Cold Lake Trip Report

[Chewie66]

I was up in Cold Lake over the holidays and managed to get in a solid week of fishing. It was freezing cold (-25 to -35) the whole time I was there but the tent and heater easily took care of that. I did a ton of moving around and exploring different parts of the lake and for the most part the ice was flat and was 15-17 inches everywhere I went. Landed a pile of pike and lake trout throughout the week and even managed to track down a couple of the elusive Cold Lake walleye. However, my final day on the ice turned out to be the most fun. Here's how it went:

I was on the lake for daybreak at the one spot where I had found a few walleye and managed to catch a couple small 14 inchers (didn't bother taking pictures of these). By 9am my luck had run out so I packed up and made the lengthy drive over to long bay to try for some pike. They were biting like crazy on basically any colour combo of jighead and twister tail that I could come up with. The biggest was this guy:

http://i1324.photobucket.com/albums/u609/Chewie66/P1030029_zpsa7e3505d.jpg


Then something out of the ordinary caught my eye as I was panning the camera around. So I dropped my jig on the bottom and gave it a couple twitches to see if I could get the new stranger to bite. Bingo! Hello Mr. Whitey.


http://i1324.photobucket.com/albums/u609/Chewie66/P1030030_zps6618139c.jpg

Around noon I decided to pack up and head out in front of the Provincial Park for some lakers. About a half hour in this guy came to say hi.


http://i1324.photobucket.com/albums/u609/Chewie66/P1030033_zpsdb9acf7e.jpg


After another couple hours of fairly slow action I finally hooked into something with my lure just off bottom. This beauty gave me 5 different species of fish for the day.


http://i1324.photobucket.com/albums/u609/Chewie66/P1030035_zps64e3d7be.jpg


I seriously contemplated going and trying for a perch after that and seeing if I could 'hit for the cycle', but considering I hadn't seen one the entire trip I convinced myself it would be a waist of time. Oh well, 5 for 6 isn't too bad and all fish were released. Can't wait to get up there again in march!

[1bluZebec]

Great job man! :sign0005:

[super mario]

Congrats

[GTZ]

Holy crap that is awesome...what a fantastic day.

[Dacotensis]

Nice catch. You should have gone for the fiver.
Next time right?

[tight line]

Going for the Grand Slam!!!

[wellpastcold]

Nice job!

[OneGirlWolfPack]

Wow!! That's awesome!

[waterninja]

looks like a great trip. congrats.

[niwrek]

Was there lots of snow on the ice?? Is it driveable? Going up at month end. don't want to haul sled or quad up if don't have too.

[simmered]

That's awesome! Nice work!

[Chewie66]

Was there lots of snow on the ice?? Is it driveable? Going up at month end. don't want to haul sled or quad up if don't have too.

The snow wasn't too bad. I got stuck once when I parked in a big drift but other than that it was smooth sailing as long as you have a 4x4.

[TylerThomson]

We were all over that lake yesterday with a 1 ton diesel. Not much snow at all on the ice makes for easy cruising.

We fished 9 hours yesterday and moved every few hours exploring French bay and around mariahs hump. I got skunked my buddy got one burbot but you could tell the bite was on the day before there was blood at every second hole we saw.

[Mayhem]

Nice...gotta love those multi-species trips.

[Chewie66]

Nice...gotta love those multi-species trips.

Yeah that's probably the most species I've caught in one day and that includes ocean fishing.

[raiderfan]

nice looking fish

[raiderfan]

what lake did they get halled out of

[TylerThomson]

re-read the first post and see if you can figure out the secret code.

[niwrek]

Lol

[sparky660]

Good work!!!

[wellpastcold]

Sounds like a pretty good day. Well done.

[Spidey]

Thanks for the report and great pics. Love the colors, pattern and symmetry on the pike.

[Kokaneeranger]

Helluva day wow

[Alberta Bigbore]

Those are some nice fish, congrats!!

