Why is winter associated with pike

cheers

I think, Leeds, that the answer is twofold.

Firstly, in the summertime the pike tend use up more energy in the fight and, being fragile, this can result in a lot more fatalities when they fail to recover from the capture. Thus a lot of pike fisherman leave them be until the autumn and winter when the fish have a better chance of survival after being caught. Obviously a lot of people do fish for them all year round, and I'm sure with care and attention fatalities can be avoided.

Secondly, until recently, it was more difficult to fish for a lot of other species in winter and so your summer carpers and so on might have a bash at pike in the cold months, not for reason number one, but simply because pike fishing was better than no fishing. With the advent of the commercials a lot of other species are catchable all year.

I'm not sure if these are the only reasons - but added together they created the winter pike fishing season in years gone by.

I'm sure more knowledgable folk will be able to add to this.

I've had my first two pike fishing sessions of the season this week. Caught nowt. :-(

Cheers,
Del

On a cold and frosty morning I too wonder the same thing.

The reason that pike become an attractive proposition in the colder months is because they are generally much bigger than their summer levels. Both from autumn eating binges putting on fat for the winter and from spawn carried through to spring.