Seen along the road driving to Alaska

You see lots of animals right along side the road. Most are active right as the sun comes up.

Black Bear
The only wood bison we saw. There were lots of road signs warning that they would be on or near the road.

Prarie dog

Not sure who this is, but we saw a few of them.

Ring neck pheasant

Elk in the campground. They bugle to each other in the morning.

Water snake

Alaska Critters

Some of the animals we saw during our time on the Kenai peninsula.

Moose and calf. We saw lots of moose, especially when traveling after 9pm.
Moose come out to check out the fishermen.

Moose & calf in the campground

Ptarmigan a pretty tame, wild bird

A loon sitting on a nest. The have a really great call that they make to signal each other.

Bald eagle coming in for a landing.

Sea otters

A black bear at the russian river. Careful and don't get too close.

St. Mary's Lake on a nice December day

The temperature was around 42 degrees when I put the pelican in the water around 11:30. I was targetting pickerel, but would take whatever wanted to put a bend in my pole. I brought 2 batteries since I knew I might be doing a bit of trolling until I could locate some fish. It was clear sunny skies when I started.

After launching I headed to the right of the boat ramp. I fished the end of the first peninsula and the standing timber with no luck. I started trolling across the face of the dam then headed up lake past the long cove. That's where I caught the crappie. Not great sized but a fish none the less. I would occasionally catch grass on the treble hooks. I was pulling 2 lures thru the water with the 1 I thought ran deeper on the outside.

By the time I was almost directly across from the boat ramp I caught the bass.

It was just after 1:30. The bass was so pale it almost looked like another species of fish. I was trying different lures on and off. I just couldn't find anything that would consistently catch fish. I headed up to the skinny part of the lake. I tried casting up there. Twice when my lure landed I spooked something in the water as it would ripple the water as the lure hit the water. I didn't catch anything up there either.

I trolled past the next bank heading towards the standing timber where I caught a few fish 2 weeks ago. I know that Andy, Chuck & Brian had caught fish there also. I even tied on a small crappie lure and tried jigging it in the timber without success. By now the sky was heavily overcast. Andy showed up. I don't know if he had any luck, but he was moving around a lot.

I made my way over to the boat ramp. 2 fish in almost 5 hours worth of fishing. Not the best day on the water but I'll take it for a December day. Most years I'm done with freshwater fishing in MD by this time of the year, but I have quite a bit of time on my hands now not working full time. I need to become a better coldweather angler. I ended up losing 2 lures, which is unusual when fishing from a boat. Most times I just go opposite the snag and it comes out, but not today. I did hang up quite a bit trolling so hopefully that means I was close to the bottom most of the time.

Here are the lures I tried.

I found some more exposed manmade structures at the headwaters of the lake.

St. Mary's Lake Grand Slam 11/17/08

Sunset - Tramonte

Pickerel - Luccetto

Put the kayak in around 1pm. Very overcast and around 52 degrees air temperature. Slight wind but nothing unmanageable. Used a rapala count down in shad, a mepps spinner, chartruese crankbait and a rapala jointed minnow. Caught all my fish in the standing timber. Ended up with 7 fish a bluegill, pickerel, 2 crappie and 3 bass. The biggest bass and the pickerel were my largest out of the lake this year. Better late than never I guess. 2 other people fishing and both were outcatching me.

The pickerel was strong enough to pull the kayak around a bit. Know as a 'Sleigh ride', it's been a while since I've caught a freshwater fish in the kayak that was able to give me a ride.

Ho usato il kayak. Preso 7 pesci. Bluegill, luccetto, crappie & bass. Il bass & luccetto erano i piu grandi che ho preso del quel lago quest anno. Nouvoloso col poco sole. Usavo il rapala countdown e un crankbait colore chartreuse. Mepps = cappotto.

Saluti tutti i soci del pescaOK.

Alaska Fish species

Dolly Varden from Jerome lake
Kasilof river red salmon


Fairbanks Northern Pike

Chena river grayling
Homer Irish Lord

Smoking Salmon

Catch a bunch of nice, fresh, chrome-bright salmon. Like this beautiful Kenai river silver salmon.

Or this stringer of pink salmon.Work in a bug free area. Process all fish. Filet then portion into serving size pieces.


Brine and marinate. Keep fish well chilled during the entire process.

Once fish have marinated the desired time, place on smoking racks to allow to air dry. Make sure you have room between each piece of fish. If using wood chunks, soak wood in water before placing in smoker.