Salmon fishing Lake Vättern

Now we are in the prime season for salmon fishing in Lake Vättern - my advice is to book a flight and go there immedeately, especially if you are a fan of catching feeding salmon from the shore! 

Me and my friends David and Jakob tried it last Sunday, but as usual when it comes to fishing for salmon, we did not catch anything, nor did we loose any .
But the fishing is quite unique; fishing from the shore, the salmon is large (Swedish record is 20,4 kg), and they are feeding – not like the salmon fishing in rivers.
The salmon is close to the shore and the surface during the colder months, feeding on three spined sticklebacks  (Gasterosteus aculeatus). This small fish is constantly moving with the currents and the wind, so if the wind is from the west, the east coast of Lake Vättern is the best and vice verca.

So keep an eye on the weather report  when going for a weekend of salmon fishing! And be sure to bring warm clothes and a life west or a floation siut – you do not want to end up in the cold water without it!

The company Höje Hunting & Fishing is  located on mount Omberg, close to some of the best spots, a good place to stay at during your weekend.  And of course you can also fish from a boat with a guide, eg. Visingsö Trolling.

I also attach a picture of two broken heroes, trying to fool a salmon…

(later that same day, two other anglers joined us, fishing for five minutes and managed to catch a nice salmon on 6,5 kg… )

But I'll be back soon, and hope to meet some of you by the beautiful Lake Vättern!

The first pike this ice fishing season

It is winter now in the west part of Swedish Lapland, but not here at the coast. All the snow rained away today. But me and my friends think that's good, because then we will have a better start of the ice fishing season. The reason to that is less snow on the ice and more light under, for the pikes hunt.

Today was me and Henrik out for the first ice fishing for pike this autumn. We had our friend Anton with us. He had never been ice fishing for pike before, so this was like a kind of guiding. Anton didn't have any equipment, so I let him use mine. Instead, I hide behind the camera all day. I and Henrik taught Anton how to do and soon should the first pike be caught.

The bait of the day was dead roach, which worked fine! The first fish on the hook was Anton’s, and he caught a nice one at 111 cm. But the pike was unfortunately very thin and weight only 7,61 kilo. No sad faces, a new personal record for Anton and a great start of the season.

During the day we caught a couple of pikes between 3 and 5 kilo!

//Markus, TeilusFishing

Kratte Masugn & Hotel Mellanfjärden

We have now added two new places to the web, both located in Central Sweden:

Killeboda Gård added to web

Killeboda gård, located at the southern tip of the large Lake Immeln, has been farmed by our family for thirteen generations. Our dock is where you start, either in a canoe or an electrically driven boat, to fish for pike, perch, bream and tench. Enjoy the silence and the forest. Finish the day in our sauna in our secluded boathouse in the cove. Choose lodgings in our rooms with breakfast included or in separate cabins or flats with self-catering. You are always welcome at Killeboda!

Read more at:  http://www.swedenfishing.com/en/tourismcompanies/killeboda

Ande the pike turns to zander

Greetings! 

Just a short update about the latest fishing trip together with Jakob from Kustlandet, it was a windy one to say the least at Brantestad fishing camp. 

Pike was the target, but this lake also holds a good stock of large zander - but according to Jakob they never bite this late in the season... So with the boat fully loaded with rods and equipment and some nice bags of dead baitfish we headed out on the lake. And Jakob steered the boat with a safe hand, making sure we would find the best place of the day. And as you can see from the picture, I think he was also looking out for ships, distant islands and perhaps the summer and a brighter future for us all...

The wind did give us some problems, even if we did choose a good spot, and we hade some problems controlling the boat and the floaters. We fished on different depths, from bottom (12 meters) to 7m, 5m and 2m, covering the pelagic zone - slowly rowing the boat forward, with the dead baitfish wobbling behind us. 

First bite came on the float fishing on 5m, suddenlyit was gone and Jakob had the first chance of catching one. But the fish was too quick, leaving us with nothing but the hooks to retrieve. At the same time the 2m float also went under, and, since I was slow, appera on the surface again. But soon it was gone again, and I tried to set the hooks - and managed! We now had our fish on the way to the boat, but the feeling was that it was just a small pike, it did some headbanging, but peacefully came closer to the boat. When it popped up we saw that it was a nice zander, even though they do not bite this late in the season... 

A nice bonus this windy day! 

Continuing the day with dreams of the 1m+ pike, that slowly followed the wind away. We caught two more pikes, biggest one around 85cm, and missed a couple of bites on the floaters (as I said, it was hard to controll them). We saw some nice echoes on the sonar, but they did not take any interest in our baits, perhaps next time...

I've said it before and now it comes again - this season is really interesting for fishing, so if you have the chance to come to Sweden now, don't miss it!

//Kristian

A taste of winter

The end of October usually means rather "pleasant" temperatures in the south of Sweden. But sometimes the winter gives us a glimpse of what is to come. And that has happened now; chilly nights and even snow in some parts. Still, if you choose the right clothes, it is perfect for fishing!

Another day of fishing and another day of trying out a new location, the water temperature had dropped 4 degrees since last week, now showing 6,3 C. Where to locate the pikes when in a new water? A question that a lot of anglers ask themself when going abroad, there is a lot of oppurtunities and spots that look great. But it might take som time to find them. I always recommend that you choose a place where you can get the latest news about the water and the fishing, on www.swedenfishing.com you'll find a good selection of those types of waters, with good accomodation (trust me, it is nice with good accomodation in the autumn/winter in Sweden...)

Well, back to the fishing, we started out in the shallows with jerkbaits and rubber baits, but no luck. We noticed that the fish was congregated deeper, from 5-8 meters, and the pike would probably be close to this. So we did go deeper, but after a couple of hours - still no luck. Desperate times calls for desperate measures, we went for trolling. Just to locate the fish and then be more effective.

On the sonar we could see a large sschool of baitfish on 6 meters, unfortunately my wobblers did only manage to hit 3 meters, and to top it off the water was really like muddy... So there was not a lot of positive energy in the boat. But just when the boat passed the baitfish, and the wobblers should be in the beginning of it - I recieved a strike on my lure. Not a very big fish, but a truly necessary one to boost our selfesteem. And it had a really nice condition, really high and fat. 

Quick photo and then release, and the next fish then attacked my friend Jakobs lure. This one was bigger, fighting really hard and we did nurish some dreams of a big mama. After a couple of minutes, the fish was close to the boat and...

Well, what happend next?  A classic, the only thing that we saw of that fish is what the photo below shows.

After this we did actually have to leave, but we will back soon. Better prepared for the pelagic pikes, with dead baithfish and floaters! (no more "bonna-trolling") I'll keep you updated!