Bow River Blog – Page 60 – Is Your Fishing Resource For Spin Fishing The Bow River

Apr 03

Floating The Bow River

By Mike Robertson in General Info

The First Float In The New Saturn Boat

If you are like me you are impatient. My new boat arrived from Idaho about two weeks ago and I have been staring at it ever since, or it has been staring at me I’m not sure which. I opened it from the box and removed the contents. I then organized the contents which included five paddles, the patch kit, two hand pumps, two replacement valves, and the valve replacement tool. I unpacked the boat and wrapped it into the boat bag that was included in the purchase. All was great and then the weekend arrived. Like a typical fisherman, I could not wait until spring to launch the boat. So I made a phone call to Andrew and we made plans to launch the boat early Saturday morning. Friday I went out to Wholesale Sports and purchased a battery powered pump which would take care of the back breaking manual pumping for us. All my gear was ready to go Friday night and then I went to sleep.

I woke up early on Saturday morning and packed the gear into the car, then the boat was to come out of my basement, this baby weighs 150 pounds and I was not feeling very strong at eight AM. I felt like a body builder trying to lift a heavy box spring mattress. This boat is awkward and bulky. I finally heaved the boat onto the last stair and paused for some deep breaths of air and I was not even half way to the car yet. I managed to get it to the car and into the trunk with the back seats folded down; after all it’s 14.6 feet long. Then I made the long drive to the river. Is it just me or when you’re in a hurry to get fishing you seem to hit every bad driver on the road and every red light along the way. Must be just my luck? I met up with Andrew and we dropped his truck of at MacKinnon Flats.

Andrew and I arrived at Policeman’s Flats an hour later and unpacked the boat and all the gear. We removed the boat from its bag and my eyes then opened wide. “This thing is huge” I stated to Andrew. This Mickey Mouse electric pump is never going to fill this monster. We managed to get most of the inflatable raft pumped up with the electric pump and then she ran out of juice. I made Andrew do most of the work as he stated to me he needed the exercise. After an hour of pumping we finally got enough air in the boat to start or trip.

Once we had her in the water the first session of rowing began. We needed to get to the other side of the river in a real hurry; the water levels are low at this point in the season. We paddled our buts off and made it to a safe deep section of river. Then the rods came out and the lures hit the water. I never expected to catch a whole bunch of trout as it’s not the right time of year. We floated for five hours and managed to yard out seven trout between the both of us. Not so bad all things considered. I was glad to finally get the boat that was staring me in the face for weeks, in the water. The Saturn inflatable performed like a dream and I was completely satisfied with my purchase. I look forward to adding the fishing frame to the boat and making it even more comfortable for this fishing season. Soon the river will be experiencing the spring run off, but after the water clears up, I will be out floating the river and looking for those large Bow River trout’s.

Get your boaters operating card here.

http://www.boaterexam.com/ Canada boat operator card.

Mar 23

Getting Ready For Spring

By Mike Robertson in General Info

Spring Has Sprung, So lets Get Fishing.

One more day or so and it will officially be spring. I have stocked up on all my favourite tackle for this coming fishing season. I can’t begin to tell you how much money I have spent over the winter months, but I know I have what I need to get the job done this season. There are many new and exciting new lures out this year, and as always I gather the ones I feel will work the best when I fish. Now I just need to go and try them out. Speaking of trying things out, my new boat has arrived from Idaho and I cannot wait to blow it up and spend the day floating the bow river. It’s a Saturn inflatable raft and its 14.6 feet in length. I am now going to buy an aluminium rack for the boat and my clients will be sitting in swivelling bucket seats. I look forward to seeing you out this year on a guided fishing trip with me. Out with the old boat and in with the new one!

Speaking of old stuff, I have noticed that some of the tackle and fishing rods I use have been discontinued. That is one thing that really gets me heated up. I use a particular product and I love the product. Then the next year they decide that they are going to take it off the market forever. I get frustrated with tackle companies that make lures or rods and reels. They keep on removing the good stuff to make room for the new and improved lures, rods or reels. Now when I find something I really like, I buy at least two of them so when they do stop making it, I know I have at least one back up. Here is what I have two or more of. Berkley Precision Tech spinning rods, Berkley Series One spinning rods, all sorts of discontinued Rapala lures. Berkley crank baits that have been discontinued and the list could go on and on. I was just in Wholesale sports looking for another Berkley Precision Tech rod last weekend and could not find what I was looking for. Seems to me I made a good call when I bought two of them instead of just the one. I am getting smarter with old age.

One more thing I would like to mention is this coming fishing season is looking like a good one. I know I say that every year but I can’t help it. With the new boat and new fishing gear, I hope to see many of my past clients out again fishing with me this year. I have booked three guided trips for this coming season and hope to do many more. Guided fishing trips make great presents for dads, uncles or brothers and sisters who love to fish. Please do them a favour and buy them a guided fishing trip this year. I’m sure they would love you for it not to mention the fact that they will have a blast and catch tons of fish. So with that I hope to see many new faces this year and many of you who I have already served in the past. Let’s get on the river and into some monster trout!

Feb 21

In Search Of Bow River Trout

By Mike Robertson in Winter Fishing the Bow River

A Foggy Winters Day.

