Salmon River.... again

Back up the the Stanley, ID area we went for another redeye trip in pursuit of metalheads. We did alright. Was pretty slow where we were, but the guys with boats who could access the other side of the run we were fishing were doing real well - prety much a fish-slaying fest! We managed 9 fish between 3 of us. No room for the fly rod at this hole so it was all traditional gear. Probably won't make it back again until next steelie season, so farewell, Salmon River. See for Springers in a couple months!

Dry Spell

Well then! It has certainly been a while since I've posted here. I've fished a handful of times since August. Once or twice on the crooked river, and a couple of times this winter on the Metolius since I've been back. The crooked is always good for a couple of fish, but so is the Metolius usually. I fished out there twice this winter (usually I hit that stream 10 - 12 time over wither and early spring), both times in what I considered pretty prime conditions, but the action was pretty weak. I caught bullies both times, but they were small - 18 inchers, which is nothing compared to the 23 - 25 inchers that are so common there. Either the fishing is just slow this year or I am not putting in my dues. I'd like to think its the later. No worries. I did get into some fish recently.

My brother came up from Cali and we fished for summer run steelhad on the John Day with my buddy Troy. Troy showed us all his favorite spots and although it was slow that day, I did manage one native steelhead:

Pretty gal here took a hunk of cured sand shrip with an orange corky. She couldn't resist taking it on the first cast! Catching this fish definately got me back into steelhead feever! I love these fish. She put up a bit of a tussle before comming to hand. Really cool spots on her. Back she went after a couple photos.

I had planned with Micah and my Father-in-law and my old roomie, Brad, to fish for Sturgeon in Idaho, but with the crazy number of steelhead in the Salmon River, we changed plans and made the long drive to Salmon, Idaho where we stayed over-night and fished all the next day for metalheads in some very cold conditions. Thankfully, we did not go home with the skunk. Brad was on fire. He muist have landed four fish while we were there. Later on he found several more. Micah, Van and Savannah all learned what steelheading is all about. That is, working really hard to go home having worked really hard.... and thats all. Such is steelie fishing. Luckily, I found a fish and Brad gave us a couple of his. We introduced them to my smoker when we got back to Boise. We got some roe out of the hens and van cured them up for our next trip. We are learning here, folks! Before too long we are going to be skilled and seasoned steelie fishers.

A couple weeks after that (last weekend) V and I took a friend and his brother back up to the Salmon for more steelie action. Even though V did not get one last time, he caught the bug and arrived on the river very well prepared with a new Shimano casting rod and reel combo - very nice! Along with a mess of corkies and some other gear, he was determined to get his fish. This time we headed for the Stanley, ID area, which is where we were hearing the fishing was strong. I caught one behemoth pretty early on, which I kept alive on a stringer until we left that hole. He measured out at just shy of 31 inches and 9 lbs (this was after he had been dead for over 24 hours). We worked pretty hard without so much as another sniff from a fish until about the last 3 hours of daylight. At that point we went back to a bridge where we had seen a lot of fish and a lot of fisherman. The nice felllows withing beneath the bridge invited us down and it was not too long before V was hooked up. His first steelie was a 25 inch hatchery hen - bonk! There were several fly fisherman doing well at this hole so I suited up and drug out the ol' Redington RS4 9 wt. If fished for 10 minutes and I was on. First fly rod steelie was a 25 inch hatchery buck - bonk! I was thrilled to have gotten one on the fly rod - something I have been wanting to do for some time! Awesome! I ended up getting 2 more oafter that, all on the fly rod, and V landed a beautiful native hen. Tom managed to find a fish also. We went home with 4 fish, who were also introduced to the smoker. How did they like it? They thought it was crowded, smokey and hot in there! yum!

More pics to come. Tight Lines!