How bout them Ling ???

[Nameless Range]

It’s the most wonderful time of the year. Again.

 

[expertgsd]

I love ice fishin for ling.as much as my little friend.
http://vid4.photobucket.com/albums/y138/Robert59/1325171535.mp4

Me too - really dope

 

[D4570]

IS that a mink?

 

[RobG]

So do you just fish bait on the bottom from shore?

 

[Nameless Range]

So do you just fish bait on the bottom from shore?

Yes. They spawn from December through February and are active at night.

A lot of guys use smelt because you can just buy it easily, but I think the best legal bait is 2” cubes of sucker meat with the skin attached. If you run your hook through the skin you won’t lose your bait. I usually catch a couple suckers over the summer, cube them up and freeze them for December/January ling’n.

Breaded and fried the filets off the ones we got last night and ate them for lunch today. I think a real case could be made that they are the best tasting fish in Montana. And just generally one of the most interesting.

 

[RobG]

Yes. They spawn from December through February and are active at night.

A lot of guys use smelt because you can just buy it easily, but I think the best legal bait is 2” cubes of sucker meat with the skin attached. If you run your hook through the skin you won’t lose your bait. I usually catch a couple suckers over the summer, cube them up and freeze them for December/January ling’n.

Breaded and fried the filets off the ones we got last night and ate them for lunch today. I think a real case could be made that they are the best tasting fish in Montana. And just generally one of the most interesting.

I think they are cool as hell in spite of their slimy habits, but I've only caught them through the ice. I skin them immediately after I catch and kill them now. It's been a while... guess I better get out.

 

[D4570]

SUCKER with the skin on is the only way to go.
But the small scale type of sucket like the whit, longnose, and mountain.
The redhorse and blue are not nearly as effective for bait but all are better than smelt especially frozen smelt.

 

[Nameless Range]

SUCKER with the skin on is the only way to go.
But the small scale type of sucket like the whit, longnose, and mountain.
The redhorse and blue are not nearly as effective for bait but all are better than smelt especially frozen smelt.

I had never given consideration to different kinds of suckers. I think I am solely using longnose suckers, but mainly because I know where to easily catch them.

 

[Dougfirtree]

Those ling look alot like the eelpout (or maybe they are the same and you guys have a different name where you are) we have here in the Northern MN. Real good eating. We just battered and fried like any other fish. Yum!!!

I used to live right near the anual "Eel Pout Festival" in Walker Minnesota. I doubt there is another festival like that anywhere... I've never caught one though. They're on my list.

 

[Nameless Range]

Only one ling tonight, but a story to go along with the evening:

I have become smalltime famous amongst the children of the families we go fishing and camping with for the stories I tell. These yarns typically revolve around the geography in which we are fishing or camping: The Gregory madman, the Hebgen Hobo, the Tobacco Root Ripper, The Bull River Brutalizer, The Flathead Frightener....

Typically, these scary stories are PG in nature, but tonight, as a dozen children surrounded me demanding a tale and none planned in my head, with a debatably flammable amount of whiskey in my veins, I embarked on an impromptu and ad hoc story of the Canyon Ferry Crippler. I told of the missing children, the bodies that were found, and the killer that wasn’t, and maybe dipped into the realm of the PG-13. My audience was captive as hell and I was in the zone.


By the time it was over three kids were crying, and the rest were asking me, “Wait, was that real?” Half the parents were peeved with me, and others appreciated it. One kid’s night was over.

Sometimes you misjudge and are the @$$hole, and yet, are still laughing maniacally about it hours later on a hunting forum.

 

[belshawelk]

Never been Ling lake fishing. But I do know a lot about Ocean fish. My entire family worked in a fish cannery. My dad filleted fish for 42 years. I basically grew up in the damn thing.

And here is what I know. God did not create a better white fish than Lingcod. Halibut- Nope, Cod- nope, bass- nope. I go to Alaska quite often fishing. All I want is ling.......................

 

[Nameless Range]

Never been Ling lake fishing. But I do know a lot about Ocean fish. My entire family worked in a fish cannery. My dad filleted fish for 42 years. I basically grew up in the damn thing.

And here is what I know. God did not create a better white fish than Lingcod. Halibut- Nope, Cod- nope, bass- nope. I go to Alaska quite often fishing. All I want is ling.......................

I’d like to try one of those someday.

 

[Nameless Range]

-5 out in December and a stiff breeze means the burbot are spawning


Supplies are gathered



Parents and feral children convene around the fire and a dutch oven full of chili




The fish are biting. The kids reel em in. We go home.




Good time of year.

 

[AlaskaHunter]

Set lines are legal for burbot up in Alaska...14 hooks per person maximum.
We put out set lines at duck camp.

 

[Nameless Range]

Set lines are legal for burbot up in Alaska...14 hooks per person maximum.
We put out set lines at duck camp.View attachment 205793

Very cool. Do you leave them sit on the bottom, and what kind of bait do you use?

 

[AlaskaHunter]

Very cool. Do you leave them sit on the bottom, and what kind of bait do you use?

Yes setlines on a cut bank. Usually use herring.
We also catch burbot in the Yukon River on our May spring trip with conventional gear and herring.

 

[Don Fischer]

Ling? Huh, never heard of them. Thought you guys were talking about ling cod! Is this the fresh water version? Where do you catch these thing's anyway?

 

[Dougfirtree]

Sounds fun. I'm jealous now and wishing there were more of them around here.

 

[AlaskaHunter]

Ling? Huh, never heard of them. Thought you guys were talking about ling cod! Is this the fresh water version? Where do you catch these thing's anyway?

In Alaska they are called burbot, while ling cod are salt water species caught while halibut fishing.

 

[Nameless Range]

Tis the season once again.

Bells jinglin, rods bouncing, kids screaming, beer drinking, tacos on the shore, smoke inhalation and clean Montana air.



A lotta Lota lota.