- 6 months ago
Documentary, River Monsters S02E05 Alaskan Horror
Category
🐳
AnimalsTranscript
00:00I'm Jeremy Wade, biologist and extreme angler in search of freshwater monsters.
00:14I normally track down these beasts in the tropics.
00:18I've never searched for one in the sub-arctic before.
00:23On these lakes deep in the Alaskan wilderness, people have been going missing without trace for as long as anyone can remember.
00:29There are native myths of a monster that's killing them.
00:35People have just disappeared out of their boats.
00:38Whatever it was in the water, they were afraid to just come up and swallow them.
00:42It has no fear of taking on boats and their propellers.
00:46Motor prop, you can see teeth marks on it.
00:49There have been many strange sightings as well.
00:52He said he could see on the surface of the water a large octopus.
00:56He judged the length of the arms to be near 100 feet.
01:00I'm going to investigate whether there really is a deadly monster from the deep, killing all these people.
01:05It's quite possible this is the biggest fish that I've ever had on the end of my line.
01:10One of my obsessions is tracking down freshwater monsters throughout the world's rivers.
01:27But a story of one monster in an Alaskan lake particularly caught my imagination.
01:44There are many myths of lake monsters all around the world, from places such as Loch Ness in Scotland and Lake Tianxi in China.
01:52No one's sure these creatures have actually been seen, but this monster in Lake Clark and Iliamna is different.
01:59Since the 1940s, bush pilots have been flying over this remote area and sightings seem to be getting more and more frequent.
02:09There are reports of it being up to 20 feet long.
02:12What are these mysterious shapes in the water?
02:15And are they causing people to drown and disappear into the depths without leaving a trace?
02:20People have tried to prove its existence for many years.
02:2530 years ago there was even a $100,000 reward put on its head.
02:30That's half a million in today's money.
02:32This kind of bounty attracted many monster hunters, from serious fishermen to someone who tried to lure it out of the water by playing music.
02:45All these attempts failed and eventually the reward was withdrawn.
02:50With still no hard proof, it would be easy to dismiss this monster as pure fantasy.
02:55But I believe these stories must have come from somewhere, and there is something down there in the depths.
03:10This is my first trip to Alaska, and my journey starts by going deep into its wilderness.
03:20I normally fish in the tropics, and I'm out of my element in a land of bottomless icy lakes, jagged mountains and Arctic tundra.
03:31As a proportion of its population, more people go missing in this forbidding landscape than in any other state in the US.
03:38The best way into this isolated area is by plane, threading your way through narrow mountain passes, where conditions can deteriorate in a moment.
03:51There are many legends of this monster.
03:53But between the smoke of the clouds and mirrors of the lakes, could it actually exist?
04:00My investigation to find out will focus on two connected bodies of water.
04:06Lake Clark and Lake Iliamna, which together cover an area of over 1,000 square miles, roughly the size of Rhode Island.
04:17The larger of the two, Lake Iliamna is 77 miles long and 22 miles wide, making it the largest freshwater lake in Alaska.
04:25Both lakes reach staggering depths of up to 1,000 feet.
04:31With such a vast area of water, I've probably got more chance of winning the lottery than catching this monster on my own.
04:38The best way to start my search is to gain some local knowledge.
04:42There are actually quite a few communities dotted around the lakes.
04:48These are the people who will have been here literally for generations and these will be the people who have the stories about the monster.
04:54So they're the people I want to talk to.
05:12People have lived on this land for more than 7,000 years, and for centuries they've fished these lakes, wearing lightweight, waterproof parkas made from seal gut.
05:24These isolated communities have a strong ancestral tradition of myths and legends, including the Lake Monster.
05:32I'm meeting up with the Hill family, who are Athabaskan native Alaskans.
05:37They have a fishing camp on the northern shore of Lake Iliamna.
05:39If you look at the shape of the lake on the map, it has the shape of a fish.
05:47There's a large head tapering down to...
05:50A tail.
05:51A tail.
05:52And the legend is that's how this lake was formed.
