This morning I woke up at the crack of too early, rolled out of bed and drove throught the darkness and smoke to the other side... .. .. Smithers.
I got to the Bulkley river where a couple people were casting spoons in the run above where I began my day. I put together my spey rod, threw on my favorite weighted black and blue intruder fly and started working the water. I had only been there for about half an hour, slowly working my way down a nice long run, when a couple arrive. She goes to the run upstream and he... ..low holes me. I wasn't too happy but I wasnt going to let it ruin my day. At least he was moving down the run, so I followed (at a distance). He was moving a bit faster than I was, finished fishing the run and joined his fishing buddy up stream. No sooner had he left and I had my fly slammed hard like a freight train followed by a big steelhead exploding out the water. After a great battle with lots of heart stopping acrobatics I managed to land the beauty. I snuck a quick pic (hard to do by yourself) and sent it on its way.
As the day went on I managed to hook three coho (two of which I landed) and another steelhead (which I lost) all in that same run. My spey rod got a good workout, my new Monic GSP running line is fantastic and I cant say enough good things about my galvan reel. LOVE those reels. #galvanreels .. sponsor me and I will gladly promote your reels everywhere I go. Oh and while i'm at it.. #monicflylines ?
Things died down and I explored up stream which yielded no fish. I went back to the first run and thought I woud give it one more sweep through before I drive home. The guy from earlier and his wife were there and working there way through. I let them go and followed behind and pulled another steelhead out behind them! This time he came over and snapped a quick pic for me. Nice guy. They came up from Oregon and had been fishing the river for 5 days with only a couple coho to show for it.
The day ended with a double double for me. Two steelhead landed and two coho landed.
This week I was out on the Skeena system again, this time chasing coho with my single hand fly rod and spey rod.
When we arrived at the Skeena, things looked promising. We set up camp and fished that evening at Ferry Island. There were coho and sockeye surfacing close to shore. Despite the water being colored up, and after a few fly changes, I did manage to hook a sockeye on the fly on a charteuse fly I nick named the "pick your prom dress" (a hybrid between a pick your pocket and a prom dress fly). This was my first ever sockeye on the fly.
The next morning we fished Ferry Island for a couple hours with no hook ups. So off we went to fish the Kitimat river in search of coho. We hit numerous locations and all we saw were zombie chum and spawning pinks. Nothing worth catching. I did manage a small cutthroat and a very nice resident rainbow. We retreated back to Ferry Island where we were camping. That evening we had no more fish to hand on the Skeena.
Thinking that the river may be more clear up stream we drove past the Copper river and found a spot to park way up stream to try our luck. Apparently luck didnt make the drive out with us and were were skunked, and demoralized. This was our last full day out there and nothing really to show for it.
That evening I did manage to hook in to a beautiful chrome coho on the spey back at Ferry Island. I had given thousands of casts over the last few days and only had my fly line knot up a couple of times. As I mentioned earlier luck was not there with us and as I was u tangnling a knot in the fly line near the reel was when the fish hit. I had it on, it turned towards me and I stripped lime mad to keep the tension on the line hoping I could play the fish without having to untie the knot at the same time. Well the coho wanted nothing to do with it and tore off in a big strong run. I had a decision to make. Let the fish run and pull the knot through the eyes on my spey rod or grab the knot before it went through and pray the fish turns. Not wanting the knot to rip off the eyes on my rod I grabbed the knot. Unfortunately the fish did not turn and it snapped me off. After a few choice words I tied back on a new fly and continued to fish. No more action that night.
Back at camp, demoralized and exhausted we discussed our next steps and decided to leave and hit the Bulkley on the way.
The Bulkley was a little more clear than the Skeena and the dip netters at the Morricetown Canyon were getting sockeye, coho and even a steelhead. The first spot we found we saw a fish in a tail out and I got him to turn to my fly twice but couldnt elicit a bite. So, we moved on. We had a tip on a location and thought we would try it.
The Bulkey was a beautiful river and I cant wait to get back. We found a peach of a run, perfect for swinging flies. There was evidence of coho remnants in the water and two people were leaving with coho they had caught. Our hopes were high and it didnt take too long before I had a fish hit, although it snapped me off after a few head shakes. As the afternoon wore on the fish were rising here and there and we fished a seam where we kept seeing them rise. Out of nowhere I had a big hit on my fly and a brief fight with line peeling before it snapped me off. Awake and pumped I fished through that spot hoping to convince another to bite and it paid off. A fish hammered my fly and promply took off out towards the current giving a nice cartwheel on the way. It wasnt a chrome coho that was for sure, it seemed to have a bit of colour but I was happy I was into a fish. As the fight went on the fish bull dogged and stayed low in the water trying to get into the heavjer current. Eventually I had him on his way in and I got my first good look at him. It was a Steelhead! Nerves were high and so was my excitment as I worked it in and landed it. This was my fist fly caught steelhead and what a beauty. After a couple quick pictures it was on it was back in the river.
A short while after that my fishing partner was into a fish that hit like a freight train. The fish was quickly peeling line and burning his fingers before it broke his fly. It was a tank of a fish. It hit hard like a steelhead and I'm sure it was bigger than mine. Both fish hit on a black and blue intruder style fly.
Cant't wait to get back to the bulkley!
In preparation on my trip to the Skeena River and surrounding area tomorrow, I have been trying up all sorts of salmon and steelhead flies. The latest of which is a variation of a favorite steelhead fly of mine. I have tied it in a variety of colours such as pink/purple, blue/black and now an orange/copper. I'm hoping to entice some steel and maybe a coho with it. I have had good sucess with copper flies for coho in the past.
For those of you interested the recipe is:
Hook: Owner size 2 - model 5115-091 tied as a stinger on a 25mm waddington shank.
Thread: 140 orange
Tail: copper flashabou
Body: wrapped copper flashabou
Hackle: black hackle tied in at the tip
Dubbing ball: holographic - gold orange diamond dub
Under wing: uv pearl crystal flash
Wing : orange fox fur (or craft fur)
Over wing: black angel hair
Collar hackle: natural guinea
I had the day off work today, and my kids did not have any school, so we decided to go to the Stave River in search of cutthroat and maybe some whitefish on the fly. I decided to take my six weight fly rod, just in case we could find something of size or maybe even an elusive steelhead. The weather was sunny and warm and the kids were happy on the shore with their metal detector.
The first run I tried produced nothing, no sightings in the crystal clear water, no rises and no takes. There were plenty of salmon fry in the river and my fry immitation was looking pretty good swinging through the run.
As we moved down stream and fished spot number two I noticed a couple rises just a little further down stream. The rises were bigger than whitefish and seemed bigger (at a distance) than cutthroat. I moved down to where I could cast to the rises and confirmed that they were indeed steelhead. This is where I began to get excited.
It only took a few stealthy casts into the relatively shallow run before my heart started racing. As I stripped in my fly I saw a wake and fin (cue the theme to Jaws) cruising up behind it. The fish followed the fly and my anticipation grew until finally.... a splash and.. nothing. The fish either missed the fly or shrply turned and left.
About ten minutes went by, a few risers showed theselves and the birds squabbled on the far bank. My attention wandered and smack! A fish hit my fly hard. A couple of head shakes and a jump and I see a nice chrome steelhead on the end of my line. One more splash at the surface and the hook pops out.
No matter how hard I tried I could not get any more fish to commit to my flies. I tried a few different patterns all to no avail. It was such a tease as for about an hour there were consistent rises and splashes from some good size fish I can only speculate were steelhead. Unfortunately, I had places to be and needed to head home. However, the excitement was enough to make me want to return another day.
