Thank god for the steady drumbeat of reports and excitement about beach fishing for Coho on the Salt pages on the beach(es) that shall not be named. This fills me with anticipatory joys of great fish heading like 5 miles east to the estuary that shall not be named. An estuary that borders on an enormous sewage farm calm and flat enough to incidentally support floatplanes (without threats of pontoon obliterating logjams and rootwads) should it somehow end up on the fishing radar, which I doubt it will.
You see fly fishermen neglect Estuarine opportunities. Specifically, that neglect translates to no crowds, and great fishing, and still no crowds. I've puzzled over why this is for a couple of years now, and the best explanation I can come up, apart from the fact that the tidal Greasy is closed to Salmon fishing, is something along the lines of Steelhead and Salmon altering brain functions, permanently. Specifically if you want to get really anatomical, right parietal lobe functions are conditioned, through the catching of ever bigger fish, to neuroplastic state changes that result in piscine neglect.
Bear with me, we'll stick with anatomy for a minute, and I'll apologize up front to those who are easily offended by boobs. Trout fishermen turn into Salmon/Steelhead fishermen, you see it all the time. It doesn't seem to work the other way. My theory why that works that way is sorta like this. Salmon and Steelhead might as well be the D-cups of fish, and to a Puget Sound fisherman, they alter brains through hormonal and autonomic influences to be uninterested in trout (any trout except steelhead) and their minimal A-cup flying-ant, skwala-munching existence. It is almost unavoidable for the majority of Salmon/Steelhead fishermen, they can't really control it, sure they will grin and bear a stocked lake fishing excursion with their own children, but what they are really thinking is "I'd rather be fishing for salmon and/or steelhead."
Roger Stephens: Boot, you have to concede that the glorious SRC is at least a B-cup fish, particularly during Chum Fry outmigration. Ain't no way that's the same creature as a stocked lake trout...
Boot: Y'all knew Roger Stephens was gonna take issue with that statement, probably Triggs too, and yes, maybe the Chum Fry Migration pushes the grand month-of-may beach-loving SRC up a cup size or so...I'll concede that... but only because January, February, and March often are the worst kind of anticipatory hell, i.e. the Chum Fry Migration SRCutts wonderbra-it-up a cup, but a month or so later you're thinking of other things, because you know that even the beach-lovin' SRC might stoop to suck down a flying-ant every now and then.
Roger Stephens: I'll have to think about this a little more, I guess the follow-up question would be, if we continue with the mammary metaphors, estuarine trouts in the Big Greasy are what cup size? Shouldn't they be an "A" too? And by your own arguments is that not an unappealing fishery for you?
Boot: Bigger fisher are not necessarily more interesting to me, behavior and motive interest me. I don't have piscine neglect, at least not that I am aware of. Back to your question though, Big Greasy trouts can't be metaphorically compared to conventional bust sizes. These trouts are metaphorically more like three breasted women. Just plain fantastic.
I submit the Big Greasy's coastal cutthroat trout is a poorly understood beast, perhaps even more so as its maturation and behaviors are directly influenced by special nutritious sauces from settling ponds (where floatplanes can land) that periodically outflow to the Big Greasy (where floatplanes should not land (f-ton of tree debris)), by the means of intermittently placed vertical pipes that line the riverbed and are clearly marked on the shores with signs that warn not to anchor in those locations. Those vertically-emitted sauces deliver- all year long- Snohomish County demographic nourishments to a relatively short stretch of river. And it's in that stretch, where the fish equivalent of 3-breasted beauties reside.
I fished here weeks prior, on a modest tide drop, and caught all kinds of searuns. Most were skinny and skittish, 12 inch fish. A few were fat and struck hard, 16 inch fish, though none of the latter were in abundance. There was one jack fish, spots only on the upper half of the body, silver below (I forgot to look at the tail) about 12 inches or so, not sure what kind of salmon.
Today, on a similar tide, I fished again. Anchoring up (not over the effluent emitting submarine pipes) was easier, and some of the more technical water I'll avoid on a stronger tide was looking approachable. Good thing too, first cast, fish on, 16 inches. The skittish fish were rarer, the larger fish more numerous. Takes were more aggressive and further up the water column. Water was clear, debris minimal, and jet skiers completely absent. An August day on the Big Greasy without Jet skiers is a worth a couple Praise Cthulus shouted among the pylon pipes.
I hooked a much larger fish trolling a brown and white clouser uptide along the logs and rootballs. I suspect one of those bruiser searuns, the 18-inch triple-breasted C-cup kind, though this fish did the Coho thing, ran straight at me, had good swirls and some solid weight. I never did see it close enough to tell what kind of beast it was.
