My 2025 Alaska Caribou Hunt

[Silas_Norris]

Absolutely fantastic story. Thanks for posting!

Grayling hand over fist on the tenkara us the kind of gravy I like

Yeah! The pilot advised we should not bring rods and so we almost didnt! I was standing outside the plane and he said we would be too high and the fish wont be there. I thought about it for a second and then thought, well we made weight so why not just bring them? I did mispeak on the rod set up! I brought a tenkara but my buddy had a small little ultralight spinning real! It did not matter what you threw at these fish, they wanted it all and were not afraid of your shadow or you walking right up next to them! I have never experienced that before! I compare them to trout fishing in these small streams but the difference was that trout are normally fearful if you get to close and they can see you! These fish really were not scared! You could catch a fish pretty much every cast. It almost got boring after a hour of that at at time so we really started targeting the largest ones we could find! I would of seriously regretted not having my tenkara.

That said, if weight is a concern for someone the tenkara is perfect. Mine weighs in at 4 ounces I believe. Some line and a half dozen flies only adds another ounce or so.

If even that much weight was a concern I would just bring some line and some flies. You could of taken a branch and made a rod that would of worked enough to catch some fish! At one point I grabbed the end of my line with my hand and just dropped it in the stream right below me and caught a couple! So, it did not take much to catch them! I am not sure if the grayling are always to friendly and hungry but they were for us.

I feel like they may have been trapped in the creek to some extent. It was very shallow and as we walked it it appeared that it may of trapped some of the fish in certain pools. Not sure though.

 

[medvedyt]

if there is no fishing pressure fish tend to no worry about what they do not know like birds (grouse) or even moose or caribou and even bear. if they do not know what you can do they tend to be curious ...

 

[kwackkillncrew]

Hey there! I think you might of private messaged me but in case anyone else is reading this I wanted to reply publicly as well. The area we hunted required a RCXXX form/tag (forgive me if I am using the wrong language here). This is a over the counter unit (Unit 69B is where we hunted).

lets not blast units, also fixed it for you.

 

[Silas_Norris]

lets not blast units, also fixed it for you.

Sorry. I edited that out

 

[Silas_Norris]

if there is no fishing pressure fish tend to no worry about what they do not know like birds (grouse) or even moose or caribou and even bear. if they do not know what you can do they tend to be curious ...

You can see the fish in the stream! Kinda cool!

 

[COCowboy]

Hey there! I think you might of private messaged me but in case anyone else is reading this I wanted to reply publicly as well. This is an over the counter unit. This unit has a quota of I believe 100 bull caribou and was filled sometime by the end of the first week of September if i recall correctly. Usually when you book with a outfitter or pilot they will try to make sure you are flying in prior to when the quota is likely going to be hit in that area but that may be something you also want to research independently.
We originally planned to go in September. I prefer hard horned animals and also knew that meat care would be easier in the cooler temps! I also did not want to deal with as many bugs etc. Because we believed the quota may not last much into September we decided that the end of August would be best for us. This was sort of a "in between" time. Some bulls were shedding while we were there and had their winter coats while others appeared to show no signs of shedding or winter coats. It was overall a great time to hunt and I would hunt the end of August again! Because some were completely shed and others completely not shed, it would also be a great time if you had some people that had different preferences. While you may not be able to be TOO picky depending on how many caribou are around, it would not of been to hard to find a bull that was shed or one that was not depending on what you are looking for. That was not a deal breaker for us at all but I know that people have their preferences. If you end up booking I am happy to jump on a call or exchange private messages with anyone to offer any advice I can!

There was a few guys on here that really really helped me for planning my trip! Dexter Grayson is on this forum and he happily answered all my dumb questions for several weeks! He has hunted Alaska for many years and was a great resource for me! He also has a few youtube videos out there to watch some of his hunts.

Thanks for getting back to me with such great info @Silas_Norris !
I definitely have more questions but I think I have to wait for my 7 days before I can PM (haven’t tried yet). I’d like to post them here too for others to learn from, but am also sensitive to not publishing too much specific info in a public forum. Between road hunters and antler hunters in my area, I’ve seen what a negative impact this can have on habitat and hunts.
My understanding is that the “registration” hunts can be paused or cancelled at any time based on the biologists understanding of herd health, location, vulnerability etc. Is the registration tag what you’re calling an OTC or is that a third option? Perhaps one that has a little more certainty (assuming you get there before quota is met) than the registration hunt?
I have lots to learn, but my understanding so far is the only guaranteed tags are draw tags. Obviously, the odds of drawing are on the order of winning PowerBall, but I’m going to put in (and donate to AK F&G) while I continue to learn about other options when I inevitably fail to draw.
I look forward to following up with you soon!

 

[Silas_Norris]

Thanks for getting back to me with such great info @Silas_Norris !
I definitely have more questions but I think I have to wait for my 7 days before I can PM (haven’t tried yet). I’d like to post them here too for others to learn from, but am also sensitive to not publishing too much specific info in a public forum. Between road hunters and antler hunters in my area, I’ve seen what a negative impact this can have on habitat and hunts.
My understanding is that the “registration” hunts can be paused or cancelled at any time based on the biologists understanding of herd health, location, vulnerability etc. Is the registration tag what you’re calling an OTC or is that a third option? Perhaps one that has a little more certainty (assuming you get there before quota is met) than the registration hunt?
I have lots to learn, but my understanding so far is the only guaranteed tags are draw tags. Obviously, the odds of drawing are on the order of winning PowerBall, but I’m going to put in (and donate to AK F&G) while I continue to learn about other options when I inevitably fail to draw.
I look forward to following up with you soon!

I will PM you more info

 

[COCowboy]

I wanted to edit the middle paragraph of my last post as it might be a bit too detailed, but for some reason the option isn’t there