05:54There's this huge fish trapped by the mountains, and when a fish is dying or laying on the side, it flops like that and kind of makes a hole.
06:02Some people say even the name Iliamna means a great black fish.
06:12Could this be biting holes in people's boats?
06:15People just wouldn't paint their boats a certain colour, and you didn't want to paint the bottom of the boat red.
06:28I guess there's some connection between painting the bottom of your boat red and the boat disappearing.
06:32The red could have attracted the predatory monster, thinking it was blood from some injured prey.
06:39These legends of the monster are clearly ingrained within local culture.
06:50But I need to find stories of the monster that are still within living memory, and I found one on Lake Clark.
06:56Pilot and town mayor Glen Oldsworth Sr. recalls what happened to an aircraft mechanic in the late 1940s.
07:06The gentleman working for us was trying to catch these large lake trout, but he kept having them break the line.
07:15And so, being an aircraft mechanic, he got some aircraft cable, which is very, very strong.
07:20So, on his normal sort of lake trout tackle, he was just getting broken off several times, so that's when he put the cable down there.
07:28He kept getting broken off.
07:30The mechanic then fashioned his own hook and fixed it to the end of the cable.
07:35This was then tied to a washed up tree stump.
07:39He knew that he had a line there that fish would not break, and so he decided whatever kind of monster was busting off his line, that wasn't going to happen to him again.
07:50Confident that he'd get his fish this time, he left and planned to come back the next morning.
07:55A neighbor that lived by the river observed that stump passing by against the wind in the lake.
08:24It was very rough, and this gentleman that observed this was very surprised that how could this tree stump be moving against the water, against the wind and the waves.
08:34Glame has told me the exact spot where the stump, weighing nearly 200 pounds, was ripped from the shore and dragged into the water.
08:50I'm going to see what I can catch at this location.
08:57I've brought a tent with me, I've also brought my rod, and I'm going to be throwing a bait into this very same area of the lake.
09:04This is not the kind of rod you'd normally see being used in fresh water. This is sort of a marine big game rod.
09:14Normally be put to use pulling in shark, marlin, tuna, that kind of thing, but everything I've heard about this place, there's stuff in here every bit as big as those animals.
09:23There's a steep drop-off that's further than I can cast the heavy line, so I'm using a kayak to get my bait to a spot where a giant might hide.
09:41Something that could drag a tree stump into the lake could easily knock a small boat over.
09:48The water in these lakes is only 50 degrees.
09:52If I was tossed into the water here, my body would seize up, and I'd drown.
09:57In these icy waters, bodies sink rather than float, and at depths of up to a thousand feet, mine might never be found.
10:05With the bait out, the plan is to leave it lying on the bottom overnight, and see if I can tempt the monster onto my line.
10:20It's just a waiting game now.
10:26It's getting close to night, but during the Alaskan summer, it never gets completely dark.
10:35It's actually very strange being up in the Alaskan night, because it's well after midnight now, and I can see the far bank.
10:47I can see the horizon there. I can see the mist over the mountains.
10:51So it's a very sort of strange, otherworldly place.
10:55The bait has been in the water for over 12 hours. If the monster was nearby and hungry, it would have taken it by now.
11:06There's nothing there.
11:10The bait's still there.
11:16When the weather comes in, the lakes are covered in an eerie fog.
11:20I heard this story about something coming again and again for fish in the water.
11:27And I went there and offered a prime piece of fish, and there's nothing doing at all.
11:35The stories I've heard from the Alaskan natives shroud these lakes in myths and legends.
11:40Such as if you see the monster, a tragedy will soon befall your family.
11:46In conditions like these, the brain becomes very suggestible, and it's easy for your mind to play tricks on you.
11:53I actually thought I saw something back there, and I did a real double take, but I think it was just the dark, long face of a wave.
12:01And I can really imagine how, if you're out here any amount of time, you know, you're going to see things possibly even if there's nothing there.
12:10This place has a special atmosphere.
