A Record Taimen Season

It’s been an outstanding season for records at Fish Mongolia this year. Our previous record Taimen on the fly was caught right in front of camp in September 2006 by Sam Wakerley on his second Taimen fly-fishing trip with us; this Taimen was estimated at around 54 inches (137cm).

Sam Wakerley with 54 inch Taimen, September 2006. Photo: Oliver Hearsey

The first week of September 2007 saw perfect water conditions, and exceptional Taimen fishing. James Schaefer joined a group of five anglers from Hong Kong with Tom Gorman on a fly-in float trip. The first day of the trip saw James land five Taimen up to 45 inches; an incredible day and sign of things to come. The week continued with Taimen on the bite. Mid-week we floated over the ‘drop pool’ and the other Jim on the trip hooked and lost a monster. Next morning James hiked back up from our overnight camp and persistently surfed a gurgler down that same rapid. Result; a 55 incher (140cm) hooked landed and released. Unfortunately James didn’t manage to get a photo, but we do believe him :-) .

James Schaefer with a 20 lb taimen. Photo: Chinzorig

But believe it or not James’ record lasted only a week. The following week saw a group from Planet Fly-fishing in France, and including Japanese artist Yoshi. This was Yoshi’s fourth Taimen fishing trip; he had already been to Mongolia twice, too other camps, and once to Russia in search of big Taimen. Unfortunately his efforts had been frustrated, and while he had caught Taimen, the big ones had eluded him. Yoshi was desperate to catch a monster Taimen.


Yoshi hooks a big taimen. Photo: Andy Parkinson

We thought we got off to a good start. Yoshi hooked a very respectable taimen of around 50 inches and played it to the bank. The next thing we knew, Yoshi was sat on the bank crying, with only a lenok on his line. What had happened? Well it seems that Lenok was the one that took Yoshi’s fly, only to be immediately swallowed by the big Taimen. And that big taimen not wanting to give up his meal, fought like he was hooked; only when he was in the shallows did he regurgitate the lenok and swim off. Yoshi was left with a very unhappy lenok, still covered in Taimen digestive juices.

Yoshi with an unhappy Lenok, straight from the belly of the beast. Photo: Andy Parkinson

Not one to give up easily, the next evening after a tough days fishing, Yoshi walked up to the home pool at camp for an extra hour fishing at dusk; prime time for big fish. This time the God’s smiled upon him. He hooked, played and landed the biggest Taimen in the river: and he did this solo. The Taimen measured 150.5cm against his rod, that’s just under 60 inches, nearly as tall as Yoshi himself.

150 cm Taimen, Rod; G. Loomis GLX 15ft 10/11 wt. Photo: Yoshi



Photo: Andy Parkinson

On the subject of records, we can only guess at the weights of these Taimen, as we don’t net or weigh them, and we certainly don’t kill any; all our Taimen fishing is strictly catch and release, and we take great care in handling the fish. You won’t see any of these Taimen being submitted for IGFA tippet class records; although we are sure some would qualify. We’ll leave IGFA records to be subject of another blog post.

Yoshi returns the Taimen to the river. Mission accomplished. Photo: Yoshi.