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Smelt fishing anyone

2K views 4 replies 5 participants last post by  Chris 
#1 ·
Not really fly fishing, but a great way to get through the long, cold winter nights. My brothers and I ( Chris, Drew,and Bob) have been renting a shack on the Kennebek river in Maine in January for the last few years. Wood stove, electric lights, a bag of sand worms, and a hole in the ice----what a good time. It's the only time I eat , drink, laugh, drink, catch a bucket of delicious smelt, laugh, drink, and still call it fishing. In fact at my good friends annual game dinner, I am known as the "smelt man". My Maine smelts, fresh out of the deep frier, are always a big hit. Anyone out there got any good SMELT stories?
 
#2 ·
BTW -

Smelt will take the fly very well. I was camping up at Rand Pond in New Hampshire which is loaded with smelt and big trout. It's a no-bait fishery but once you hook a smelt on a little stone nymph it's not uncommon for a big trout to go nuts chasing after it.

With all due respect to smelt, the excitement came from the latter experience. I fried some up and tried them, pretty tasty but I had a heck of a time filleting them. ;)
 
#5 ·
It is a blast. I live right across the street from a small city that gets put out on the ice. The local pizza and chinese restaurants even deliver.
The fly eating smelts are freshwater, the ones we take through the ice a anadromous sea-run rainbow smelt. a large one is about 10".
I don't have much room here, but I can offer breakfast and a shower at my apartment after an all-nighter on the river. (sold my house when Ian got sick)
Chris
 
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