I guess we just had our annual spring snowstorm. We get one just about every year without fail.
The weather here can be so tricky. Wow, it was so lovely and warm all last week, almost summer like, and then, a weekend blast of winter, sunny one day and a blinding blizzard the next. I went from hiking on bare woods trails one evening, to snowshoeing in deep powder the next.
And you know what, we still have plenty of time for another storm or two; maybe that wasn’t the last. You never know in this neck of the woods. I can recall plenty of snow in April, even May for that matter.
Only time will tell.
More from Paul Smith
No matter the weather springtime is a fantastic time to break out the fishing rod. My father loved April trout fishing. He’d be geared up and pond side as soon as the water opened up. I think it was his favourite time of the year. Of course nowadays trouting for native brook trout closes April 15 and doesn’t reopen until May 15.
Dad would be devastated. This is a regulation that I have always been against. I’ve written on it before so I’ll not pursue it again just now. Suffice to say I’m missing many fantastic days fishing with my grandkids. My childhood would have been very different.
At least I can go sea trout fishing — sea run browns that is. Designated waters stay open for the month that brook trout season is closed.
That’s good, but there’s so much extra pressure placed on our sea run brown populations. Folks just want to go springtime fishing and I fully understand this. But please be mindful of conservation. There’s no need to kill each and every trout you catch.
Keep a meal and release the rest.
That’s what I do. There’s no need to fill the freezer and besides, many of the sea trout we catch in spring aren’t good eating anyway. They have survived a lean winter and need the sustenance of the summer ocean to fatten them to prime condition.
Many readers have asked me for guidance on sea trout fishing.
When, where and how are all legitimate questions. If you are a beginner spring is the absolute best time because the trout are hungry and easy to catch. Or easier I should say, because browns are very wary and smart trout, never really easy to catch. They are always tougher to fool than brook trout, no matter how lean the winter has been. So to answer when, go fishing on a miserable rainy and windy cold day in April. I’m guessing we will get plenty of them. Snow also works. The trout might just be biting.
Dress warm. If it’s sunny and calm get the yard raked up.
Where is straightforward. Brown trout were introduced to Newfoundland and haven’t wandered far beyond the Avalon Peninsula. There are a few populations on the north side of Trinity Bay and others along the south side of the Burin Peninsula. Pipers Hole River is a fine spot. Brown trout are present to some degree in just about every river on the Avalon Peninsula. So watch for folks fishing and pay attention. It isn’t hard to figure out good areas. Anyway I’ll name a few rivers to give you somewhere to start.
Witless Bay is renowned for very big trout and there are plenty of rivers to wet a line in all along the Southern Shore. Conception Bay South is prime territory, Seal Cove, Avondale, Colliers, Topsail Beach and more. Out my way, there’s South River, North River, Shearstown, and Salmon Cove. On the Trinity Bay side you can fish New Harbour, Greens Harbour, Hopeall, Whiteway, and Hearts Delight. So there’s plenty of water to choose from.
It’s a blast. Or you could just stay in St. John’s and dangle a line in Rennie’s River.
Now we get to the interesting part, how to catch sea trout.
I’ll tell you up front and foremost that this can be a challenge, at least from a fly fishing fur-and-feather perspective.
There are essentially three ways to angle for any fish, those being, bait, hardware and fly. I’m a fly fisherman but I have dabbled with the other avenues on occasion throughout my life. It’s my guilty indulgence.
Bait fishing is simplest of all, the perfect way to introduce kids to the angling life. Most of us have floated a bobber with a worm under it so we know the drill. Maybe you have hand-line fished for cod with capelin or squid as bait. Anyway, the bobber and worm doesn’t work too well for sea run browns.
They just don’t like it. I’m not sure why, they are very intelligent for a fish, and maybe it just does look natural to them, or fails the smell test. Regular old garden worms don’t cut it by any account.
The best baits are sea lice or cut worms. Sea lice you can harvest from shoreline kelp and cut worms are greenish grubs found on farmland. They both work best by using a weight on the end of your line and a hook and bait suspended a yard or so back the line. You just stand there and wait for the tip of the rod to twitch. Or a bobber might work. There are absolutely no absolutes in fishing. So give it a try if you like and let me know what happens.
You might freeze your toes trying.
No matter the weather springtime is a fantastic time to break out the fishing rod.
Hardware angling is practiced with a casting or spinning rod but without the utilization of any live bait. In Florida there is a clear distinct border between bait fishers and hardware aficionados.
They don’t always like each other too much. They all love fly fishers. But there is no such line here in Newfoundland and Labrador. A top tier method for spring brook trout is to bait a Lucky Strike spinner. So that’s hardware and bait together. Some folks, and me in my younger days, prefer a baited spinner with a fly attacked a meter or so up the line.
Now that covers it all at once. Me and my Dad caught a lot of trout like that. But it will not work for sea trout.
When I was a kid, Dad and I fished for sea trout with Rapala minnow lures. The best ones were floating plugs that would dive when retrieved on a spinning rod. I still have a tackle box full of them from the ’70s. We did pretty good with that in springtime. I’m a fly angler so I don’t bother with it and I don’t see many fishers using those style of baitfish plugs. You can buy them anywhere and I think they will still work. Folks do use them trolling in the ocean bays, so I’m told. If you give it a try let me know.
The most popular hardware device in this neck of the woods is “The Nail”. Essential it’s a 3-1/2 inch wire nail with the head cut off and then flattened on both ends with a hammer and anvil. Then you need to drill a tiny hole in each flattened end. On one end attach a hook via a split ring. On the other connect your line through a swivel. Paint “The Nail“ red and you are ready for action. This really does work.
Finally, what about fly fishing? It’s complicated, worthy of a full column. In my first year I hardly caught a bloody sea trout. And I had already caught many salmon and brook trout. The learning curve was so steep yet rewarding.
Stay tuned.
Paul Smith, a native of Spaniard’s Bay, fishes and wanders the outdoors at every opportunity.
Credit: Source link