Juvenile bald eagle, tons of Osprey, otters, harbor seals, black crowned night heron, great blue heron, kingfisher, rufous Hummingbird, gulls, geese, sculpin, stickleback, pile perch, pikeminnow (in brackish water) and frogs (yep, salt water, heard them, didn't see them, though have seen them before, alive and kicking) were otherwise present. Fun times.
You see fly fishermen neglect Estuarine opportunities. Specifically, that neglect translates to no crowds, and great fishing, and still no crowds. I've puzzled over why this is for a couple of years now, and the best explanation I can come up, apart from the fact that the tidal Greasy is closed to Salmon fishing, is something along the lines of Steelhead and Salmon altering brain functions, permanently. Specifically if you want to get really anatomical, right parietal lobe functions are conditioned, through the catching of ever bigger fish, to neuroplastic state changes that result in piscine neglect.
Bear with me, we'll stick with anatomy for a minute, and I'll apologize up front to those who are easily offended by boobs. Trout fishermen turn into Salmon/Steelhead fishermen, you see it all the time. It doesn't seem to work the other way. My theory why that works that way is sorta like this. Salmon and Steelhead might as well be the D-cups of fish, and to a Puget Sound fisherman, they alter brains through hormonal and autonomic influences to be uninterested in trout (any trout except steelhead) and their minimal A-cup flying-ant, skwala-munching existence. It is almost unavoidable for the majority of Salmon/Steelhead fishermen, they can't really control it, sure they will grin and bear a stocked lake fishing excursion with their own children, but what they are really thinking is "I'd rather be fishing for salmon and/or steelhead."
Roger Stephens: Boot, you have to concede that the glorious SRC is at least a B-cup fish, particularly during Chum Fry outmigration. Ain't no way that's the same creature as a stocked lake trout...
Boot: Y'all knew Roger Stephens was gonna take issue with that statement, probably Triggs too, and yes, maybe the Chum Fry Migration pushes the grand month-of-may beach-loving SRC up a cup size or so...I'll concede that... but only because January, February, and March often are the worst kind of anticipatory hell, i.e. the Chum Fry Migration SRCutts wonderbra-it-up a cup, but a month or so later you're thinking of other things, because you know that even the beach-lovin' SRC might stoop to suck down a flying-ant every now and then.
Roger Stephens: I'll have to think about this a little more, I guess the follow-up question would be, if we continue with the mammary metaphors, estuarine trouts in the Big Greasy are what cup size? Shouldn't they be an "A" too? And by your own arguments is that not an unappealing fishery for you?
Boot: Bigger fisher are not necessarily more interesting to me, behavior and motive interest me. I don't have piscine neglect, at least not that I am aware of. Back to your question though, Big Greasy trouts can't be metaphorically compared to conventional bust sizes. These trouts are metaphorically more like three breasted women. Just plain fantastic.
I submit the Big Greasy's coastal cutthroat trout is a poorly understood beast, perhaps even more so as its maturation and behaviors are directly influenced by special nutritious sauces from settling ponds (where floatplanes can land) that periodically outflow to the Big Greasy (where floatplanes should not land (f-ton of tree debris)), by the means of intermittently placed vertical pipes that line the riverbed and are clearly marked on the shores with signs that warn not to anchor in those locations. Those vertically-emitted sauces deliver- all year long- Snohomish County demographic nourishments to a relatively short stretch of river. And it's in that stretch, where the fish equivalent of 3-breasted beauties reside.
I fished here weeks prior, on a modest tide drop, and caught all kinds of searuns. Most were skinny and skittish, 12 inch fish. A few were fat and struck hard, 16 inch fish, though none of the latter were in abundance. There was one jack fish, spots only on the upper half of the body, silver below (I forgot to look at the tail) about 12 inches or so, not sure what kind of salmon.
Today, on a similar tide, I fished again. Anchoring up (not over the effluent emitting submarine pipes) was easier, and some of the more technical water I'll avoid on a stronger tide was looking approachable. Good thing too, first cast, fish on, 16 inches. The skittish fish were rarer, the larger fish more numerous. Takes were more aggressive and further up the water column. Water was clear, debris minimal, and jet skiers completely absent. An August day on the Big Greasy without Jet skiers is a worth a couple Praise Cthulus shouted among the pylon pipes.
I hooked a much larger fish trolling a brown and white clouser uptide along the logs and rootballs. I suspect one of those bruiser searuns, the 18-inch triple-breasted C-cup kind, though this fish did the Coho thing, ran straight at me, had good swirls and some solid weight. I never did see it close enough to tell what kind of beast it was.
Juvenile bald eagle, tons of Osprey, otters, harbor seals, black crowned night heron, great blue heron, kingfisher, rufous Hummingbird, gulls, geese, sculpin, stickleback, pile perch, pikeminnow (in brackish water) and frogs (yep, salt water, heard them, didn't see them, though have seen them before, alive and kicking) were otherwise present. Fun times.