The Yokanga

I’ve been lucky. I’ve fly fished all over the world, from Alaska to the Zambezi.  I’ve targeted everything, from the humble chub of my local River Cam in England to the arapaima of the Brazilian jungle. 

I still fish for EVERYTHING with a childish enthusiasm, and my fishing friends will tell you that I have to be dragged away from the river – any river – when it’s time to reel up and head for home. 

I love to fish for anything that swims. But for reasons that I struggle to explain, Atlantic salmon still draw me back again and again. 

Why? 

While the permit of the Caribbean flats or the big trophy trout of New Zealand offer a stimulating sight-fishing challenge of stealth and guile, let’s face it: Most salmon fishing is, to a great extent, an exercise in dumb luck.

Atlantic salmon fishing is mostly blind fishing for a quarry that are not duped into taking a cunning representation of their prey but that simply grab the fly out of curiosity or irritation.

There are also bigger, meaner fish out there. The monster tarpon of the Nicaraguan jungle, the blistering powerhouse giant trevally of the Amirantes, or the cartwheeling sailfish that sizzle into the blue skies above the Pacific are all undeniably bigger and stronger than even the most titanic Atlantic salmon. 

However, for me at least, that grab – that savage, primal grab – from a big Atlantic salmon, way out in the icy currents of a big, brawling river is singularly the most exciting moment that fly fishing can offer. High up on the Kola Peninsula, the vast wilderness region that straddles the arctic circle in North West Russia, an inconspicuous little stream trickles

out of Lake Alozero. In its upper reaches it meanders placidly across the flat tundra. Fed by numerous tributaries, it starts to swell in size and picks up speed as the gradient starts to steepen.

Finally, in its last few miles, the river drives down off of the table-land of the tundra, forcing its violent and unrelenting way through the craggy bedrock of the northern coastline and crashing into the Barents Sea at the god-forsaken Military Base at Gremikha Bay. 

It’s not the big, familiar home-away-from-home timber lodge on the middle river, the laughs with old friends over a delicious, rib-sticking supper or a late night-cap, or the thrill of seeing those dear old veteran guides – Vova, Sasha, Edvard, Anatoly, Big André, and the rest, year on year. 

It’s not the magical white nights, wading the home pool or the notorious Lilyok confluence, while the sun briefly gutters behind the hill across from the lodge before peeping back up an hour or two later. 

It’s the fish. It’s simply the fish. Those big, brutal, magnificent fish.

Until you’ve hooked one of these fish, you simply can’t understand what the fuss is all about. They are like no other salmon – like no other fish – that I’ve ever tangled with. 

If you are going to tackle the salmon of this brutal river, then be prepared. Never has the maxim “Fail to prepare and prepare to fail” been more apt. If there is a chink in your armour, these fish will find it.

Fuss all you like about flies, about new rods, about the latest fly lines.  But before you do, make sure that your reels are in good order, have a smooth and powerful drag, and are loaded to the hilt with at least 400 metres of well-maintained 65lb gelspun backing. 

Your hooks should be sharp and ultra-strong – Ken Sawada XD1 tube doubles in size 2 and 4 are the only choice for the brutal environment of early spring. Partridge Patriot doubles are excellent for dressed flies in later weeks. Leader should be ultra-abrasion resistant Seaguar  Fluorocarbon in 30lb, 35lb and 44lb Breaking Strain. 

I also have a third rod waiting and ready on the rack back at the lodge so that I can win that evening race for the killer spot while my friend is re-rigging his set-up. 

I carry two main lines – The RIO Skagit Max Long is my go-to in the high water of early season.  It can throw anything from small doubles to one-inch tungsten tubes, and it means I simply don’t have to change my shooting head – it just gets EVERYTHING done. I break with orthodoxy and fish 15’ tips, and the Max will send them flying across even the widest pools of the Yokanga with ease.
 
In the typically lower, warmer water of mid and late season, a RIO Scandi body in 10 or 11

weight, fitted with tips from floating to Type 8 is a more elegant, more subtle way to present your fly.   It will cover most eventualities, but carry the Skagit just in case you want to start lobbing a bigred frances or snaelda into the deepest, darkest pools. 

Good, tough, felt soled boots and a pair of robust and leak-free chest waders are a must.  A tube of UV Wader repair can be a godsend – the early season water is savagely cold. 

At the very top of your packing list is a good, reliable wading stick. The Yokanga’s big, boulder-strewn pools require careful but aggressive wading and you need to be safe in what are sometimes powerful currents.  
Take extreme care.

The moment when you first hook a big Yokanga salmon is thrilling and terrifying in equal measure. Even if your gear is absolutely bullet-proof, these big chrome berserkers will find a million ways to wreck your dreams. 

That moment – that big wrenching grab – can come out of nowhere, so be ready. This is it.  

The moment that you have dreamt of all through the long dark winter, the long business meetings and the rain and the traffic jams and the late nights at the tying bench. It’s a moment that may only come once in your week – perhaps only once in your life – when you are suddenly attached to a true Yokanga leviathan. 
As my Norwegian friend  Stig Skokeng  likes to say: “Don’t f@ck it up.”

The key thing is to give the fish plenty of time to take the fly before smartly lifting the rod to set the hook. Bear in mind that monofilament running line has a lot of stretch, so bang that hook in hard, especially at long range. Once the fish is on the reel, take it easy and try not to pull too hard. Treat the fight like a boxing match. 

In the first few rounds, all the advantages are with the fish. In the heavy currents of early season, the fish can disappear downstream in a few short seconds, and people are routinely spooled on the river.

In order to avoid this, the first thing you should do is get out of the river and try – if possible – to get downstream of the fish, so that the fish is now fighting both you and the current.  
 

Look for slack water – you will have a huge advantage if you can find a back-eddy or bay in which to fight out the end-game. When the fish starts to really tire, draw it into the slack, where the lack of oxygen will really affect its ability to fight. 

The lack of powerful current also allows you to net the fish more efficiently and safely.

Don’t be in a rush, and wait until the fish is properly beaten before you draw it into your guide and his waiting net.

I’ll say it again. I’ve been lucky. I’ve fished Yokanga for nearly two decades, and I’ve caught some stunning fish.

Yet the real behemoth – the forty – the one that we all dream of, has so far eluded me.