I met up with a buddy the first weekend of the month on the Klick for some steelheading. I brought the boat and he brought the scotch. Oh my god did we have fun. Norm has fished it a few times in the past with some guide friends so he knew the ticket for success. Beads and bobbers baby! I know they say Steelheading is the sport of 1000 cast, I assume that may be the case if you’re swinging. Well, I’m sorry, I don’t have that kind of patience. What good is the foreplay if you don’t reach home base. I realize I might receive some ridicule for the beads and bobbers thing and I have caught fish before on the swing. I agree that the tug is cool and all but the fight is what I’m after. Out of the 2 days floating the river (my first time there) we landed 8 metalheads. Norm had the set-up but apparently I have a knack for spotting the right water. Saturday was cloudy and cool with no wind… perfect! That night it rained hard and we were concerned the river wouldn’t respond well. It turned out to be just fine. The river rose a few inches and clouded up some but still a good 1.5 feet visibility. All but two of our fish were wild. We both wanted to bring home something for the little women and on the last day, the last fish for both of us was a hatchery brat. I know some people say that hatchery fish don’t fight as hard as a wild fish. This was not the case for me. My hatchery brat fought just as hard if not harder and went airborne more often. She was a bit retarded though. Once we got her close enough to net she went into some shallow water then swam right up onto the beach. All Norm had to do was walk over and pick her up. She also had a hook from a previous encounter. Since there was no line attached to the hook I suspect the unfortunate angler lost her to a bad knot. The weekend couldn’t have been better, especially since I managed 2 more fish than Norm to hold bragging rights until the next time we get on the water together.
All I'll add is be nice. I'm to point I'm pretty much staying out of debating. But if people start getting shitty I'll start parking people. Got it? Its the holidays let's keep it civil.
Great pics and a Great fishing trip, don't get better then that.......Well fishing related anyways. Congrats on all the good fish
And because of this, I'm not adding my $.02 (that have nothing to do with the tactics used I might add)
All in a days work! Nice fish captain. Bobber down gets the heart pumpin too. Good to see you had fun! That's what it is all about.
Good for you. IMO beads under a bobber are every bit as much flyfishing as a weighted streamer on the swing. One could easily malign conehead steelhead flies on thw swing as not very different than jigs better suited to a Bill Dance baitcasting technique than a fly/spey rod. It's splitting hairs to argue that one small gear detail is a valid way to fish while some other small detail isn't. The good thing you did was release the wild fish and keep the hatchery meat. Enjoy making fudge dragons with that.