12:12But I'm a rationalist. I've got to stay detached and not let my imagination get in the way.
12:22To move this investigation on, I need to find out if people have actually come into contact with the monster.
12:27Hello, Bill.
12:30I'm meeting up with Bill Trefon, who is Alaskan native Dinaina.
12:34His family has been living on Lake Clark for generations.
12:37I heard that your parents had an encounter with some large unknown creature in the lake a while ago.
12:44They were about maybe a mile out, and all of a sudden their motor just stopped.
12:57My dad was going to start working on it, and my mother saw where behind him a big tail came up and went down.
13:12Motor prop, you could see teeth marks on it.
13:19What did they think it was?
13:20I think it was a pike.
13:25And you've got, they're a pike in the lake? They're a big pike in the lake?
13:27Oh yeah, there's some pikes in the lake.
13:30Did your mother have any idea how big it might have been?
13:35Judging from the tails, you thought maybe 12 feet long.
13:3912 feet.
13:40So going back generations, people say that if you actually see one of these big fish, it's actually, it's like a bad sign.
13:55They're superstitious about it, you know.
13:59They see the big fish, something will happen in your family, they don't know who or when.
14:04My mother saw it, my dad drowned it next summer.
14:07Tragedies like Bill's father drowning only help to strengthen the legends surrounding the monster.
14:17But this story has given me some vital information as to what it could be.
14:23Attacking a propeller suggests it is a sight predator.
14:27It's not some deep water scavenger, but it's active on the surface.
14:31This all fits with it being a pike, which is what Bill's mother thought she saw.
14:38To see if the pike here really can reach such a monstrous size, I have to catch one.
14:44Fish on! Fish on!
14:45I'm in a remote part of Alaska, looking for a lake monster that reportedly lives in these freezing waters.
15:02A fish the size of what I've been hearing could actually sink a boat.
15:04I've got my first suspect, a giant pike that attacked a boat, which I'm now trying to catch.
15:11This is Chilitna Bay, near where the boat was attacked and where locals say the biggest pike are.
15:17I've come across pike in warm water before, but I've no idea how big they can grow in these glacial conditions.
15:25A pike has hundreds of needle sharp teeth that can cause serious damage to whatever it gets into its mouth, including humans.
15:33Glen Ellsworth Jr. has seen many times how voracious the pike around here can be.
15:40So you've actually seen them take birds?
15:42Yeah, I've seen them take birds, I've seen them take baby ducks and adult ducks.
15:46Adult ducks?
15:47I saw one eat a muskrat once right in this river.
15:50And pretty much anything they can fit their mouth around.
15:53Right.
15:54If a four or five foot pike can eat waterfowl and mammals, it seems logical that a twelve footer could be a man-eater.
16:04So what I've got here, I've got a lure that's sending out very, very strong signals.
16:09It's a very bright flash and a very strong vibrating throb.
16:14And I guess actually that was probably what was happening when that fish went for that propeller as well.
16:18Oh, that's a nice-sized fish, that's a nice-sized fish. Here we go, that's going again.
16:32That's a nice fish.
16:34Going under the boat, I don't want to go up the other side of the boat. Look at that lovely fish.
16:38Deep, lovely, clear water so you can see the fish really well.
16:41Right, that wasn't clear.
16:48A lovely Alaskan pike.
16:51Just do a quick measure here.
16:5440 inches. Lovely fish.
16:57A 40-inch pike is probably around 20 years old.
17:01The thing about a pike, if there's ever a fish where, you know, the way it looks tells you about the way it lives, I mean, that is the pike.
17:07I mean, it's, you know, head full of teeth at one end, not just on the jaws but on the tongue, on the gill rake as well.
17:14And they have eyes that make them a deadly sight predator.
17:19You can really see here these sighting grooves, sort of converging on the prey here.
17:24So a bit like sighting grooves on a rifle.
17:27And they can just judge the distance to the prey.
17:30And they're so wonderfully camouflaged here, just blending into weed.
17:34Very long, streamlined shape.
