Ice Fishing for Pike

Pike Fishing, Eskimo Style

Umea - Northern Sweden

The cold temperatures we had for a couple of weeks have been stopping us from going out fishing but at the same time building up the ice-coverage for one of the seasons most exciting fishing methods - ice fishing!

Rising Temperatures

Temperatures had been dropping to well under -10 degrees for some weeks. Then the weather report had promised higher temperatures for the weekend and rods and reels were checked, new line spooled on and wire traces were made.

Days are short up here in the winter, December and January delivering only dusk conditions in mid-day. Come February things are getting better rapidly though and provide daylight from about 7.30 to 15.30.

My cell phone began beeping at 5am and unlike on working days I jumped out of bed quickly and started heating some water for hot dogs and coffee.

After picking up a friend and cruising the empty roads we arrived at the parking place at about 6.30. A twenty minutes walk through the snow carrying chairs, bait, tackle and food saw us at the lake in what was still the darkness of the night.

Waiting for Dawn to Break

A full moon lit up the lake quite good but we still used head torches for baiting up. Then we sat in total silence waiting for dawn to break. The lake is my favourite for pike; no wonder since my personal record of 29lbs 3oz came from it an early May morning two years ago.

Christer, with his personal best summer pike from the lake

That time I caught the pike in open water when float fishing a lively roach. That pike was a lake record and it still was this mild morning. Actually the temperature was about the same as that time, +2 with a warm southern wind.

Now the lake is covered with about 20 centimetres of ice and the swans that alway welcomes us to the lake in the summer are probably somewhere far south where winter does not mean snow, ice and temperatures that mean you have to heat your drink when you want it ice-cold.

As dawn breaks more creatures show their presence. Some ravens cry in the sky and a sea-eagle shows its silhouette over the forest (a fisherman in summer he survives on hares and other small wildlife in winter).

Holes are Drilled

We started up as always drilling holes through the ice. Years ago we used a hand-drill for that but luckily we nowadays have a motor driven ice-auger for drilling the holes.

Drilling the holes with a motor driven ice-auger

Quite quickly we drilled holes to accommodate four rods each and some holes for our friends who were still lying in bed with a hangover. They could show up at 8am or at noon - who knows?

We usually use both live and deadbaits for this fishing, but this time we had a bucket with live roach and also live perch and dead herring. The bait is lowered through the ice and fished just under the ice or all the way down at the bottom. In this lake we usually fish right under the ice because it is quite shallow with a maximum depth of about 150 centimetres (about 5ft).

We use Baitrunners or multipliers for this fishing, and the rods are quite short, 3 or 4 feet, to be able to control the fish without standing too far away from the hole. The Baitrunner is engaged or, in the case of a multiplier, the spool is set to free-running. If this is forgotten you will probably end up with your rod and reel in the lake!

A Clever Indicator

We use a clever indicator with a line clip attached to a metal swinger that lets the baitfish swim a little but releases the line when a pike takes. Also attached is a small bell so a bite can be heard as well.

The rod is then placed so the line goes directly from the tip ring and into the water. It is important to check that the line goes totally free from the ice since it can easily freeze to the edge of the ice hole.

Rod in position and all set ready for run

When we are all set-up we find a central place to set up base camp. From there everybody can see and hear their indicators.

The first bite came almost directly.

Even though it gave a good boiling when it came to the hole, Jocke could feel that it was just a jack. It was landed, unhooked, weighed and released.

As always we took a photograph of the first pike of the day since it sometimes could be the only one.

Only a jack, but the first pike of the day

The day continued with jack action and jack landings.

The 'Hangover Guys' Turn Up

Our hard-partying friends showed up at about nine, looking anything but fit. The day went on with not much action except a couple more smaller pike with the biggest one just over 10 lbs.

One of the 'hangover guys', Andre, lost a couple of pike when the striking and we laughed at him as he ran for the third bite.

“Don't bother, you will just lose that one too!” We shouted at him.

I just found out that I had a video function on my digital camera and went after him to document his third loss of the day. How wrong I was and how cool it was that I filmed everything from when he set the hooks until we weighed the fish.

Actually, as we came to landing the fish I handed over the camera and I am the one landing this beast after Andre fought it skilfully. It was a very intense fight and you can see us all going from, “Bring the jack up now, we need to get back to basecamp,” to “Maaaan, it's massive!” in a couple of minutes.

OK, so I lost the lake record but I got to film this and enjoy hauling this massive pike up on the ice. Seeing a fish of this calibre is just awesome.

Dream fish, almost 30lb

The length was measured at 118 cm (about 3.87ft), exactly the length of my previous lake record.

For you to enjoy we also filmed the release of the pike and if you listen you can hear the roar of joy from Andre at the very end of the movie.

After the weekend, temperatures dropped again and it was -18 Celsius as I write and it seems it will hold on for a while. This means no pike fishing since you cannot handle it fast enough to prevent ice-burns at those temperatures. Smaller species can be handled faster and we will be doing some burbot fishing next but that is another story.

As soon as the weather gets warmer again we will be back for some pike action again!

Go to the FM Photo Gallery to see all the pictures of this great day's fishing in Sweden

All pictures by Christer Sjaunja