Joined: Apr 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 241 Location: Singapore
Alaska’s Midnight Sun, Part 3A : Kenai Rainbows « Thread Started on Jun 30, 2005, 4:02pm »
There are not many locations in the world where a fly fisher can consistently hook up with 20inch or bigger wild Rainbow Trout. The Upper Kenai is one of those rare rivers where a fly rodder stands a good chance with these big Rainbows. Typically, a 16 inch fish is a good size trout on most trout waters while a 20inch trout is considered a trophy. On the Kenai, a 20inch trout is just slightly above average and trophy size begins at 30inch! A 20inch trout usually weighs in at about 5-6lb while a 26-27 inch Rainbow would most likely exceed the magical 10lb mark. A 30inch Rainbow may weight in above 20lb. The biggest Rainbow caught on the Kenai weighs in at a staggering 28lb! All Kenai Rainbows are native fish that was spawned and bred in the wild with no intervention from the Alaskan Fishery Department. The Fishery Department’s sentiment is that “if it ain’t broken, don’t fix it!”
But Rainbow fishing on the Kenai is not without its challenges. Firstly, the Upper Kenai is designated as a wildlife refuge and boat motoring is not allowed until you float into Skilak Lake. Hence, access is only possible with McKenzie style drift boats with some hard rowing in between to get to likely fishing sports. The river behaves differently everyday depending on snow melt and the Glacier so one needs a good guide that can read the current to find the trout. A typical fishing day starts at dawn between 4:30 to 5:00 am so that we get to drift the productive areas in the morning period.
Most importantly, successful catch of big Rainbows depends on matching the hatch….. and Kenai Rainbow are least interested in insect hatches but gets very excited over the annual “Salmon egg” hatch. One main reason that Rainbows thrives on the Kenai is because of the tremendous amount of protein that the annual Salmon run brings to the river. Rainbows gorge on the trillions of Salmon eggs and hundreds of tons of post spawned Salmon carcasses between Jun to Sep to fatten up for the lean winter. Although there are phenomenal Caddis and Green Stone Fly hatches on the Kenai, I guess if I were a Rainbow, I would choose to eat fresh Salmon eggs and flesh over a bug too! So the challenge is to conceive the perfect egg and flesh fly pattern. It may sound simple but its actually quite complex, because you fly must stand out from the trillions of eggs and tons of flesh that are floating in the river and yet still look like one of them! Otherwise, the catch rate will be mediocre at best. Our guide uses an ingenious pattern that was just irresistible to the big Rainbow. As expected, all their clients are sworn to secrecy to protect the trick of their trade.
But trout being trout, a drag free drift is imperative to get them to bite. Any hint of an unnatural movement in the fly will spook them half way to Russia. The fast and deep water of the Kenai makes this somewhat of a challenge. Primary technique is “High-Stick Nymphing” with a strike indicator and one or two very small split shots to get the fly down to the right depth. The strike indicator is attached on the butt leader about 8 inches from the fly line tip. Leader length varies between 9 to 12 feet depending on water depth. High-Sticking essentially requires you to cast your fly upstream, split shots and strike indicator included, from your location. As the indicator drifts down stream towards you, strip in excess line and lift the rod tip high so that the floating fly line does not drag the indicator and the suspending fly below it. As the indicator drift pass your location, the rod tip is pointed skyward such that only a very shot length of fly line remains on the water. A gentle upstream mending is then executed to feed fly line behind the indicator for a perfectly natural drift. You can then gently lower the rod tip to feed more line into the drift and perform mini upstream mending until you need to cast again. A proficient caster can manage 60-70ft with the weight fly, split shots & indicator in tow. Average caster usually manages about 30-40ft. But consider the fact that you can fish both sides of the drift while high-sticking, a 50ft cast actually allow you to have a drift of just under 100ft, so even a 30ft cast will catch you some fish.
While high-sticking for trout, you need to watch the indicator like a hawk. If it so much as hesitate by a frog’s hair or dip a tad on the drift, hit hard! Trout will mouth the fly and spit it out in a split second when they discover that it taste nothing like Salmon Egg Sashimi. One probably has only a fraction of a second to set the hook before they change their mind. Very often, the take may be so gentle that the indicator hardly serves it purpose. So if your instinct tells you to strike, hit hard!
Recommended tackle for high-sticking on the Kenai is a 7wt fast action rod to handle the split shots and weighted fly, not to mention big fish in fast water. Don’t play around with 5x tippet because 10lb trout collects them to weave winter jacket for their boyfriends! 0x floro-carbon is the norm with 1x being the lightest recommended by the guides. It makes sense when you think about it because a big Kenai Rainbow is actually bigger than the Salmon! I choose a Winston LT 6wt as my primary “Business” trout rod and back it up with AJ Thramer Hollow Built Bamboo rod based on a Jim Payne 201 taper.
The most productive part of the Upper Kenai for big rainbows, and also the most challenging part is a stretch of waters know as the Kenai Canyon. Our guides affectionately call it “The Wall”. This river in the Canyon stretch essentially got squeeze through 2 vertical canyon cliffs, forming a class 2-3 rapid white waters. There are pockets of slower waters within the rapids that monster trout loves to hang out!
