Gonna have an opportunity to catch both of these this year while out on a hunt. I have never fished for either one. I'm assuming that I could use the same lures I use for trout for the grayling right? Would you guys have anyinsight on what I should use to rig up for pike in the wat of lures and terminal tackle? Is wire a requirement with pike? Lastly both should be fine with a typical shore lunch rub placed in tinfoil pouches over the coles right? Thanks Dean

Hi Dean

Are you using fly tackle, or spin? Grayling are not usually terribly selective, but there is nothing like watching one jump up and then take a dry fly on the splashdown!

I would not bother with wire for pike, but it can help if they are inclined to spin and wrap up your line.

If you are lucky, AK Grayling will reply; that guy knows grayling!

And his Dad is a pike chaser of some renown,,,

Grayling are surface feeders, they like flies, but I always used to catch them casting small spinners like the Mepps Aglia. Black Roostertails always worked well, for rainbows and grayling. If you buy Mepps, avoid the undressed treble hooks, I've found that the dressed lures outfish the undress ones 2 or 3 to 1.

Pike I can't help you with, but if it is somewhere remote where they aren't pressured, I've been told they'll almost hit a bare hook in warm weather. Large Mepps spinners, larger spinnerbaits, jighead type swimbaits ,get some of that gel type superglue that Berkley sells for when they strike and tear the swimbaits apart. Go to the Infisherman website, they are the pike gurus. You'll need wire for leader, and know how to tie it. You'll also need to know how to deal with the Y-bones when you clean them.

pike - a good baitcasting reel (ABU Garcia 6500), line around 20#. medium heavy rod, BALL-BEARING wire leaders, Dardevles or Dr. Spoons, and Colorado or Indiana-blade spinnerbaits

We have always done fine on grayling with small gold spoons.

Pike, my buddy used to guide up out of Aniak.... he used pixie spoons( I think I"m using the right name, the ones with the fake plastic egg sacks in the middle of the spoon) as much as anything. Their goal was any client was to catch a 50 plus inch pike before they left. I don't know that they failed very often.

Definitely bring good quality wire leaders for pike. Use large Spinners, spoons, jigs with mister twister tails. Chartruse, orange, black top colors. Throw some zara spooks on top water for fun.

I enjoy fly fishing for pike and use big rabbit streamers, deceivers and clouser minnows.

Grayling small spoons, meppps panther martin spinnners

Flies- Adams, stimis, Royal wulfs, prince nymphs 12-14 sizes

Dean
Anything will work for pike in the way of lures, but Johnson's silver minnows and jitterbugs hold a special place with me for the job on hardware stuff. We catch hundreds on our annual week-long trip, and a a hundred per day per person is only a good start. I use a doubled piece of Maxima 20# for leader and seldom lose one side of it... Changing every day or so is usually enough.

There is a good tieable wire leader, but it is not needed. We are almost exclusively fly fishing for them and big topwater flies like deerhair mice work great. Bunny flies work great as subsurface stuff. Marabou flies also work real well but are too delicate for sustained use.

Do not worry about long fights with pike as they have a lot of quickness, some power, and almost no stamina.

Grayling in lakes can be fussy, requiring a fairly specific presentation, but usually they are easy and flowing water usually means they are easier yet. I will often use a small nymph for a dropper on a stimulator or other large dry. The dry acts as strike indicator (bobber for those not fly fish fluent).

For spin fishing for grayling a small spinner with a dropper either before or after with a small nymph is very effective.
art

4 me it's slam dunk fly rod is the way to go. I caught this 46" Musky on my 9' 9 weight. Anything else is just cheating and way too easy...

Have a super trip!

Dober

It may not be right, but I use wire leaders for pike. I've even seen the wire get pretty chewed up. But sadly, it's been a while.

same here bud, I ain't got time to being giving lures and pike away.

have had good results with red and white striped daredevils, and silver kastmasters.

I like catch and release into a frying pan!


Dean if you have time to hit a Fred Meyers before flying out, they sell a little shot head jig called a gitzit. green is what slammed them this last late Sept. early October.

I'd always had good luck with Mepps, but believe we only caught one grayling on a Mepps outa about 100 fish that day.

the majority were caught on a green gitzit. you may be fishing early enough to not need it, but it sucks to not have the right gear to catch fish when there's fish about.

can't think of many meals I prefer over AK surf and turf, skillet of spuds and sliced onion, moose backstrap and grayling fried whole after being dunked in some cornmeal.

gawd amighty but that's good eatin!

I used lots of wire over the years, then came to my senses and actually started looking into it a bit... I think the Maxima outfishes the wire, lasts nearly as long before breaking, but importantly does not kink like wire.

Those into kink may just ignore this and carry on...

have never used it Art will have to give it a try

9" stainless leader and the 1 1/8 Oz Johnson silver minnow will work but any of the 3" long spoons work nicely too. The five of diamonds and the red and white daredevil is another great bait

My preference is to fly fish for both. You can do double duty with a 6wt on a hunting trip. A little much for grayling but a hell of a lot of fun for pike. We have always caught a tons of pencils before we catch the big guys so it keep its fun. Bring a reel with a good drag, bass/pike/ or salmon taper floating line and some Rio toothy critters leaders and you will be good to go. Swap out the swivel on the toothy critters for a little heaver one as they do break after 20 or so fish.