It was a cold and fogy Saturday morning. Boredom was creeping in like the cold air from an open window. There was nothing to watch on television and my fishing tackle was staring me right in the face. The thought crossed my mind that a trout would be nice today, just as I stopped staring at my newly acquired tackle the phone rang. It was almost like the fish gods were telling me something, a great sign from above. Andrew’s on the phone and the first words of his tongue are “so are we going out fishing today Mike”. Hearing those words to me is like giving candy to a baby, I just can’t refuse. So we make the plan and we meet at the watering hole for coffee.

Andrew begins loading his gear into my vehicle and immediately we start talking about who is going to catch the monster today. Were off and then vehicle rumbles to an abrupt stop and we pile out near the river. The fog is thick by the river and the wind is nippy. On go the layers of clothing, two pairs of socks, heavy winter jackets and toques on the head. We both tied up or hooks in the parking area to save time by the river side; after all we need to maximize the number of casts we make; its -8 degrees below zero not including the wind chill. Surprisingly there are quite a few guys out fishing even though it is cold and windy. We walk and fish at the same time as we move up the river in search of hungry large trout. The cold air is starting to get to my hands and upper body, doubt then fills my brain. I felt like it might be just too cold for the fish to feed.

Many casts are chucked outward and finally the rush of a fish is mine. My heart pumps rapidly, warming me and my hands up quickly. I get the fish to turn around as he is running down river to get free of my hook. He turns and heads back up river tugging hard the complete distance before the shoreline. I see it is a rainbow and gently remove her from the water. As fast as the she came to shore she was gone out into the river again after I released her back in the ice cold blue.

Andrew and I decided that we would head back downriver towards the vehicle and see if we could catch a few more trout along the way. We arrived at the van and cranked the heater up to warm our freezing hands. We stayed in the van ten minutes and decided we would cross the river and fish the other side. Like true die hard’s, we parked the van and continued to seek out more trout. We walked back upriver again this time with warm hands, eager to catch the big one. We arrived at a bend in the river, usually a great spot to catch fish. I was working my lure through a deep seam and happened to look to my left as I was following my lure downriver. My eyes caught Andrew’s rod bent over and loaded with a big fish. I knew he was into a big trout so I dropped my fishing rod and quickly walked over to him to snap a few photos. The battle was on and then we both saw the fish breach the water. WOW what a massive specimen!

I don’t think Andrew knew just how big this fish was until he was right beside him on the shoreline. We both knelt down to bring this fish up past the ice that lines the bank. I snapped three pictures of his fish and then he released the trout back into the Bow River. The weather was just too cold to continue on fishing so we wrapped up and headed home for the day. Soon we will return to the Bow River to battle those monster trout’s on a warmer day. Until then we will have to deal with the boredom and sharpen those hooks for the next adventure.

Feb 01

The Fish Memory Theory

By Mike Robertson in Fishy News

Do Fish Have Memories?

If they do, just how good are they?

According to some scientists, memories in fish are better than we may have believed. Forget what you know or have heard, Fish have a memory that lasts much more than three seconds and are capable of deception and learning, say’s Dr Kevin Warbuton from New South Wales. He has been studying fish for more than three decades and says they’re much better at memory than we give them credit for. He states the idea that fish have a short memory is wrong. “It’s absolute rubbish”. “There’s been a lot of work done over the last 15 years on learning and memory in fish, and it has been found that fish are quite sophisticated. Fish can remember prey types for months; they can learn to avoid predators after being attacked once and they retain this memory for several months.”

Warbuton believes fish are capable of learning, albeit at a cost. For example, his research on the silver perch revealed something unexpected. “With one type of prey, the fish got more and more efficient at catching their food,” he says. “But when we put two different types of prey in together, their overall efficiency dropped. We think it was because they suffered from divided attention. It’s a cost of learning.”

Dr Ashley Ward, a fish biologist at the University of Sydney says where the three-second memory urban myth came from is hard to find. “It seems to come from an advert many years ago, but nobody is sure what it was for,” he says.
Ward believes the misconceptions surrounding the intelligence of fish may stem from the early days of zoology. “Back then [zoologists] tested their abilities based on what a human could do … so obviously the fish would fail.” Ward says we now know of numerous of examples of fish displaying amazing memory skills.

He refers to one anecdote from the United States, where a Professor Charles Eriksen spent several months feeding a pond of fish while calling out “fish-fish”. After a break of five years, Eriksen returned to the pond and called out “fish-fish”. Immediately a number of the surviving fish swam to the surface waiting to be fed.

I wish I could call out fish-fish and the trout would end up on the end of my line. Nahhh, that would take the fun out of it for us. In all seriousness though what does this information mean to me. Well first off if a fish has that good of memory, then how often I change lures needs to be reconsidered. The colours I use most often needs to thought about. Perhaps I need to paint my lures customs colours, that way the fish will not remember me when I cast my lures to them. I know some of them laugh at me when I use the same thing over and over again. Now that I know a little more my decision making will change. Hopefully these facts will help you make better decisions while out on the water casting to your favourite species of fish.

Foolin’ em on April Fools day

The First Trip on the Bow River, 2025

The Late February Thaw

Merry Christmas And Happy New Year 2025

Bow River Winter Fishing Tips

Floating The Bow River

Getting Ready For Spring

In Search Of Bow River Trout

The Fish Memory Theory

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