Best Way to Preserve Salmon (Hope: food, location, fish)

[User 2]

Originally Posted by Dusty Rhodes

Dang,... sometimes I think I am the only person on planet Earth to go to Alaska, get a guide, go fishing and not catch a single thing,

I can't say for sure what your experience consisted of, sometimes one just doesn't catch a fish. More often than not, I can fish as well as most anyone I've ever fished amongst, (not boasting, I've just been lucky enough to have many years of experience), but there are still those days, even if fish are being caught all around me, I may not have even one hit or one nibble, I may have nothing but a fit and a giggle. (whoa, I just realized I went all Seussian there for a minute, (I am now vigorously shaking my head, while simultaneously blowing out my breath through loosely flapping lips causing staccato blubbering noises in order to clear that kind of thing out so it doesn't continue, sorry)


Any way, no need to feel that you are the only one.

On another slant, I know of many in your boat, (it's a pun, not a punt).

If the new guides in my area are anything to judge things by, those whose experience matches yours is an increasing phenomena. The new guide's main interest is filling their boat with the maximum number of clients, run them up and down the river for a spell and then get them back out of the boat in order to pack in another full boatload in order to repeat the same for the rest of the afternoon. Double or triple the seats in your boat, double the number of trips in a day, and you are maximizing profits.

Most of these types infer some kind of guarantee you will catch fish.

There are still a few guides of the 'old fashioned' kind, whose over-riding concern is that each client receives the very best chance to have a quality experience, and the best opportunity to catch fish, but even they cannot guarantee fish.

For the most part, the modern guiding industry is just that, an industry, whose primary goal is to be modeled after a corporate plan to maximize the return of profits.

Like most other business today, expertise, the value of the product, service, or experience and high quality individual customer service are sacrificed to make way for efficiency and volume.

If you need a guide, choose your guide very carefully, it's been a wildy popular growth industry with little or no regulation. For every high quality trip you might hear about, I can easily double that with horror stories.

[JavaPhil]

Dusty, I went up to Clear Creek up by Talkeetna with the boys, who limited out in 3 hours, and I didn't get a nibble all day. I teased them with every known winning piece of bait and lure known to catch kings. I laid it across them, ran it in front of them, gigged and jerked and nothing. Zero. I watched a 4-year old girl catch 2 pretty Dollys on a plastic Zebco rod with a molded reel.

How humiliating. And I know those kings were laughing up there dorsals at this chump on the bank.

[Glitch]

The last rainbow I caught was underneath the Talkeetna railroad bridge and was 36" long, 12.5 pounds. I thought it was a Silver salmon at first, until saw the coloration on its sides. Caught it using roe with 6 pound test on a light rod and Penn spinning reel.

[Glitch]

Originally Posted by JavaPhil

Dusty, I went up to Clear Creek up by Talkeetna with the boys, who limited out in 3 hours, and I didn't get a nibble all day. I teased them with every known winning piece of bait and lure known to catch kings. I laid it across them, ran it in front of them, gigged and jerked and nothing. Zero. I watched a 4-year old girl catch 2 pretty Dollys on a plastic Zebco rod with a molded reel.

How humiliating. And I know those kings were laughing up there dorsals at this chump on the bank.

That reminds me of my two trips to Montana Creek this past June. The confluence of Montana Creek and the Susitna River opened for the first time Saturday morning at 00:00 AM. So I get there early Friday evening and find a nice spot where the Kings are jumping and rolling just 10 feet from the bank. For two hours I had to wait watching hundreds of Kings swimming past my feet, while other fisherman began showing up.

At precisely mid-night I, along with about 100 other fisherman cast our lines, and the Kings vanished! From mid-night until I left at 2:00 AM, only 4 fish were caught by 100+ fisherman, and one of those was a burbot.

No wonder fish swim in schools... so they can learn to tell time!

[Rance]

Here's a neat trick we used to do as kids fishing the Kenai River...back when snagging was legal. Yeah I'm that old!
First...locate, some rollers or jumpers. Now between 6 or 8 kids...somebody snag a fish and bring it in. Tie a 20 foot chunk of fishing line to the fishes tail...and tie a small stick to the other end. Let the fish go. It goes right back to the hole. Now you know exactly where they lay. They are just 20 foot ahead of that stick. Cast accordingly...wait...wait...jerk...fish on! Man it was good livin at 9 years old.

[dreamdriven78]

What about fishing in a lake which is about 1x2 miles wide? It's a smaller lake east of the lockwood lake in Matanuska-susitna borough. I have a property I bought on this lake and was wondering if I would be able to feed myself partially with the fish caught from this lake. What fish are found in the small Alaskan lakes like mine and can I fish year round?

[Rance]

I'm not to familiar with fishing up that way...but I'd guess there is dollies, maybe rainbows...and probably even some pike.

[Glitch]

Originally Posted by dreamdriven78

What about fishing in a lake which is about 1x2 miles wide? It's a smaller lake east of the lockwood lake in Matanuska-susitna borough. I have a property I bought on this lake and was wondering if I would be able to feed myself partially with the fish caught from this lake. What fish are found in the small Alaskan lakes like mine and can I fish year round?

There are no "pan fish" in Alaska (i.e., crappie, bluegill, sunfish, perch, etc.) the waters are too cold for them. Many Alaskan lakes contain no fish because they are too shallow. Those lakes that do contain fish may have landlocked silver salmon, dolly vardens, rainbow and/or lake trout. Some lakes in south central Alaska, including the Kenai Peninsula, have been illegally stocked with northern pike (which never get very large). Where you find pike, you will not find trout, and visa verca.

As to whether the unnamed lake in the Lockwood Subdivision contains fish or not, I couldn't say. I haven't fished lakes west of the Susitna River.

[User 2]

Originally Posted by dreamdriven78

What fish are found in the small Alaskan lakes like mine and can I fish year round?

Contact Alaska Department of Fish and Game. I would be very surprised if they have not included this lake in their surveys.

[Rance]

Might be something here:

Sport Fish Division - Alaska Department of Fish and Game

Or here:

Lake Stocking Data - Sport Fish Division - ADF&G