As for flys grayling are easy (drys) royal wolff, adams, mosquitoes, etc. Size 18-12. (Nymph) p-tail's, prince's, GRHE, etc. Size 12-8.

For pike any good bunny pattern works great. Throw in a little flash, a few articulating and a couple weedless. I also always bring some mice and frogs for top water stuff. Bass poppers work killer as well.

All the hunts and fly out fishing I have done weight was a concern. I could never see bringing a bunch of terminal tackle when I prefer to fly fish.

Pike make a killer shore lunch too!

Thanks so far guys . This is a hunting trip and not a fishing trip so this is all about makin meat for grub so the bug stick aint gonna do here. Not relying on it but sure beats mountain house.

I think I would take the mountain house over grayling

The fly rod would be the sure bet for me but if your more comfortable slinging gear St.Croix make some pretty nice packable spinning rods.

+1 on that, but as KK said, pike are EXCELLENT...

Lots of lakes in AK produce pike tasting strongly of bog... Grayling are just bland and boney, not bad at all.

I am also a fan of heavy monofilament over wire as a pike leader. Haven't used wire in decades. It doesn't kink, as Sitka pointed out, and the percentage of strikes seems to be a little higher, especially on bigger fish.

Double ditto on the mono over wire. I'll save the kink for my next Bangkok trip...

OK you last two guys...what KIND of Mono for leaders?

Ive only tried it twice...80 Lb. " Hard" mono made for tarpon leaders. The second one set the longevity record for lasting six seconds....

Maxima Chameleon 20# doubled is my standard...

Thanx...will give that a try...

I can get away with 50 flouro mono for leaders 90% of the time when pike/ musky fishing. Still have the occasional bite off. The mono hook-up ratio vs steel leader is much higher on pressured water and can sometimes make a big difference.

I think pike is just as good as walleye if caught in cold water

I�m wid ya on da flyfishing for dem pike! And the shore lunch.

Learnt my lesson many years ago on a backcountry canoe trip in Ontario, when my casting rod broke and all I had left was a fly rod.
The pike were running small anyways, but what fun!

Old Norwegian joke.

Can I flyfish when we get back into that lake?

Ya sonny, you can fly vat ever you vant back into dat lake.

don't forget jaw spreaders

A few favorite pike lures. Catching on top the most fun






This lure won a fishing contest with brother and his buddy. Landed 62 pike in one afternoon on it

Used this one a lot for sub-surface. Ended up getting the pattern from a fly swap a while ago. Turned out to be one of my favorites.

Articulated rainbow:


They seem to eat everything when you get remote though. After snacking on some peanuts and throwing the shells off the side of the boat we kept hearing splashes. Thus the nut popper was born

Tom,

I use some hard-finish 30-pound mono, can't even remember the brand. Made up a bunch of leaders a while back and still have some. Can't absolutely say I've never had one come apart, but can't remember when it did. I

Another vote for that.

Thanks JB..we may have to discuss this further over adult beverages...

Sounds like a plan!

Mason makes a hard mono. Also good. A bit more difficult when making knots because of its hardness

Mason is very hard to find most of the time... Maxima is everywhere...

Halibut circle hook welded to a license plate has crossed my mind for lunkers.

I found them a little difficult to cast on a fly rod...

Practice, you swatter, you.

Dean, if your fishing with a spinning outfit bring along some small Mepps spinners and I mean SMALL as grayling have small mouths.

On my last float hunt, I brought along a small packable fly rod with some tiny little brown and gray flies (cannot remember what they were called) and I didn't have much trouble catching them. From what i've seen and experienced, once a grayling hits your fly, the rest will follow suit. As for eating, grayling are delicious if you use enough seasoning and you'll want to eat them right away, don't save them for later because they will get soft and mushy. I've cooked them in beer before and they were very good, butter is better though. Bring along a shaker of mixed seasonings like, salt, pepper, garlic, onion powder, cayene (if you like spicey), oregano, parsley, and whatever other spices you prefer.

As for pike, I;ve found that when they are hungry, they will bite just about anything. I use to fish Minto Flats every summer when I lived in NP and catching pike was never a problem, it was catching the BIG pike that was a bit diffcult. And pike are excellent eating except for those pesky Y-bones.

Y-bones are not a problem if you know how to remove them. I find taking them and the reasonably-sized ribs out of northerns much less of a pain than taking the steel-girder sized ribs out of walleye. (And then you have the epiplurals to deal with in walleyes as well.)

There is a video on YOUTUBE demonstrating how to remove the Y-bones from Northern Pike.

My buddy Scott Sundhiem guides mostly for walleye on Ft. Peck Reservoir in Montana, but also does pike under duress. He came up with a very slick system for filleting pike many years ago.

Instead of doing the standard filleting of each side, he lays the pike on its belly and fillets the back off, starting right behind the head. The top half has only a few very fine bones, and this results in a big chunk of nice meat.

It also results in a cut just above the Y-bones, so he next fillets the sides off. One simple slice at the top of each fillet takes out the Y's.

My wife wrote this up in Field & Stream magazine maybe 15 years ago, and a few months later one of Scott's clients told him to hold up when Scott was about to fillet a few pike after a day on the lake. The client pulled a folded piece of paper out of his pocket, and said, "I want you to fillet them this way."

It turned out to be Eileen's article, torn from the magazine.

I'm guessing he recieved a decent tip?

bhtr