We didn't catch a lot of monsters on the 'Nush, but this was clearly a beast...that we released.
During the last week of June and into the start of July, it’s hard for my thoughts not to wander up to the incomparable Nushagak River in remote Southwest Alaska. Before I was a papa, I spent 7 seasons guiding on the word’s greatest king salmon stream…which always seemed to peak about this time of year.
The ‘Nush is simply one of those places you must fish before you turn into fertilizer…there’s just no other place like it. You won’t find better king fishing anywhere. Looking back over all those seasons, I can clearly recall my worst-ever day of fishing, which still resulted in 18 kings to the boat! And the best of days were well into the triple digits, though after a dozen or so you kinda lose count. I’d say the average day during the meat of the season saw each of our boats hooking 20-40 per trip.
Most of my photos from those days are all on slide film, but I recently found a few digitals. So, here we go a little walk down memory lane…
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Happy Father's Day to me!
Mother Ocean gave Darin DeLuca a sweet 26-pound gift of succulent halibut fillets for Father’s Day. He caught the fish near Capitola, CA in the New Brighton kelp beds while drifting a live sardine. How the heck DeLuca got that fish aboard with his little butterfly net is another story…
In addition to some seriously good dinners coming up, DeLuca is entered into our June Hawg of the Month Contest and earns a chance to win a free fishing trip at the end of the year. Think you’ve got game? Enter your fish
HERE.
Dude, does that thing have a Hemi in it??
Here’s another round of everybody’s favorite game…Fill in the Blank! Using the comments section below, go ahead and give us your best guess as to what VinMan here is saying to his pal…
If you're a Kwikfish, you don't wanna end up here!
The old cardboard box in the corner of my garage…if you’re a salmon or steelhead plug and you end up there, you can rest assured that your career is over.
It’s amazing how you can buy 20 identical plugs and typically only 1 or 2 of them will ever prove to be certified All Stars. Sure, several will catch fish from time to time, but not frequently enough to be on the A Team. A few others will catch fish with some tweakage (after you do things like replace the line attachment screw, drill out the rattles and mess with hook configurations). Others still will be totally worthless…
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Live long and prosper, little buddies!!
Hope this helps…the California Department of Fish and Game just completed a release of 16.5 million Sacramento River fall-run Chinook salmon smolts on June 15.
The majority of the fish were placed into acclimation pens in San Pablo Bay prior to release, while others were released in rivers that flow to the bay. Smolts that survive to adulthood will return in two to four years to spawn in Central Valley rivers, boosting the recovery of the species in California waters.
“We hope this year’s above-average water flow and the use of a variety of release sites will improve the overall survival of the smolts and increase the return of adult salmon to their home rivers,” said Neil Manji, DFG Fisheries Branch Chief. [click to continue…]
Vinman with a nice Clacka steelie
Well, it seems like good fishing and fishery news is harder to come by these days, but here’s one for ya: The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife today approved a temporary rule increasing the combined steelhead/salmon bag limit (total of three fish a day ) on the Willamette, Clackamas and Sandy rivers, effective June 18 through Oct. 31.
Under the rule change, anglers are permitted to retain up to three adult adipose fin-clipped fish per day. The combined three-fish total allows for retention of steelhead, salmon or both, of which no more than two may be salmon.
The temporary measure was enacted in response to strong early returns of summer steelhead that have been observed at ODFW fish counting stations in the three rivers.
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Open up and say ahhhhh! (IGFA photo)
Holy creature from the Black Lagoon, Batman! While this titanic beast may look like something that may slither up out of a storm sewer and start devouring unsuspecting city dwellers in some John Carpenter flick, it’s actually a pending
International Game Fish Association All-Tackle Word Record wels catfish!
While fishing with a live bream on the River Po in Mantova, Italy with IGFA Captain Alberto Bartoli, angler Roberto Godi hooked into this enormous, 250.3-pound cat…which fought like a wounded wildebeest for 45 minutes before being subdued…weighed…and released.
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