17:36And then you've got the dorsal fin right at the back of the body, so you've got a big propulsion unit.
17:40As soon as that prey comes within range, it lunges.
17:43And once it's in those teeth, there's just no getting away.
17:46So just a perfect predator, this fish.
17:52There she goes.
17:53I've seen that pike can certainly be aggressive.
18:01They'll hit a piece of vibrating, flashing metal on the end of a line.
18:06I suppose that once in a while, they might possibly hit a boat propeller.
18:13But the thing that's bothering me is that Bill Trafond's mother talked about seeing something that was 12 foot long.
18:19And pike just don't get that big.
18:22They'd be really pushed to reach even half that length.
18:25And at that size, they're not going to be knocking anybody out of a boat.
18:28And they're not going to be posing a threat to anybody in the water.
18:32So I'm doubtful that what Bill Trafond's parents encountered actually was a pike.
18:37But I do believe that what they encountered could have been the lake monster.
18:40But what is there in the water that can reach that kind of size?
18:49Something monstrous could have come in from the sea and into Lake Iliamna.
18:54Connecting the two is the Quijak River, which is 50 miles long.
18:58I've just seen some dark specks on a tiny little island down there hauled out on some gravel.
19:06And those are freshwater seals.
19:07Now this is one of very, very few places in the world where you have seals in fresh water.
19:12And it does bring home the fact that although we call this expanse of water a lake, it's just so huge.
19:18And if the seals have managed to get in here from the ocean, it does make you wonder what else might have gone in as well.
19:23Salmon sharks, a close relative of the Great White, have been seen in the area.
19:28But they can't live in fresh water, so that has to rule them out.
19:33But there is one animal around Alaska's shores that's big enough to be the monster and can survive in fresh water.
19:44What is the longest lived aquatic animal?
19:48Is it A, koi carp, B, quahog clam, or C, bowhead whale?
19:55The answer, when we return.
19:59I asked, what is the longest lived aquatic animal?
20:03The answer is B, the quahog clam.
20:06One discovered off the coast of Iceland was 405 years old.
20:09I'm deep in the Alaskan wilderness in search of a lethal lake monster.
20:20I've eliminated my fur suspects, pike and salmon sharks.
20:24I'm now finding out what could have got into the lake from the sea.
20:29Beluga whales are big enough to be the monster and can live in both salt and fresh water.
20:36Could they have swum up the Quijack River into Lake Iliamna?
20:39The shallowest part of the river is the braids, a labyrinthine area of channels, and they'd have to swim through here to get into the lake.
20:49My pilot, Glenn Alsworth Jr, knows the area well.
20:52This looks like about what, five or six miles like this, something like that?
20:56Yeah, there's about five miles where it's braided this way.
21:01And on the deeper channels, of course, you can see the darker blue water where the deeper channels are, and then the lighter brown where there's more silt deposit.
21:09This water down here, I mean, there looks to be some pretty good channels through.
21:17I think, you know, you've certainly got eight or nine foot in places.
21:20I mean, it might come up to two or three here and there, but apparently people navigate these waterways with prop boats, you know, without chewing up their propellers.
21:30So it definitely looks as if there's enough water for belugas to get up into the lake.
21:39The thing about belugas is that they are mammals, they breathe air, so they have to surface regularly.
21:45And in that case, even with the sparse human population around the lake, the sightings would be much more common than they have been.
21:52Whatever the monster is, it's something that stays submerged and hidden for long periods of time.
22:01On top of that, the people here, they know what belugas look like.
22:05If the lake monster was a beluga, frankly, it wouldn't be a mystery.
22:11I'm drawing a bit of a blank with suspects so far, so I'm going to come at this from a different angle.
22:17I'll investigate the monster's potential food source.
22:20Legends of the famous Loch Ness monster have been dismissed by some because there isn't enough food in the lake to support an animal of that size.
22:28Is there enough food in Lake Iliamna to feed a monster?
22:34There is one event each year in these waters that could be what I'm looking for.
