Esox niger (chain pickerel) and Esox americanus vermiculatus
(grass pickerel) barely make Canada with their northern ranges. Of
course, we call them chain pike and grass pike -- what else?

Peter

(Joel Axelrad) wrote in message ...
Only the nutty Canadians call Walleye -
Pickerel.
A Walleye is a giant member of the perch family.
A Pickerel is a mini member of the Pike family.

Joel Axelrad
**DFD**


But why do nutty 'mericuns call what are obviously pike, "pickerel"?
And before you go down that road, the useage of "pike" is very old.

Peter Charles wrote:

Well it was a long time coming . . .
After a minute or so, up it
comes and the unmistakeable head of a pickerel surfaces, about 20" and
around 2.5 pounds. Reach down and slip the hook with the forceps and
off he swims.

Felt like a kid with his first bluegill . . . .


That was a GREAT eating fish you released. Walleyes are usually a pretty
tough target for fly fishermen.

Willi

JR wrote in message ...
Joel Axelrad wrote:

Only the nutty Canadians call Walleye -
Pickerel.
A Walleye is a giant member of the perch family.
A Pickerel is a mini member of the Pike family.

Yes, all that's clear. The question was, if Canadians call walleye
pickerel, what do they call pickerel?

JR

And before I get jumped on, the etymology of pickerel is "little
pike".

Some Canadian fishing writers have made it clear that our usage of
pickerel is incorrect, but still, it is part of our fishing history.
We have numerous place names with "Pickerel" in them, in reference to
Stizostedion vitreum, not Esox variants. "Walleyed pike" was probably
the original term, with walleyed meaning bulging eyes, so "walleye"
also stems from an incorrect identification. You took the front half
of "walleyed pike" and we took the back half of the name. Who's
correct? The French-Canadian term of "doré" at least has no
misinformation in it. More and more Canadian fishing TV personalities
and writers are adopting "walleye" along with calling everything on
the end of one's line, a "bait". The usage of pickerel as meaning
walleye, has largely disappeared in Southern Ontario but here in
Northern Ontario, only the visiting Yankees call it a walleye.

And since I'm still in Northern Ontario at this moment . . . . it's a
PICKEREL!!! ))

JR wrote in message ...
Joel Axelrad wrote:

Only the nutty Canadians call Walleye -
Pickerel.
A Walleye is a giant member of the perch family.
A Pickerel is a mini member of the Pike family.

Yes, all that's clear. The question was, if Canadians call walleye
pickerel, what do they call pickerel?

JR

And before I get jumped on, the etymology of pickerel is "little
pike".

Some Canadian fishing writers have made it clear that our usage of
pickerel is incorrect, but still, it is part of our fishing history.
We have numerous place names with "Pickerel" in them, in reference to
Stizostedion vitreum, not Esox variants. "Walleyed pike" was probably
the original term, with walleyed meaning bulging eyes, so "walleye"
also stems from an incorrect identification. You took the front half
of "walleyed pike" and we took the back half of the name. Who's
correct? The French-Canadian term of "doré" at least has no
misinformation in it. More and more Canadian fishing TV personalities
and writers are adopting "walleye" along with calling everything on
the end of one's line, a "bait". The usage of pickerel as meaning
walleye, has largely disappeared in Southern Ontario but here in
Northern Ontario, only the visiting Yankees call it a walleye.

And since I'm still in Northern Ontario at this moment . . . . it's a
PICKEREL!!! ))

JR wrote in message ...
Joel Axelrad wrote:

Only the nutty Canadians call Walleye -
Pickerel.
A Walleye is a giant member of the perch family.
A Pickerel is a mini member of the Pike family.

Yes, all that's clear. The question was, if Canadians call walleye
pickerel, what do they call pickerel?

JR

And before I get jumped on, the etymology of pickerel is "little
pike".

Some Canadian fishing writers have made it clear that our usage of
pickerel is incorrect, but still, it is part of our fishing history.
We have numerous place names with "Pickerel" in them, in reference to
Stizostedion vitreum, not Esox variants. "Walleyed pike" was probably
the original term, with walleyed meaning bulging eyes, so "walleye"
also stems from an incorrect identification. You took the front half
of "walleyed pike" and we took the back half of the name. Who's
correct? The French-Canadian term of "doré" at least has no
misinformation in it. More and more Canadian fishing TV personalities
and writers are adopting "walleye" along with calling everything on
the end of one's line, a "bait". The usage of pickerel as meaning
walleye, has largely disappeared in Southern Ontario but here in
Northern Ontario, only the visiting Yankees call it a walleye.

And since I'm still in Northern Ontario at this moment . . . . it's a
PICKEREL!!! ))

George wrote:Consider youself called. According to A.J. McClane's Fishermen's
Encyclopedia,
the Chain Pickerel is found from Eastern Canada through the Lake Ontario
drainage sothward, east of the Appalachians to Florida, and also in the
Mississipi Valley, as far south as Texas.

IIRC, in Canuckistan they are sometimes called "jacks".


George Adams

Where I grew up in East Texas they were called jackfish.

Big Dale

Willi & Sue wrote in message ...
Peter Charles wrote:

Well it was a long time coming . . .
After a minute or so, up it
comes and the unmistakeable head of a pickerel surfaces, about 20" and
around 2.5 pounds. Reach down and slip the hook with the forceps and
off he swims.

Felt like a kid with his first bluegill . . . .


That was a GREAT eating fish you released. Walleyes are usually a pretty
tough target for fly fishermen.

Willi



Tell me about it, as I released the fish, all I could think of was,
"There goes lunch." If I had had a frypan and the fixin's with me,
that boy would've been fried.

BTW, I'm getting a sneaky hunch that PNW winter steelheading
techniques may be the ticket for these fish -- with the addition of
pulsing the swing to impart a rise and fall to the fly. Next time I
go back, it'll be with the Loop and a set of shooting heads.