The Winter Olympics are over. The days were packed with events, athletes that were beginning to look like Marvel heroes, and ever-more-sophisticated equipment. Suggestions for possible new Olympic sports were bandied about on air.
Actually, “bandy” is ice hockey played with a ball rather than a puck, and is very popular in northern Asian countries. It has often been suggested as an Olympic event.
There is another winter sport that could have been considered years ago, one that combined ice skating, speed skating, javelin skills and much courage. That sport was known as fish skating.
Fish skating was very popular locally, especially on Lac La Hache. Norm Wood recalled his experiences as a young member of an avid Lac La Hache fishing team.
“There were four members in our fish skating group: Hugh “Bunny” Ogden, Eric, Hugh’s son, Norm Ewart and me. We’d go out on weekends. There would be lots of other people on the lake. The condition of the ice had to be just right, thin and clear as glass, with no frost or snow on it. We went out one or two days after the first freeze. The ice would be just a few inches thick so it was rubbery and flexible.
“Two guys were needed. One had an axe and the other had a special ice fishing spear. The spear had two tongs on either side in a vee shape with a third, smaller metal rod in the center and a couple of barbs to hold the fish. It was all welded together. The fish would be guided into the center of the spear by the tongs and held there. The shaft of the spear would be 16 or 18 feet long. Most shafts were wooden but mine was made of round stock metal.
“The way it worked was just like herding cows. One guy would get on the top side. The other guy with the axe would go to a shallow bay where he figured the fish would be headed. He’d cut a hole, usually with three swipes of the axe. When the guy with the spear spotted a fish he would work it towards the hole by skating with it, playing it out. Then he’d skate around to the hole with the spear and the other guy would finish skating the fish to the hole where it would be speared and lifted out. One weekend we got 22 char and two ling.”
Johnny Felker once described a way to herd the fish that he found successful. He said when the fish were nearing the hole and the water was shallower you would pound on the ice which would stun the fish and make them easier to spear.
“Because the ice was so thin, fish skating was dangerous,” Wood continued. “We knew that some fishermen had drowned doing it. I fell through one time and didn’t know whether I was going to get out. The other guys found a pole on the shore nearby and I was able to grab that.
“While we were fishing there was a beautiful sight we would often see. You’d be skating along and there would be a school of small, silvery kokanee close to the surface. You would startle them so suddenly they would all turn together. The sun reflected off them and they would sparkle as they darted away.”
Old photos prove the success of fish skating. One picture shows a 20-pound char being lifted out of a hole. Another picture, circa 1938, shows Lac La Hache historian Molly Forbes as a young woman, and Gilbert Forbes and Archie McDougall on the ice with a pile of char at their feet. They are holding onto the shaft of a spear.
Some say that fish skating was probably introduced by French Canadians, either early settlers or fur traders who moved through the Cariboo. As far as any future for the sport is concerned, Wood said that it has been illegal for a long time. Probably a wise decision.
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