Published Oct 15. 2007 - 16 years ago
Updated or edited Aug 8. 2015

Autum Pike in the Dutch polder

Saturday morning at the end of my nightshift at the veterinary clinic I decided to head out to some unfamiliar water to wet my new streamer creations and see if I could fool some pike. The streamers were simple, large 4/0 Ad swier hooks, the new series because the old ones are way to thick to properly set the hook.
I arrived at the water just after sunrise and it was beautifully quiet, the water was clear and dark with still enough vegetation to hide some nice pike.
The first few casts were under a bridge, always a hotspot for pike and i did expect some action here but nothing. Pike fishing is active, cast, move, cast, move and constantely fish the water in a semi circle and leave the streamer in the water as long as possible to the toes of your feet, you'll often be pleasantly surprised what lying in front of you.
After several minutes the sleepiness was soon turned into an adrenalin state of awareness when all at once a pike burst through the watersurface with a nice arched body and its mouth wide open and showing the white of its mouth and the red of her gills. Instinctively I set the hook and after a nice short fight with another jump she was landed with the gill grip. (I hardly use a net, small pike i get with he neck grip, large ones with the gill grip)

[img:1f0a7954f4]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v136/Dendro/fishing/IMG_0957.jpg[/img:...

After that i was fresh and awake. Several cast later and another smaller one was fooled by my bucktail streamer. Again a nice take and some jumps.

[img:1f0a7954f4]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v136/Dendro/fishing/IMG_0963.jpg[/img:...

[img:1f0a7954f4]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v136/Dendro/fishing/IMG_0959.jpg[/img:...

My start of this season has been a good one, maybe i'll head out for pike today again.

Stephen Wade's picture

Nice Cap promotion...ha ha ha...

Nice Cap promotion...ha ha ha. I think all i need to do now is catch a nice fish and take a pic of me with my GFF cap on.. :D

Great fishing Brian.!!! :P

Steve

Wonderful fish. I only wish...

Wonderful fish. I only wish that there were more Esox around northern Virginia. I was raised on huge pickerel and a few pike in new England. I miss them a lot. Where do you live, Brian?

Brian Elward's picture

I live in a small town next...

I live in a small town next to the city of Utrecht. It is a great base for most of my fishing. The dutch polders are just a bit to the west of Utrecht, but i can also catch pike, perch, pikeperch(zander), rud, asp and many more species in the small river flowing next to my house. The polders are nice for pike since they are so plentyfull there. almost every farmhouse has a bridge and everyone of them is an excellent hiding place. The average pike there is about 20 inch, but sometimes you have a bigger one that reaches 40.
Yesterday i went to a small suburban area and with the rest of holland water is always close at hand. I caught a great 40 incher which to my surprise fought like a madman, it even took line of my reel.

[img:2cce2f4c75]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v136/Dendro/fishing/83cm.jpg[/img:2cce...

But with all those fish and water around my fishbuddies and I still have to drive several hours to Germany, Denmark or Belgium to fish for trout on streams. Pitty because it is still my greatest passion

Gear?...

What gear do you use for your pike fishing? I would like to know weights, lengths and all of the rest. Thanks.

Kasper Mühlbach's picture

Brian,...

Brian,

good catch. I have been out one day, but I only saw one skinny pike landed by a jerker (jerkbait fisher).

Kasper

Brian Elward's picture

Well with the weather turning...

Well with the weather turning colder now the pike are stocking up and this is always a great period. Most lurefisherman still wait untill it gets colder before they really start fishing. It can be tricky at times since there is a lot of plantlife in the water.
The material I use is variable to the surroundings and especially the size of the streamers i use.
The set in the picture is actually quite a heavy one, it is an 8 weight TFO Ticrx (more a 9 weight) . :). No pike has ever been through to the backing, they might take some line but the are no endurance fish and everything is explosive. The runs aren't very long and you can drill them on the hand.
For the polder pike i like to fish light, a nice 6/7 weight and floating line. Bucktail streamers around 10-15 cm on hook size 4/0. If I want to throw larger tandem streamers i will take my 8 weight, also with a floating line. If the water is quite deep, in lakes then i might use an intermediate line. Then again a pike will gladly shoot a couple of body lenghts upwards to get the streamer.
I still use stainlesssteel wire but a few friends of mine have started to use thick fluorcarbon, 80 pnd breaking strain, with good results.
What do you use for pike fishing?
Brian

>>>>What do you use for pike...