[Darkwalleye]

I went over on to try the sask side of cold lake and it would seem the regulations are not the same as alberta when it comes to barbed hooks if you are on the sask side and get stopped by fish and game using barbs he will issue the ticket. He claimed I was the first person he stopped that had pinched the barbs so far that morning he was on a sled undercover posing as a someone going for a sled ride.

[mikebossy]

Darkwalleye, rules are supposed to be the same on either side afaik, unless they've come up with something different for ice season, can't see why that would be though, if you have an Alberta licence you should be judged by Alberta rules on Cold Lake, unless of course you crossed the big obvious painted line that denotes the border, you know the 10 foot wide red line painted on every year,:bad_boys_20:, someone else chime in if i'm completely fos on the licence, the red line is 'for real', lol

[bingo1010]

alberta regs apply to the whole lake, and alberta is barbless, never heard of this before,...............edit.......... from sask regs...


"Barbless Hooks! Barbless hooks are mandatory on all Catch and Release Waters in Saskatchewan, as well as on Athapapuskow, Caddis, Cold, Madge and Tobin lakes and Lake of the Prairie"

usually the regs are consistent from both provinces, one weird point is that an alberta co is enforcing sask laws....do they have authority to do that??

[bcacoutdoors]

alberta regs apply to the whole lake, and alberta is barbless, never heard of this before

You can use barbed hooks again in alberta.

[Mike_W]

To the OP wicked trip looks like a tank of a white!! Did you keep it? I would imagine pretty nice worm free meat? I have caught Burbs from cold and they are awesome cold water firm white meat ...whitest meat burbs I have ever caught that's for sure!!

On a side note to the Sask Alberta Regulations if you are fishing under the authority of an Alberta fishing licence Alberta regulations are the only ones you need to follow....I have not had a chance to check the regs this year but there was a special section for cold in years past.

That said I feel cold lake is the one place an angler should feel obligated to use barbless this fishery is amazing and mainly catch and release. Kudos to all fishermen who hold themselves to the barbless standard on this lake!!!

[bingo1010]

You can use barbed hooks again in alberta.

I realize that, but as has been stated ...if you are on the sask side then you need to be barbless

[Pixel Shooter]

Make sure you tell the Sask CO's this because I know of 4 boats that got ticketed, don't ask me how I know. After a 20 minute debate with the CO I still got written up with a warning ticket. When using new hooks, take the time to pinch lol....duhhhhhh



On a side note to the Sask Alberta Regulations if you are fishing under the authority of an Alberta fishing licence Alberta regulations are the only ones you need to follow....I have not had a chance to check the regs this year but there was a special section for cold in years past.

[pikeslayer22]

A question I always wondered about is daily limits? If you have licenses in both provinces are you able to retain dailly limits for both? Not that I would as i don't really enjoy eating trout but often wondered

[Mike_W]

In 2012, during an amendment of the Alberta Fishery Regulations, 1998,
the Federal government inadvertently removed the provision prohibiting
the use of barbed hooks. This rendered the barbless-only requirement
when angling in Alberta unenforceable. The intent is to restore the
legislation at the earliest opportunity. Until this occurs, anglers are asked
to continue to voluntarily comply with the spirit and intent of the
barbless-only regulation and refrain from the use of barbed hooks.

Sportfishing in Cold Lake
Sportfishing in Cold Lake requires either an Alberta Sportfishing
Licence (see licence exemptions under “Requirements” on this page),
or a Saskatchewan Angling Licence. The Alberta Fishery Regulations,
1998 apply to the Alberta portion of Cold Lake; while the Saskatchewan
Regulations apply to the Saskatchewan portion of Cold Lake (Saskatchewan
regulations are consistent with Alberta regulations for Cold Lake).

In looking into the Sask regs it does appear that they list cold as barbless contradicting what the Alberta regs say about the regulations being consistent.

Funny how that all works, up until Sask went barbless all of Cold Lake the use of Barbs was legal even though Alberta was "Barbless" now Sask changes there regulations and it applies to there portion of the lake ....which makes sense but the way I feel it should have been anyway.

Seems you could fight the ticket based on what the Alberta Regulations state "Consistent"

Either way real men use barbless!!