Fishing the canyon can be sheer hard work. The guide must keep the boat in position in the rapids with only the oars, and casting on the bucking drift boat and getting a good drift in the rapids is a real challenge of will and skill. But I assure you that the outcome is worth it! Of the 3 occasion that we get to fish the wall, we landed 6 trout between 26inch and 28inch. And 5 of those Rainbows weigh more than 10 lbs.
Incidentally, the biggest fish of the trip was actually taken on the Bamboo rod! While fishing the wall, my fly on the Winston got snagged on a submerged rock and broke off. Instead of wasting time to re-rig (guide was occupied on the oars), I simply picked up the Bamboo and continued fishing. A monster Rainbow took the fly and what followed was a 20 minute struggle between 12lb of Rainbow muscle aided by the mighty Kenai, Vs a nervous trout novice aided by a piece of "Tek-Ko"! To facilitate some chances of landing the fish, our guide row us a few hundred yards down stream into slower waters. Fortunately, the underdogs won in the end!
Besides Rainbow Trout, there are also lots of Dolly Varden (a species related to the Artic Char) to be caught on the Kenai. They behave exactly like Rainbows and are great fun on fly rods.
While the Kenai Rainbows were of Monster proportion, I was hoping to do some small stream trout fishing before we leave Alaska. Our guide suggested a day of walking and wading on the beautiful Russian River, although he did cautioned that it may amount to a 6-10 mile hike in rough and hilly terrain for the entire day. I thought since we had come this far, what’s another 10mile? Stay tune for part 3B on Russian river trout……………..
« Last Edit: Jul 31, 2005, 10:42am by ShadowCaster »
Re: Alaska’s Midnight Sun, Part 3A : Kenai Rainbow « Reply #6 on Jul 11, 2005, 9:10am »
Hi Tan Yik,
Tks for sharing those fab pix. As always, you are fishing places most of us dream of. I've been out of circulation now for some time. My last trip was to NZ with Sean, Peter and Chee Keong. Sean's guide was top rated and some of the browns and rainbows which were released were pretty close to double digits! Seeing all these pix and reading those mails bring back memories. Think I'll go remove the dust off my rods and reels. Hope to catch you by the water sometime.
Joined: Mar 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 940 Location: SinCity
Re: Alaska’s Midnight Sun, Part 3A : Kenai Rainbow « Reply #7 on Jul 12, 2005, 9:12am »
Quote:
Suddenly.......an evil thought crept into that thing between my ears : Leave my kiddies at home for the next holiday or put them up for adoption ...
Twenty years from now, Fcuky woke up one morning on his birthday. Turning to his wife and hoping to get a birthday kiss or wish, he find her turning away from him. Dishearten he got up to wash and went down for breakfast hoping that his grown up children remembered his birthday. They finished breakfast in silence and left for work. Sadly he finished his breakfast and went off to work. On his driveway, his driver of twenty years grunted and got into the driver seat leaving Fcuky to open his own door. They drove to his office in silence. Arriving at his office, his receptionist ignored him, the tea-lady brought him a cold cup of coffee. Fcuky slumped into his chair and wondered what did he do to deserve this treatment.
At lunch time, his sexy secretary went into his office and notice him in a gloomy mood.Took pity on him and brought him out for a hearty lunch. After the meal, she wished happy birthday. She mentioned that since it is his birthday they should celebrate it and suggested that they proceed to her apartment.
Ho say liao!
When they got there, the secretary suggessted that she changed into something comfortable. Rubbing his trouty-slimy hands in glee, he changed into his birthday suit as well, turn off the living room light, sat down and waited for the grand opening. The bedroom door opened and a bright light illuminated the hall, there stood his wife, his children, driver, receptionist, tealady and his secretary pushing a trolley with a big birthday cake topped with candles burnring away.
And there sat Fcuky in his birthday suit wondering what happened twenty years ago...
"Fly fishermen are born honest, but they get over it." -- Ed Zern
"Some go to church and think about fishing, others go fishing and think about God." - Tony Blake
FCUK Full Member FCUKed Off Already member is offline
Joined: Mar 2005 Posts: 962
Re: Alaska’s Midnight Sun, Part 3A : Kenai Rainbow « Reply #8 on Jul 12, 2005, 5:29pm »
That may well be true.....in cyberspace
But in reality - I've seen enough not to have any expectations whatsoever from my ' ducklings ' - which is why ang mor prefer PETS to KIDS, in this generation
Though what I can afford is theirs - but whether they'll appreciate is anybody's guess
Soon, they will rather stay in summer camp - than to have me drag them halfway across the world - to see their grandparents
Little wonder why I always preach APPRECIATION
And speaking of appreciation :
Billy - HELP !!! Can please move this 2 post into my thread or not I too stupid to know how to do it myself la
So paiseh to blemish this fantastic Alaskan fishing report
Thanks and much appreciated - but I can't thank you enough for your Sage FLi that caught me 7 carps in the 7th month - making me feel like some 7 star lucky fatboy, yesterday
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.... drooling for part 3B 
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