Afternoon at the Lake/Primitive Fish hook

Finally a nice sunny day! We've had generally grey, cloudy, drizzly weather here for the past couple of weeks with only the occasional sunny break, so I've dedicated most of my time to finding employment...on a side note, don't EVER finish a master's degree at the same time a recession hits!!! Given that it was such a gorgeous day, and being Saturday, there was no chance for me to work the phone or email, I decided to head up to Rice Lake to see how things were looking. I figured it would be a good way to escape the city for an afternoon and I also hoped that I might just catch a hatch coming off the lake given the warm temperatures and bright sunshine. I'm very eager to start collecting and identifying western aquatic insects and setting them out on a hatch timeline. Having an intimate familiarity with the phenology of aquatic insects makes actually catching fish while fly fishing INFINITELY easier!

As I made my way from the bus stop up to the lake I found I was quickly overheating. I had on three layers of wool, and given the warm spring sunshine it was just too much. I removed my jacket and sweater and walked the rest of the way with just a woolen base layer. It was fantastic! It really felt like spring! When I made it to the forest I could see patches of snow and the temperature dropped quite a bit under the canopy of giant fir and cedar trees. Still, given my brisk pace is wasn't altogether unpleasant.

When I got to the lake however any thoughts I had of rising swarms of mayflies or caddis quickly disappeared... it was entirely frozen, and people were ice fishing!!! Of course, being coastal BC people (and of the city kind at that!) they had NO IDEA how to ice fish, but I'm not going to get into that.


Unfortunately there were swarms of squawking city people, and gangs of gagling teenage girls around so the whole experience ended up being a fairly far cry from the peaceful enjoyment of nature I had envisioned.

They seem to think that nature is quite beautiful, and for that I commend them, but they are very obnoxious in their enjoyment. Apparently it's fairly rare for the lake to freeze over entirely, and perhaps that explains the rather foolish and even downright stupid behaviour I witnessed. Everyone it seems had to find the largest rock they could carry from the forest, and throw it onto the lake's frozen surface. Apparently simply seeing that the lake was frozen wasn't enough, and it's true state could only be ascertained via destructive testing methodologies (ie throw a heavy rock at it!). And while skepticism over the lake's solidified surface followed by testing to confirm the results of a visual inspection may be reasonable to some, it seems entirely UNREASONABLE (to me anyway) to stand on the ice and jump repeatedly up and down in one spot merely to conclude that yes...it's ice.

Doing my best to ignore the antics of the other people, I decided that it was just too nice out to head home right away and to do some wood carving. Given the location, and my thoughts already being on fishing, I figured why not carve a primitive fish hook? Now anyone familiar with Ray Mears will know what I am talking about. You take a stick and whittle away until you get sort of a check mark shaped thing. Then, using spruce roots or other cordage you can affix a sharp piece of bone to your hook to act a a barb. Problem is, every time I've ever seen Mr. Mears carve one of these, the hook ends up being HUGE!!!! Oh sure, it'll work for pike, but if you're fishing for trout finesse is the key. The hook must be very, very small indeed. No self respecting trout would ever find itself on one of Ray's carven hooks! Quite frankly, as a long time angler, his hawthorn fish hook seems much more convincing to me. Still, the idea looks fine in principle, and I wonder if it could be scaled down a bunch to work with trout.

First I found a suitable branch (fir of course, probably the most abundant tree around here) and set to work carving.

After about 1/2 hour of additional whittling...


I had something which I was fairly happy with.

It's still too big in my opinion, but I thought it better to leave a little extra on it and finish the carving once the wood has had a chance to dry out.

Now it seems clear to me that using a hook like this will require a significantly different technique from what I'm used to. Luckily, the technique I have in mind to test the effectiveness of the hook should complement my fly fishing nicely. During the early and late season, when surface water temperatures of the lake are below 18C trout can be readily caught on the fly in the upper layers of the water column. As the temperature rises in mid summer the upper layers, and especially the surface layer become too hot for trout (I've measured rice lake surface water at 24C) so they hunker down near the bottom of the lake where the water is nice and cool. So once July/august hits, and fishing switches over to cool, spring fed rivers, I'll test my hook at Rice lake when catching anything on a fly there is a stretch. My plan is to use a weight to make the hook sink to near the bottom. The hook will be attached to the weight with about a 18~24" length of line. Being wood, the hook should naturally want to float thus keeping it a few inches of the bottom, and well within the trout's feeding zone. Properly baited, and with a little patience and luck I'm hoping this thing will actually catch a fish!