Fishing Under the Ice | Life Below Zero
♪ CHIP: When you're providing things, you're doing things, it's so much easier when you're done with the work to sit back and enjoy than to spend a whole day doing nothing. ♪
♪ CAROL: Come to me, fishy, fishy.
WADE: That sounded new to me, too.
AGNES: No contact.
CHIP: Look at that. I caught leaves. (laughs) Today, we're fishing down in a place called O'lokatok. My wife assures me it's a good place. As a kid, she used to go down with her sister. We eat a lot of fish, especially with the decline of the caribou, and we need some dog food, and we need some people food. This time of year, we have two kinds of fish here. There are sheefish and there's the pike that are out to get the sheefish. Well, I intend to catch them both, so, yeah, we'll see how that goes.
WADE: Why do we have to do this?
CHIP: So we can eat the fish. If you don't eat, you go hungry. You know when the caribou are gone and the rabbits are gone, ptarmigan are down.
WADE: Just fish.
CHIP: Fishing is still pretty good. Like hunting, do you like to hunt for your family?
WADE: Yeah.
CHIP: You can fish for your family. You can get your anaa fish. You can get your mom fish. You can get all your aunties fish. You can get your uncle some fish.
WADE: Hope I get one.
CHIP: I hope so, too.
AGNES: Chip and I decided to take Wade Kelly out fishing. Bringing the kid out to spend the night camping is really important while he's young so he'll want to go back out there, get more fish, and provide for his family.
CHIP: Just 'cause the fish aren't here right now doesn't mean they won't be here later, so you can always try these holes again. Another thing, we can go put holes all the way along the river if we felt like it.
AGNES: Could go a little bit farther out still.
CHIP: Yeah. 'Cause I'm, I've got about that much water between the ice.
AGNES: Oh, I caught one!
CHIP: Whoa, whoa, sheefish!
AGNES: A little one.
CHIP: Sheefish, sheefish.
AGNES: Yay! (Chip laughs) Yes!
WADE: Whip it! Are you gonna whip it?
AGNES: I got it already.
CHIP: See, Grandson. Here, you trade me holes.
WADE: Lucky my anaa catch one. We're gonna have fish for dinner.
AGNES: Oh, I caught one!
WADE: She catch two of 'em!
CHIP: Yeah. Your anaa's a good fisherwoman.
AGNES: (laughs) No, I just was thinking-- oh, I got one!
CHIP: Again? Man! Three different holes, at that. Gee whiz!
AGNES: Every hole!
CHIP: Wow, just go over here and bless mine, would ya? Wow! She is fishing circles around us, literally, look at this. Right around us.
WADE: We got three fish now because of my anaa.
CAROL: Got one.
WADE: What?
CHIP: Oh, a big one?
WADE: Just leave a fish for me.
AGNES: Oh, I caught one, too!
CAROL: Pull it! Oh, man, you guys.
AGNES: I got a siulik!
CHIP: Oh, me, too! Oh, me, too, look at that. Oh, I got a pike, too. Woo-hoo! Wow, two siuliks at once.
CAROL: What are you guys doing? (laughs)
WADE: I hope I get one.
AGNES: Grandson, the trick is not to let your line loose. Always keep it tight like this. Look, tight. And your fish won't get away.
CHIP: You'll learn, Grandson. Ooh, I got one.
AGNES: Hey, hey!
WADE: A big one, bigger than all of them.
AGNES: Hey, right on, Carol, woo-hoo!
WADE: Oh, she finally got one. Oh, I got one!
CHIP: Keep going, Grandson, keep going.
CHIP: Oh, he got a fish stick! (laughing) All right! Grandson, come over here. I'll make a new hole for me. Come on, you can come fish further, where you can catch something. Come on.
WADE: I thought I got one, but it was just that stick.
AGNES: It's really important to, um, make sure we keep trying until he catches a fish, and that way he'll get that feeling of, you know, providing, and that's very important that he gets that if he wants to be a hunter when he grows up.
WADE: I just want to catch one fish! ♪