22:39Every July, there is the world's largest run of sockeye salmon.
22:43I'm normally busy catching river monsters in the warmest parts of the world, and fishing for salmon is totally new to me.
22:54This is bear country, and they depend on the salmon run for food.
22:58So I'll be in direct competition with them for the best fishing spots.
23:04We're only about 65 miles from where self-styled grizzly expert Timothy Treadwell and his girlfriend were eaten alive by a hungry grizzly.
23:13Carrying a gun at all times is common practice in the Alaskan wilderness, and in case a bear does attack, my pilot Glenn Ellsworth Jr. is carrying a .50 caliber handgun.
23:26The bears may have already found a good fishing spot.
23:30Just literally, I don't know, sort of 15 feet from where I'm standing, there's been a steady procession of fish through, working their way upstream.
23:37And there's also some big dark groups holding as well further down, so I'm quite looking forward to getting a line in the water.
23:45There are no bears in sight, so it seems safe to try and catch my first salmon.
23:53When sockeye salmon come out of the sea and enter fresh water, the males undergo a monstrous transformation.
24:00They develop a hooked jaw and grow teeth to defend their spawning grounds.
24:04Not only that, both the males and females turn red and stop feeding, so they won't go for any bait or fly.
24:12What you're doing is you're casting out, you've got a lump of lead here, and you flick it 45 degrees upstream.
24:19It comes down, and the fish are all facing upstream, and the idea is, they've got their mouths open.
24:24That just gets in their mouth, that panics them, they run.
24:27That ends up in the mouth, so it feels like a strike, and that will be in the mouth, probably like that.
24:37But they're not actually going for it. That's the theory, I'm going to see if I can put that into practice.
24:42Time to try and get my first salmon.
24:44Well, there you go, you got it.
24:48Ah, we got one. I actually hooked one. That was a bit of a surprise.
24:52I was, the line just was ticking down, and they haven't really spooked off too far.
24:56Just ticking down, it just stopped, and I think I was a bit too surprised.
25:00I think I just pulled. I should have sort of actually tried to set the hook a bit more on that one.
25:04With this many salmon around, it's not long before the bears start returning to their fishing spot.
25:09Here's a bear just coming out of the brush on the far side.
25:13Whereabouts is it, Glen?
25:14He's just looking out of the brush, watching for salmon.
25:16Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
25:17I mean, that's a very definite fisherman's posture, isn't it?
25:20Even though it's a, yeah.
25:21You can tell he's ready to pounce down in the water.
25:24Within minutes, three large grizzlies have surrounded us.
25:30Our day on the river has suddenly become dangerous.
25:39I'm on a quest to find the Alaskan lake monster.
25:47I've eliminated some suspects, and I'm now seeing if there is enough food in these lakes even to sustain it.
25:53I'm trying to catch a salmon, which could be a food source for the monster, and I'm surrounded by deadly bears.
26:00Grizzlies are considered by some to be the most dangerous of all bears.
26:03They can grow up to 1,500 pounds and run at 30 miles an hour.
26:09Humans are wise to keep a safe distance.
26:12This is absolutely typical.
26:13You find a good spot, somebody else comes in and tries to elbow you out.
26:16But I think, I think in this case, I'm going to make a graceful retreat.
26:22Once they've moved off a bit, I can carry on trying to catch my first salmon.
26:26But these grizzlies are putting me to shame.
26:30Ah!
26:34Ah!
26:40Fantastic to see these bears close up. I wasn't really expecting that.
26:44You can see they're semi-aquatic, but I don't think this is the lake monster.
26:48But I think you could call it, in some ways, a bit of a river monster.
26:51Ah!
27:01Here we go!
27:05Believe it or not, this is the first salmon I've ever had on the end of my line.
27:10This is a fish that can swim hundreds of miles up these fast-flowing rivers
27:14to get to its spawning grounds, so it can put up a strong fight.
27:17All right, the fish has done me a favour. It actually has turned off the main flow.
27:22I'm so engrossed with catching a salmon, at first I don't notice our interested onlooker.
