Success!
Despite work and mother nature pulling a number on me I managed to squeeze a full day in on the Salmon river this saturday. I met up with Frank on friday night and hit the river sunday morning. We started off in the upper fly zone and I knew it was going to be a good day when Frank hit the first fish five or ten minutes in. The hole we were fishing was running high and it made landing fish nearly impossible because of some impassable rapids at the tail. We quickly went 0-7. We headed down river to a few more spots and touched a fish here or there without landing one until we got to a good hole at the bottom end of where we like to fish.
Within a few minutes we had both had a fish or two on and lost one. Finally after a short while I hooked into a really nice fish that seemed like I had a good chance to land. I knew it was good but I didn't know how good. After loosing so many fish that day Frank and I were determined to land this one but I knew it would be a battle. This fish ran up and down the length of the pool jumping and tail walking several times. Eventually the fish was able to make it into a set of rapids but I wasn't giving up that easy. Frank and I took off at a near sprint down river after the fish and finally managed to bring it to Frank's waiting net an easy ten minutes into the battle and several hundred yards downstream.
I knew it was a good fish from the fight but I didn't realize how good it was going to be. This was one of the fattest fish I have landed in my life, the pure weight of it was amazing considering its length.
Within a few minutes we had both had a fish or two on and lost one. Finally after a short while I hooked into a really nice fish that seemed like I had a good chance to land. I knew it was good but I didn't know how good. After loosing so many fish that day Frank and I were determined to land this one but I knew it would be a battle. This fish ran up and down the length of the pool jumping and tail walking several times. Eventually the fish was able to make it into a set of rapids but I wasn't giving up that easy. Frank and I took off at a near sprint down river after the fish and finally managed to bring it to Frank's waiting net an easy ten minutes into the battle and several hundred yards downstream.
I knew it was a good fish from the fight but I didn't realize how good it was going to be. This was one of the fattest fish I have landed in my life, the pure weight of it was amazing considering its length.
Not long after we landed that fish I hooked into another that was even bigger but after a short battle and a few tailwalks that fish swam off into the sunset and would go on to haunt me for the rest of the day. We fished for the rest of the afternoon getting a few hits here or there but the action really slowed down in the later part of the day.
We decided to head down to Altmar to finish off the evening and Frank managed to hook up right before the sun went down. That fish put up a hell of a fight and gave us some trouble bringing him to hand but Frank got the job done and we put another in the net
In the end it was a great day on the river. We hooked up around 20 times and brought some nice fish to hand. The weather cooperated for the most part with sporadic snow and freezing spells but for the most part it was just a nice day. The river is fishing great right now and mid week traffic is very light. Head down and take advantage! Look for high flows dropping to lower levels and you should have some good fishing.
Nice fish there ... hard not to love that river - even with all its faults.
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