04-24 REELLIFE digital - Flipbook - Page 19
fishing
What an adventure this
whole fishing thing is.
Like many things in life,
often the journey is more
fulfilling, exciting, and
memorable than the
ending. I shouldn't even say
“ending”. Maybe outcome
or result are better words.
I have no intention of
stopping fishing for what
quickly became one of my
new favorite fish—the latest
stamp to be added to my
fishing passport.
others, or perhaps more
bluntly, a phrase we all
heard as kids, if you don’t
have anything nice to say,
don’t say anything at all.
Don’t yuck someone’s (my)
yum. My recent yum, both
literally and figuratively as
you’ll come to read, centers
around catching what
became a winter fishing
obsession. I am referring to
one of the more mysterious
fish I’ve come across as an
angler, the burbot.
I’m going to come right
out with it, the fish pictures
included with this article
are not show-stopping,
wall-mounting, brag to your
buddies type of fish. Some
might look at them and
wonder if they were even
photo-worthy at all. But to
those folks, I’d retort with a
new phrase that has newly
become part of my regular
vernacular. A polite way to
say be nice, be joyful for
Highly regarded for its taste
as poor man's lobster yet
criticized for its appearance,
I knew I had to catch one,
two, as many as I could.
They are most active during
the winter months and at
night, two challenges as
we’ve had an unseasonably
warm winter and I’m
more apt to hit the snooze
button and sleep in than
drive to a frozen lake and
sit outside in the dark or
first light of the morning
hours. Still, I had to add
this fish to my checklist of
caught species. The fish is
an oddity with their eel-like
appearance, freshwater
habitat (the only cod to live
in such an environment
in North America), and
some seeming barriers in
place - fishing during the
winter, night activity, and
competition with other
anglers - I was obsessed. I
researched online, talked
with other anglers, called
MT FWP for information
from biologists in the field,
asked questions when
buying gear at local shops,
and watched YouTube clips
(check out our ProTip video
with Craig Dowdy on the
website or our YouTube
channel on how to filet
burbot), anything you could
think of to educate myself
on how to best catch this
fish.
APRIL 2024 | 19