27:28Out of the water, out of the water.
27:33Right, it's coming.
27:34OK, OK. Right.
27:36I think...
27:38We're going to run and break the fish off.
27:43I think it...
27:44Oh!
27:45Oh!
27:47Hey! Is it on the fish?
27:49This bear is clearly not afraid of us.
27:52And that's a problem.
27:54Can we just break it off?
27:56No.
27:58We're going to break the...
27:59No, we're just going to break the fish off.
28:01This is a young grizzly, but although not fully grown,
28:04it could still attack and kill any one of us.
28:07Luckily, it's more interested in the salmon than us.
28:10It took my fish, and a minute later, it's back for more.
28:17This time, we need to fire a warning shot.
28:20I am going to fire away.
28:22He's getting too pushy.
28:24Oh! No!
28:26You guys, plug your ears.
28:30Just deep breaths, just calm down.
28:32It's all part of the day and the life of the fishermen in this part of the world.
28:38Even after a warning shot, the bear won't leave.
28:43So it's best that my film crew and I get out.
28:46Be careful, there's that one deeper hole.
28:48I didn't quite succeed in landing my first salmon,
28:51but it's clear that they are a vital food source to the whole area.
28:54With millions of salmon coming in every year,
28:56and fish like pike in these waters year round,
29:00I'm convinced that there is enough food to sustain the monster I've been hearing about.
29:05Back on the trail of a monster, my investigation has taken a leap forward.
29:10This could be the breakthrough I've needed.
29:13I'm meeting up with Robin Levine, who saw the monster last year,
29:17while coming into land on Lake Iliamna.
29:18Robin's an anthropologist who works on these lakes, studying subsistence fishing by the Alaska native people.
29:27And it was around here you saw the monster as well, I gather.
29:30Yes, the Iliamna Lake monster.
29:32She's trained to observe things accurately, so has a clear description of what she saw.
29:41Robin is going to show me exactly where she saw the monster from the air.
29:48Oh, there's the drop-off, yeah?
29:51Now you see the clear shallow right over there?
29:54Yeah.
29:56That's where we saw it.
29:58Right there. It was over on that very clear patch.
30:01Oh, really?
30:05We probably had a good 30 to 40 seconds, maybe longer, to see it.
30:12Initially I thought it was a seal, but almost immediately after that thought crossed my mind,
30:16I realized it was far too big to move differently.
30:21It had a long, broad head, blunt to nose.
30:26There were very distinct pectoral fins, fins on the side of the fish.
30:33What about the size of this?
30:35As we were pulling into the bay where we were landing,
30:39and my friend was coming to pick us up in his boat.
30:43I estimated that what we saw was about the same size as his boat.
30:48And that's 15, 18 feet long.
30:5218 feet is the same size as three of me, end to end.
30:56And much bigger than what Biltrophon's mother saw attacking her boat.
31:04It looks so normal. I've seen beluga from the air.
31:07I've seen seals from the air.
31:09It looked a part of the natural environment, and I'm sure there was some obvious explanation for what we saw.
31:15This is the breakthrough I needed. A graphic description of its shape from somebody who saw it very recently,
31:25and who observed it clearly for some time.
31:28And from her description, the thing that struck me most was how much she emphasized its fins.
31:33Now, on a normal fish seen from above, like the salmon, you don't normally see the fins because they're tucked in or folded away.
31:40But there are certain fish where, particularly the pectoral fins behind the head, really stick out, a bit like wings almost.
31:48This is a crucial bit of the description, and I now really do think I have my prime suspect.
31:59All I've got to do now is catch it.
32:01There it is! There it is! There it is!
32:15My quest to prove if there is a monster in these deep Alaskan lakes is now well underway.
32:21I finally had the big breakthrough I needed, an eyewitness account of the monster from last year.
32:27It was over on that very clear patch.
32:29Oh, really?
32:30No!
32:34I've now got a strong suspicion that the monster I've been looking for is a white sturgeon.
