May 16, 2007 - Pumphouse Lake “Gong Show” - Yukon Fishing Report

Despite the colder weather, reports have been coming regularly on the fishing in our local Whitehorse lakes. I was able to sneak away last Saturday night for my first official Yukon fish this spring. It was a brisk night and I got on the lake around 9 p.m. There was still enough light to comfortably rig everything up and get on. I pulled out my trusty four weight with a floating line and a sink tip and planned to troll and cast with bead head patterns. I was amazed at how everything was coming together and the ease to which I was able to get on the water. I quickly threw on some tippet which usually takes me a while, strung up my rod, threw on my flippers, stepped into my belly-boat and was off. Last year just before I hit the water for the first time I stepped on and broke my net. This year I only forgot my net.

A nice little Pumphouse Rainbow. The reel in my lap and rod in my hand made it an interesting night.

I started kicking towards the second set of power lines and felt a weight drop off my rod. I lost the bloody the butt of my rod and the reel fell out. With no butt, there was no seat for the reel. I was half thinking I would head home for the night, but I decided to fish with my rod in hand and reel in my lap. Dealing with this adversity I came up with a trolling technique style that would still allow me to sense a fish take. Kicking up and around the lake, I had a fish on within 15 minutes. Due to the floating line with the sink tip I needed to have enough line for the fly to sink. This was a problem without a reel on my rod. I had to strip my line into my lap without being able to manage it on my reel. It resulted in a complete mess of line all around me but a fish still on my line. I brought the little 16 inch rainbow to the boat but had to deal with this obscene and unmanageable amount of line. After untangling my line for the next 10 minutes, I was able to fish again. The action was great and the fish were acrobatic. It may have been because I could not have any slack in the line (without the ^%&^@# reel!) but these fish were jumping like crazy.

All in all a gong show but a great night out.

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