-
THE
CENTRAL FINLAND SURPRISES
- Roberto
Ferrario
In this
wonderful and wild area of Scandinavia there is a huge
number of rivers and lakes full of brown trout and other
predators.
The central Finland is the
region of rapids, rivers and huge lakes rich of
different kinds of fishes. The wide lake area and the
immense forests offer the ideal conditions for a
wonderful fishing trip and relaxation in the nature.
The rapids of this region, as the one of Kuusaankosky,
are renowned in all Europe. This region can be reached
by plane in less than 1 hour from the capital Helsinki
or by car in little more than 3-1/2 hours.
DIVERSITY OF FISHING
 The main fish of these
waters are the brown trouts, wild fishes, very
aggressive and with an incredible stamina; the average
size is around 1 kilo with common catch of 2-3 kilos;
some record fishes more than 6 kilos were caught in this
region.
To maintain high the hooking ratio, every year the
regional fishing organization stocks the main rivers
with thousand of juvenile brown trouts.
Huge numbers of perch populate every lake of this region
and here every year fish over 1 kilos are caught. Good
numbers of pike and zander are the main catch for spin
fishermen with a good average number of catch per day.
The Finnish record for pike is a specimen of 17 kilos
even if some books report a pike of 24 kilos. Any way
the average size is between 2 to 4 kilos with rare fish
over 10 kilos.
Every lake here seems to has predominate fish; there are
lakes full of bream, other full of perch and so on. So a
good guide that knows the area is very important for a
successful trip.
One of the biggest lake of the region and of whole
Finland is the Pajanne, with a length of over 150
kilometers and where can be found a good population of
landlocked salmon.
Fishing with natural bait is allowed everywhere with no
license, but for all other fishing a regional license is
absolutely compulsory. In some private area, like rapids,
is necessary also to pay a daily permit.
THE RAPIDS' QUEENS
With some other 3 friends I have had the way to fish in
this region during the month of June and notwithstanding
a cold weather due to a delay in the best season, we
have had an high number of catch.
Brown trout, ide and pike were the main catch and we
found them aggressive mainly in the morning and from
late afternoon until late evening.
Our purpose was to explore the area around the town of
Jyvaskyla and mainly target brown trout in rivers with
fast moving waters and rapids.
We choose a small cottage placed on the bank of a
wonderful and quite lake near the little town of Kuusa.
From here every day we drove to the fishing places, not
far more than 15 minutes by car.
The best and more prolific rapids of all area are the
one of Kapeenkosky, Keskisenkosky and Kuusaankosky.
On the first rapids we caught a good number of brown
trout iven if the fishing wasn’t absolutely easy; any
way the size of the fishes were between 1 and 1½ kilos.
These trouts here are really great fighters and to catch
them in fast moving waters is always a big thrill;
sometimes they won the fighting breaking the nylon line
that wasn’t always under 0.25 of diameter.
In these tea colored rapids, trouts seem appreciate
morning hours and late evening hours and always eat
lures of medium dimensions like Rapala Countdown 7 and 9
centimeters; instead on the central day hours 5
centimeters lures worked a little bit better.
These rapids give us other emotions with some fishes
different from brown trouts, in fact we had the way to
catch some pikes until 3 kilos, few small zander and
perch. Very strange, we caught also 2 bream of about 1
kilos that eat our artificial lures. We caught all these
fishes where the water was more quiet with slow current
and deeper holes.
In this and last season in these rapids were caught nice
size fishes like brown trout of over 3 kilos and pike
until 13 kilos.
 Here our guides Jani and Juha had special rights to fish
in these waters and they dispose of 2 small boats to
fish in central part of the river and where isn’t
possible fish from the shore. Near the rapids there are
also facilities for barbecue, for a coffee stop or
simply relax.
The second rapids that we visited during our fishing
trip where the one of Keskisenkosky, smaller than the
first rapids and with a jin color water. Here the waters
hasn’t an high speed and is less turbulent.
Unfortunately we haven’t had a lot of luck finding a bad
day with a drop down of temperatures, lot of rain and
wind, so brown trouts stopped their feeding activity. So
after a few hours of fishing with no action our guide
Petri Korhonen decided to move downstream with a rowing
boat to do some pike fishing in quite waters. Biting was
surely positive with some good action, but the fishes
were smaller with a maximum of 3,5 kilos.
Any way we found this action as a valid alternative to
choose when trout fishing isn’t positive.
The rapids where we have had more success where the one
near the town of Kuusa, the big and powerful rapids of
Kuusaankosky. These rapids are the most famous of all
central Finland region and also of all over the county
due to the abundance of brown trout and other predators.
Here we caught an high number of brown trouts, more than
20, until 2 kilos, ide of 1 kilos and some small pikes.
We fished only from the boat, that with the help of a
Finnish guide is the best solution to have good chances
of catch and reach the best hot spots. Here there is
also a good fishing organization with two excellent
guides Juha Happonen and Koikkalainen that dispose
several boats for the different fishing situation.
Very close at the rapids there is also an hotel
restaurant where is possible to spent the week or simply
stop and relax or to eat something.
Up and down these huge rapids there are areas with calm
water that are the ideal habitat for pike and zander.
During the day we fished these rapids we caught brown
trouts mainly with Rapala lures as Countdown, Team Esko
and Glass Shad Rap. Any way some of the best trouts were
caught in an unusual way; our guide Timo told us that
sometimes trouts eat on the surface big lure (popper)
and in particular 7 centimeters Skitter Pop. I was very
skeptical but my fishing partner Sirpa wanted to give a
try. She insisted until she caught a nice size ide and
few casts later a 2 kilos brown trout. I immediately
wanted to give a try and a nice size trout didn’t
esitate to eat my lure.
I was really impressed to see how many aggressively
these predators demonstrated jumping completely out of
the water eating the lure on the surface. I haven’t ever
seen a so wonderful trout action; it was a great fishing
experience and a new technique that I learn. With this
technique we was able to catch a good number of good
size brown trout.
SEASONS
Best seasons for this region or better for these rapids
is from June to September with June surely the best
month for brown trout. During this month the weather is
warm and there is the "midnight sun" so with more light
also during the night and so with more hours for fishing.
 Productive is also August, but the fishing is different,
in fact fishing is mainly done during the night with
complete darkness. These because during the day is
usually very sunny and hotter and brown trout, but also
pike and zander, tend to eat and become aggressive
mainly during night hours.
In these region brown trout close season runs from 15
September to 15 November; so when brown trout season
open, a magic moment starts. After 2 months with no
fishing pressure and after spawning, trouts are
aggressive, voracious and no suspicious. On good days
more than 20 brown trout per angler are common. The only
negative point is that in mid November rarely the
temperature arrives at 0 degrees with an average of -10
degrees Celsius!
For detailed information about fishing in the region the
best way is to visit the web site
www.fisufishing.com where you can find all you need to plan a fishing trip.
During my trip I have the way to fish with several
different guides, every one specialized for a specific
stretch of the rive or fishing area.
GUIDES
AND ACCOMODATION
-
Regarding Kapeenkosky rapids I suggest
-
- For
Keskisenkoski rapids, the best guide is
-
- For
Kuusankosky rapids, contact
- (this is surely the
best guide that I have ever fished with)
-
- For
accommodations near the rapids, visit
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