32:39It's a living dinosaur that has changed very little over 65 million years.
32:44Their range is all along the west coast of North America, from mid-California all the way up to Alaska.
32:52They can survive in both salt and fresh water, and I've also seen how the river that connects Lake Iliamna to the sea is easily deep enough for them to swim up.
33:00Even though they're bottom feeders, they have an interesting behaviour.
33:06They can jump out of the water.
33:07In recent years, a close relative of theirs, the Gulf sturgeon, has been seriously injuring people in Florida.
33:15Could jumping white sturgeon in Lake Iliamna and Lake Clark be the basis of the myths of fishermen going missing?
33:21Could they be causing people to disappear, knocking them out of their boats and into the freezing water?
33:34To prove my case, what I need to do is to get my hands on a big sturgeon.
33:38However, what we're talking about here is an absolutely immense body of water, where nobody has ever caught one, and where the sightings are, you know, they're less than once a year.
33:47So, to get one on the end of a line, you know, if I had 40, 50 years, I might be in with half a chance, but realistically, it's just not going to happen here.
33:57My challenge has always been to catch this monster, and by hook or by crook, I'm going to get one.
34:03With the odds stacked against me here, I'm leaving Alaska and going down to the Columbia River on the Oregon-Washington border.
34:11Here, they have a large population of white sturgeon, and I'll have a much better chance of catching one.
34:18This will be another first for me. I've never caught a white sturgeon before, and I hear they can put up an incredible fight.
34:26This line, although it's very fine, is actually, it actually has a breaking strain of 100 pounds.
34:33It's braided line. The thing about this is, though, it's nice and supple.
34:37So, you know, that's not going to sort of drag a lot in the water, but another thing about it is it's got, well, it's got no stretch, virtually no stretch compared to nylon, monofilament, normal fishing line.
34:47And what that means is if I hook a big fish with this, I haven't got that elasticity of the line.
34:52You know, I'm going to feel everything very, very directly up here.
34:55So, you know, it's going to be quite a physical struggle with a fish on this gear.
35:00So, just one final detail. What we're using here is a barbless hook. There's no barb on there. And that's very much about just sort of looking after the fish.
35:11We need to go quick. We're on the back end. We're on the back end.
35:17I'm going to drop this bait into about 80 feet of water.
35:20So, there we go. It's fully rigged.
35:22I think it's still sinking. It's going down about 80 feet of water and that will just bump the bottom there.
35:35Bring it in there.
35:39That's fine.
35:42Oh.
35:44That's a bit of a knock again there.
35:47Bit of a knock. There's something definitely interesting there.
35:49It's at that point where all your imaginings about what's under the water, they are, well, they're starting to take shape.
36:09Whatever it is, is on the end of that line. But that line is so fine, the water here is pretty deep.
36:1570 foot or so. I'm attached to something.
36:19There it is. There it is. There it is. There it is.
36:26My first white sturgeon and the animal I think can easily grow to become a lake monster.
36:33It's a bit of a tug of war this. I just bring it up and then hook out.
36:40While taking the hook out, my chance to finally see the monster up close eludes me.
36:45Hold on. Hold on.
36:49That was a very, very brief contact with the animal there. I was leaning over the side. That was, I couldn't reach out as far as I wanted.
36:56The sturgeon are clearly here and that one was about five feet long. But I want a larger one. White sturgeon can grow to about 20 feet.
37:04In there.
37:05It's not long before I get my next bite. And this one feels much bigger.
37:13And this fish could be bigger than I am. When the fish wants to go, I'm letting it go. But I'm letting it go under pressure. It's having to work for the line it takes away.
37:28And then when the fish takes a bit of a breather, I'm hoping, you know, in those little gaps, I can gain a wee bit of line.
37:35I think we might have to, might be an idea to cast off.
37:42Jack, I think it might help if we cast off.
37:49Are we going? Are we on our way? This is a long, long run. We're running out of line here. We're running out of line. We need to go quick. We're on the backing. We're on the backing.
