Help with Tullibees?

[scotta]

Im interested in trying to smoke some tullibee. Ive been smoking some recently caught trout with good results. I have never fished for tullibee before. Do they roam the open basin water? Anybody willing to give me some info? I dont need specific lakes or spots, just a general idea of how to fish for them. I guess I should ask if they are a good fish to smoke? I have a few ideas on lakes to try. Any help would be great. Thanks

[The Hammer]

Scotta,

Tulibee are a good fish to smoke. My dad use to net them on various lakes around Minnesota including Mille Lacs. They usually can be found suspended on the big lakes like Mille Lacs and Leech. In years past we would fish them with wax worms but no particular spots on the lake. I do not know where to target them. We caught a few on Lake of the Woods a few weeks ago.

Good luck

Hammer

[DEADhead]

look for mud flats over deep basins. tullibee are pelagic so they'll be in open basins and can be found anywhere throughout the water column. Use a little spoon, take the hook off, tie on a 12-18" leader and tie on a small jig or ice fly and tip with waxies. keep jigging and if tullies are in the vicinity they will come in to your lure. action will pick up during late ice.

[fisherdog19]

Dead, I caught another one on Lida this morning, and had about 5 other ones on my flasher. They were chasing my jig around like crazy but I could only get one to bite. Just though you might want to know.

[Ray1]

Here are a few good tulibee lakes around the DL area , star, pelican, rose, and lida. Theres alot more but these are the ones ive fished.

[DEADhead]

thanks for heads up Peter. May have to get out this week and try for some...

[Dahitman44]

Long Lake by the Perham/ Frazee area has been the best Tulibee fishing I have ever been on. The action gets better as the season goes on. March is the best.

[fisherdog19]

Are they better than 10 inches

[scotta]

I was crappie fishing out on long lake last winter and caught a few. They were 12 inches or so. I was fishing in the narrows. I didnt keep any. Ive never had the urge to smoke fish before. Do they school tightly in late winter? I havnt fished long this year yet, but Im fairly impressed with the size of fish. Most of the fish that Ive caught have been pretty decent. I definately wouldnt mind putting a small dent in the tullibee population. Does anybody know if frozen smoked fish keeps, or if it loses flaver like frozen fish does? I suppose I could freeze the fish and then smoke em as I eat em. I have just been using pickeling salt as my cure, but am thinking about using a little brown sugar curing salt. Any ideas or suggestions?

[DEADhead]

I freeze my smoked fish all the time and it does not lose any flavor, however, my fish are vaccuum packed and then frozen in a deep freezer. I use canning salt and brown sugar, but avoid using "cure"; the whole reason I like to smoke food myself is to avoid consuming sodium nitrate and sodium nitrate. Those two ingredients are carcinogens and can contribute to colon cancer and have been linked to COPD. I realize that they have antimicrobial properties and prevent botulism, but my fish aren't cold smoked, they are basically "cooked" in the water smoker and are consumed within a few days after smoking.

Here's a little insight to my fish smoking process:

I've use a propane smoker, the great oudoors smoky mountain model, 36" x 14" x 16". It works great, I can usually smoke 10 fish (20 fillets) at a time. I use a dry brine of canning/pickling salt. The wet brine is much too salty for me. I cover the fillets in salt to they are covered liberally. A lot of times I am smoking previously frozen fish; I leave the brine on for 15 minutes, rinse, and then let dry on cooking racks until the pellicle forms (about an hour). I then typically cover the fillets with brown sugar and smoke. I have also put cracked pepper on the fillets and they turned out amazing. I smoke the fillets on as low as heat as possible for the first couple hours, then I bring the temp up to about between 185-205, depending on the ambient weather, until the internal temp of the fish reach 165". Note that I put the fish in the smoker, after my chips have begun to start smoking. If you put the fish in at the same time with fresh chips, you start cooking the flesh before the smoke starts to get absorbed.

I've also brined fish in the past with brown sugar and Hawaiian soy sauce (Aloha Shoyu). I don't reccomend using soy sauces from the grocery store like Kikkoman or others like that because they are WAY too salty. Hawaiian style soy sauces are much sweeter and not quite as salty. If you go to an Asian market, they should be able to direct you to a sweeter soy sauce like Kim-Lan. I've had co-workers use garlic salt for flavoring smoked sockeye, and I've used it before as well on rainbows. To be honest, I don't detect the flavor much, as the smoke usually covers up the taste. Brown Sugar and salt or soy sauce work the best for me.

I've got one tullibee sitting in my freezer waiting to be smoked. I'm waiting for a few more of his friends to join in before I smoke my next batch... YUM!

[Dahitman44]

F-Dog --

You bet they are.

at least 10.5 inches