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Nav,
No touchy the buttons! :)

http://www.outdoorhub.com/news/wisconsin-fishermen-spear-massive-sturgeons/

Mark,
Even though I can't see him, I bet the fish looks alot like Dan.
Something about the low slung, bottom feeder mouth.
Don't tell him that I said that.
John.

Its all true John.

MarkS wrote:Nav, No touchy the buttons! :)

The "edit" button is gone... Capt. Pat fixed the gremlin :-)

Just funnin ya Nav.

Mark,

How do you spear a sturgeon in the dead of winter?

We fish for them out here in the SF Bay and the Delta rivers, but I've never heard of spearing them.

John,
We have Sturgeon spearing dedicated ice houses (sturgeon shacks) with large openings in the floor anywhere from a couple of square feet to massive 6' x 8' holes in the ice. We also have dedicated chain saws filled with food grade vegetable oil or sled mounted circular saws that cut these holes. Depending upon ice thickness the floating chunk is then pushed with long picks under the ice and shoved away. The shack is then placed over the hole in the ice which keeps it from freezing over too solidly. It needs to be cleaned every morning during the 16 day season of the skim that forms over night. The shacks have no windows and are generally painted black inside to make for a movie theater like setting. Decoys are hung down in the hole at a desired depth and many guys will lay white PVC pipes filled with sand gently across the lake floor (not to stir up the silt) to aid in seeing fish as well as sizing them to determine legal fish. A sturgeon must be a minimum of 36" although very few near that size are taken.

The spear hangs just over the hole on a hook with the tines in the water to reduce splash when taking aim. There is a rope tied to the head of the spear which detaches from the handle (suction fit) while fighting the fish. This rope goes out the door of the shack and is usually tied to the bumper of your vehicle. When a fish of legal size or trophy size goes through the hole you pick the spear off the hook and give her a fling! The first link is long but it is a great story, worth the time.

http://fox11online.com/2014/02/13/the-f ... n-youtube/

http://fox11online.com/2014/02/13/succe ... o-a-close/

interesting mark, I use to see them jump straight out of the water
off long island in the ocean, they are protected

atlantic sturgeon
http://www.dec.ny.gov/animals/37121.html

That is truly amazing. I'd have so much adrenaline flowing if I saw one, I'd probably end up in the lake! Most of the ice fishing I was around as a kid in Iowa involved a lot of parents with a lot of alcohol...and not a lot of fish. Maybe a half frozen carp if they were lucky. LOL!

The sturgeon fishing here in CA is a winter fishery with ghost shrimp being the main bait. It's a similarly slow fishery here in that if you're getting more than a fish or two a season, you're either putting in a lot of time or you're a legend. I think I went two or three years of fishing the season hard before I got my first sturgeon. You'll almost be in a trance and then the alarm on the sounder goes off. The nerve racking part out here is that you see them on your sounder looking like logs swimming about 25' under the boat. Every now & then one goes by that you swear is a submarine...at least 10' long. A lot of times they rub your line as they swim by, which looks very similar to the way they pick up the bait. So you think you're getting bit, and then the line goes dead. They are even more prehistoric looking here with some serious armor plating on the sides.

Good stuff. Thanks for the post. I never knew about sturgeon spearing until today...

John,
There is no hook and line season on that body of water. The only shot at those fish is with a spear.

Charlie,
They jump all over the place when we are out trolling. I had one land on one of my boards one time. I thought it was gone but it popped back up and ran true.