37:56Wait a minute. Wait a minute.
37:57Wait a minute.
37:58Wait a minute.
37:59Wait a minute.
38:00Wait a minute.
38:01Wait a minute.
38:03generous
38:08Flash go.
38:09Look at this line.
38:12If you haven't, look at this line. This is the backing.
38:18ematine.
38:19You haven't looked at this line. This is the backing.
38:31This is the backing.
38:32I think I may have hooked a monster, but I'm running out of line.
38:36That's the end of my line there, off the reel, I want to get the proper line back on the
38:39reel.
38:40Right, there we are, we've got the line back on the reel here.
38:44That was hairy, I was just watching my line going, that line's coming up on the water.
38:52There's the fish, there's the fish, there it is.
38:54There we go, there we go, there we go.
38:56There we go.
38:57Ah, I've seen the fish now, that is certainly a big fish.
39:03It's taken me half an hour to bring the sturgeon in.
39:06Knowing that this is only around half the length they can grow to, I now totally believe that
39:11a larger one could drag a tree stump into the water.
39:17That was a tiring fight, I've caught some big fish in freshwater.
39:20This is probably, this is probably the biggest freshwater fish I've caught, about 300 pounds
39:25of this one, you know, a real monstrous fish.
39:30That's actually 105 or even 106 inches.
39:34That's 8 foot 10 inches.
39:36Nearly 9 foot.
39:37Nearly 9 foot this fish.
39:39That's quite a thought, that's one and a half times me.
39:42At 9 feet, this fish is roughly 80 years old, but they can live to over 100.
39:49This looks big in the water, but these things grow to 20 foot, possibly even more, and I
39:54mean, just imagine seeing that in the water, I mean, you could be forgiven for saying that
39:57was a monster.
39:59Up to 20 feet long matches all the descriptions I've heard about the monster, including robins.
40:05Plus the pectoral fins and the long, streamlined body fit how she described what she saw.
40:12But what about the teeth marks on the propeller?
40:16Just take a little look at the mouth here.
40:18Although it's, you know, you could say it's predatory, it's eaten, it's eaten quite a large
40:22dead fish, but there's no teeth in there at all, I can put my, put my hands in there.
40:26See it's almost, it's very telescopic, you can imagine that just extending and literally
40:30just sucking in a small fish.
40:33Having only gums means it couldn't have been teeth marks on the propeller, but I think
40:38I know what caused them.
40:40What's interesting about a sturgeon, it hasn't got a bony skeleton the way we have or the way
40:44most other fish has, it's just got cartilage, but what it has got, it's got bony plates on
40:48the outside of the body, not totally covering it but just in rows, and these are
40:51you know, some form of protection, they really are, you know, sort of quite tough bits of
40:55bone, there we go, and also a very bony head, very bony gill flap as well.
41:03I believe Bill Trefon's parents actually ran over a white sturgeon, and the propeller going
41:09over its bony plates caused what looked like teeth marks.
41:14It may not have any teeth, but this mouth is perfectly formed for being a bottom feeder,
41:19eating mollusks and small fish.
41:21This would explain why it is so rarely seen on Lake Iliamna or Lake Clark, because it
41:26spends most of its time in up to a thousand feet of water.
41:32On the rare occasions when they do come to the surface, this could be what is causing some
41:36people to disappear.
41:37They're jumping.
41:40Nobody knows why they jump out of the water, maybe it's a panic reaction to being disturbed,
41:44but when they do, an airborne giant could easily knock somebody out of their boat and
41:49into the icy depths.
41:51This all makes me convinced that the Alaskan Lake monster is actually a small landlocked
41:56population of white sturgeon.
41:58But I mean, so impressive just to get close to an animal like that and to actually touch
42:02it and look at it close up.
42:04And I really think that for a few moments there, I was actually in the presence of the
42:10lake monster that is the lake monster.
42:16Want more of the world's wildest, strangest and most terrifying freshwater horrors?
42:21Visit our website at animalplanet.com slash rivermonsters.
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