>>>>What do you use for pike fishing? <<<<

I don't get to go Pike fishing around here. For big Pike and Pickerel up north I used my old guitar strings for leaders. I would cut and wrap a four inch leader out of the unwound strings. The best fly I used was a long yellow maribou. Pickerel killed it.

We have Tiger Muskies in the rivers around DC and there are a few lakes with real Muskies. They are tough to fish for and I have no expirience with them. Wish me luck. Their time of year is here and I am going to try and get me one or two.

Hi Brian...

Hi Brian
Nice to see a sign of life from you, obviously your doing well!

The pikefishing in sweden is good at the time but i do aswell as you long a bit for the trouts, although freshwater crocs aint a bad substitute!

The gear i use is a soft #10 Vision 3zone kitted with a coma real and a cut down #11 wf line (floater). My leader of choice is hard monofilament 1,00mm and the flies is dustwipe devievers tied on 4/0 Swier hooks (barbless!)

Sorry for a bit of lousy pictures but i was f**king freezing my fingers of!

Brian Elward's picture

Nice Pike, like the dark...

Nice Pike, like the dark colors. It's a fairly large one isn't it?
Luckily the weather overhere isn't that bad at the moment, nice and clear skies with night frost and good temperatures during the daytime. Fortunately I don't have to start wearing any gloves yet.
Tomorrow I'll go for pike again, or many perch. Still haven't decided yet.

They turn pretty dark in...

They turn pretty dark in these murky waters.
I think it was about 3,5lb so it's nothing big. I just know how to snap the frame;)

When is your closed season for pike and predators and what season do you fish seabass? Im pretty eager to get down to your canals.

The nightfrost strangely still have'nt struck stockholm but Jan had -6degress when he went to work this morning. Now it's time for the race we can't win. The one against the ice!

Any big winterfishingplans? Is there any ice down in Holland?

Brian Elward's picture

The weather is still ok, and...

The weather is still ok, and for some years now we don't have a strong winter that brings lost of ice. So fishing for pike can be done throughout the winter. Pikeseason lasts till march 31 (how you read the rules ;) ) and lasts till the end of june. Seabass is a fish that stay in these waters from may to october.
Today i went fishing with the bellyboot, had a beautifully colored one.p

[img:9f2dba56a3]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v136/Dendro/fishing/IMG_09912.jpg[/img...

I don't have big plans for pike, whenever i want to go fishing i go for a coouple of hours. You never really know where the big ones are. So it can always turn out in pleasant surprises[/img]

Just a bit of hangover fun in...

Just a bit of hangover fun in photoshop.

any pic of the seabass?

Brian Elward's picture

Hum seabass, unfortunately I...

Hum seabass, unfortunately I do not have many seabss picks. that's because whilst fishing from a belly boat in salt water the change of damaging my camera is very high. lpus my computer died on me recently and most of my fishing pictures were on it.
But I do have one seabass pick on teh computer, it was my very first one!

[img:aead495c0d]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v136/Dendro/fishing/DSCF00111.jpg[/img...

Great sport, can't wait till next year.
for now just some small pike to be caught :)

[img:aead495c0d]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v136/Dendro/fishing/Reeuwijk4.jpg[/img...

hey man, that last one looks...

hey man, that last one looks good. I can't wait until this weekend when I'm going for my first (wtf, this late?!) trip of the year. Hopefully the water will clear up a bit and the pre-spawn madams will be hungry as ever before.

Me and Jan spoke about going down to your very flat and crowded country for some pike and maybe zander fishing.

about the seabass, check out the site www.fishingimages.com for some really nice seabasspics, and maybe a good project for a trip this summer...

peace

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