Caleb Wilson is a big fan of the often-overlooked burbot, and he says the best time to fish for them is at night. So, on March 19, he and his father Sean went out on the Kootenai River around sunset. They launched in Sean’s 18-foot jet boat along with their fishing buddies, Casey and Cooper Schaff.
“I think burbot are so underappreciated,” says Wilson, who works as a seasonal fisheries technician for the Idaho Fish and Game Department. “I love catching them, and the state of Idaho has brought back our burbot fishery in recent years from the near brink of disappearing in the Kootenai River.”
Wilson explains that the Kootenai is “about the only place for good burbot fishing” in Idaho. The big, wide river has plenty of deep water, which is where he typically finds the biggest fish.
“We ran downriver toward the Canadian border,” Wilson tells Outdoor Life. “It was a new spot we wanted to try.”
Once they reached their spot, the anglers rigged up heavy, 2-ounce glow-in-the-dark jigs with chunks of baitfish. Using a spot-lock trolling motor to hold the boat in position, they thumped bottom with the jigs in holes that were 30- to 50-feet deep.
Not long after the sun had set, Wilson hooked a fish deep, using 15-pound braided line and a short, 10-pound fluorocarbon leader.
“I knew I had a good fish, but I first thought it might have been a trout because it’s head was shaking as I brought it up,” says Wilson. “When I got it in the boat I knew it was a potential catch-and-release record.
“The Idaho release record was open, as almost everyone keeps burbot because they’re so delicious to eat. They’re known as the poor man’s lobster because they’re so good on a dinner plate.”
The anglers measured Wilson’s burbot at 26.75 inches long. Then they took some photos of the fish, released it, and kept on fishing. They caught and kept some smaller burbot to eat, and as soon as Wilson got home that night, he filled out the Idaho record application online. He says his fish was officially certified as a new catch-and-release record on April 23.
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Burbot get a whole lot bigger, though, especially in other waters. The all-tackle world record, caught in Saskatchewan, weighed just over 25 pounds.
“I know there are some bigger burbot in the Kootenai,” he says. “That’s my new fishing goal now: To break my own Idaho catch-and-release record.”
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