Category Archives: Minipi wildlife

Minipi Virgins No More

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For as long as I can remember my husband Dave has always wanted to go to Minipi. With wide eyes and excitement, he described how he’s always wanted to catch a trophy brook trout! In fact, the brookie was our first trout species we caught on a fly rod!

We were lucky to book the last week of the season this year. It was time for brookie nookie (spawning) so fishing was a bit tougher. Challenge accepted!

With my first cast on Little Minipi, I caught and landed the biggest brookie of my life! I was in awe over all 7 1/2 pounds of its masculine spawning colors! Feelings of excitement, amazement, disbelief and pure exhilaration consumed me! He was a beautiful specimen, I was honored to catch & release him.

The rest of the week was whipped cream with cherries on top (catching even more brookies). You couldn’t slap the big smile off my face! Anne Marie Lodge is beautiful, comfortable and inviting. Even better were all the amazing guides and lodge staff that made our experience memorable. The guides are amazing! They’re all fishing veterans and are full of knowledge and great tips to land that fish! They’re patient, offer guidance when needed, and all have a great sense of humor – I laughed all week!

Well, after a week at Minipi, we caught brookie fever/Minipi mania! We’re already planning our return for dry fly action and are soooo excited to return!

For now, we leave the trout to procreate to keep our fishing dreams alive.

“Minipi: where the brook trout are measured in pounds, not inches”

Here’s a few photos from our trip! Click to view full size.

Pike for Variety

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The rare opportunity to catch brook trout of huge proportions lures us all to Minipi. Landlocked Arctic char also belong on every fly fishers life list. However, pike offer a great secondary target and change of pace. They can run up to 20 pounds, and even the smaller fish provide exciting fishing with their vicious, slashing strikes. I always carry a small bag with a few simple rabbit strip leech flies, black or purple, some on weedless hooks, some on plain worm hooks.

Extremely simple to tie (they only require one material), they are equally simple to rig. Use braided tieable or knotable wire. Store-bought wire leaders will work, too. The pike are especially active in early season, in the few weeks after ice-out in many coves of Minipi and Anne Marie. During the summer, weedbeds and lily pads provide cover, where the ‘water wolves’ lie in ambush for their prey. Even a small patch of lily pads will normally hold a few pike. An eight-weight rod and floating line, with a seven or eight-foot leader of 15 or 20 pounds, topped with about eight or ten inches of the wire completes the pike outfit. Cast beyond the weeds or pads and strip your fly medium fast, close to the cover. And be ready for the explosion.

Pike For Variety 02

Minipi Loons

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Whenever I think of Labrador, I usually think first of the big, beautiful Brook Trout who call this place home. But not far behind… there are the Loons. One of Canada’s national emblems… a symbol of all that is wild and beautiful about this special place.

This female Loon with her young was one of Labrador’s most welcome surprises for me. This particular female was very tolerant of nosy visitors who wanted only to take a few photos and admire her. She was there to greet us every day when we went by on the way to our fishing spots. As long as we didn’t press her too closely, she was proud to show off her young ones. Get too close and she would voice her displeasure with the haunting cry for which they are famous. That distance might vary from day to day with 30 feet being agreeable to her one day and 40 feet the next day. We actually did press a little too closely one day and her mate, who was 100 yards away swam over to us with a minnow in his beak.

Loon with Minnow

He swam up to our boat and tried to lure us away from his mate which we allowed him to do.  We then left them in peace.  There were a number of different Loons at each lodge site, but this particular pair were the only ones who would allow a close approach.  It made for a very memorable trip to see and photograph them.  A rare opportunity and a wonderful gift from a very special place.