Your most memorable summer-run?

[nick]

As with many other things… the first one is often the most memorable. So, my first steelhead remains the one I like to remember the most. June 1981. My first summer in WA after Uncle Sugar sent me to Ft. Lewis. Another guy was showing me his zipper-lip spot. We’d spent a couple of hours with small trout and smolt. The sun was just starting to come over the cliffs to hit the water. I put on a new chrome #2 spinner. Third cast, the spinner stopped drifting. I tugged… darn… snagged, I thought. Tugged again… nothing. Started to grab the main line to pull free when the line suddenly went slack. I faced back toward the water and started reeling in. I saw the fish slash across the width of the stream to stop about 3 feet from the rock I was standing on. I reeled like crazy. Got all the slack in. The fish started zipping upstream, then down. Back and forth, several times. All within an area of about 30ft, no more than 10ft from the bank. Hardly took any line off the reel. After a couple of minutes of this, the fish stopped between two big rocks, only about 4ft. from me. I just lifted the fish straight up out of the water. 24in native hen. My friend took a picture. I removed the hook and put her back in. She just sat there for what had to be 20 minutes, or so. Finally she just slowly swam off downstream.

[Ironhead]

This story is one many here will relate to, another story of a small steelhead that fights with such power, speed and ferocity, one is just left shaking and giggling.
Myself and BCSteel were floating a summer run river, we had caught some fish this day and it was a beautiful sunny August afternoon. As we approached a very shallow tailout, for some reason a little slick on the far side of the river caught my attention. It was not deep(3 ft), and really didn't look promising at all, in fact I would say, 99% of good anglers would have kept going. For some reason, and it felt almost like "deja vu", I urged BCSteel to stop and try a cast.
BC made his cast to the far side of the river and as his float and jig hit the water, a steelhead who was sitting camoflauged, in this crystal clear water, took off down river, obviously frightened and spooked by the commotion. Well, this fish made it about 10 ft down and then did an about turn, and came flying back and took the jig on the run,WOW, this was some awesome stuff. The fish put up a good fight and was quickly returned to carry on with it's long wait till spawning.
After this display in the shallow clear tailout, I would have bet money that there would not be another fish in this spot, but experience told me, another cast, would be mandatory.
 Having tied up some natural jigs, I quickly tied one on, BCSteel liked to call these jigs of mine, the "mossman" series, as they basically look like a stick with a olive sparkle chenille body with a deer hair tail, not exactly a "classic".  So off went my cast and it was a very crappy one, missing the intended target by a good distance, I turned to BC and said "holy F#$%, what a beek(cracker) I am". As I was about to reel in to cast again,my float shot under and all hell broke loose, this steelhead went NUTS, he tore the pool to a froth, with a fury I have not witnessed from any other fish ever, including world famous Thompson river screamers. In fact he decided to take his show back to salt water and tore off down river with me in hot pursuit. This carried on for at least 10 minutes, before I was able to actually get a good look at this fish, and what I saw was most surprising, all this action was the work of a 5 lb buck steelhead , who quite frankly was rather ugly.
I'm not sure what set this fish apart , fight wise, but I look forward to the day that I get to battle another like it, if it is much larger I may be in trouble though.
The thing that stands out most about that fish was the speed it had, it was almost surreal.
Counting the days to "opener", with this beautiful pile of summer run toys I recieved from RVRFSHR, it is gonna be sweet. Me and BCSteel are gonna take turns, with one guy fishing jigs and the other spinners and rotate every pool, gonna spell trouble for the fish.
A few pics from "the little steelhead that could ".
The chase


the fish

[One More Cast]

I was fishing sw washington stream last year on my way to CuttstoSteelies 4th of July BBQ.  I had got a late start and my day was going kind of slow.  I had decided to call it a day and the the "one more cast" saying to myself when my bobber dips under the surface at the tailout.  ended up with a nice 6-7lb steelie.  Were this is one there might be two.  About 30 minutes later in the same area the bobber goes under and there is a big flash and a lot of weight behind it too.  I keep him in the hole for a while but he finally decided he had enough and drow river he goes.  The good thing was that the deepest the water was was about 3ft.  The bad thing is its full of good size bolders and swift current.  It took me about 300-400 yards down river before i got it to shore.  Seeing a pig like this jump 3 ft out of a 1-2ft fast moving current is enought to stop your heart for a moment.  When i finally got him in i was shaking. 

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[Brian]

Great stories guys! Can't wait to get back out on my favorite summer run streams, only 2 weeks from today!

Great topic Andrew, thanks for starting it!

[Andrew]

Like I said, Brian, we gotta get the positive energy flowing before the opener, and there's nothing like a bunch of crazy fish stories and pictures of prime summer fish to get guys thinking about getting out there, putting in some time, and discovering summer-run for themselves. And if you read into the stories a little more than the "incredible fish" part, you'll start to make some interesting more general notes about techniques and fish behavior. Great posting, guys (keep it coming!). This is what the Steelhead Notebook is all about.

I'll do one more (this isn't my "most" memorable fish, mind you): 

I was out on another favorite summer-run stream with Sturzman and conditions were just about optimal once again. A freshet had been through a couple nights before and there was still good cloudcover--a fortunate set of circumstances considering it was mid-July.

The first hole of the day looked pretty fishy, but it didn't put out like we thought it might. We knew we'd be hooking up this day, though, and there was no rush; we ambled downstream rather casually tossing quotes from Jack Handey's "Deep Thoughts" back and forth (I think we spent most of our trips last summer doing this). 

I was rigged up with a #3 electric brass/kelly green spinner, and I had been pitching it into the main channel somewhat absent mindedly as we walked along. As we crossed a small side channel, I switched it up and pitched the spinner literally over my shoulder into the top of first little pocket it formed, still absent-minded--it looked like a very unlikely piece of water at no more than 20 feet wide and 18 inches deep. You know what happened. 

A fish erupted from the water with my spinner in its jaw, pulled a 180, and proceeded to scream down the side channel, leaving a ripping wake all the way down and burning my drag so hard that you could actually "hear" it's tail moving the pitch of the drag's "zzzzz."

It was tough to get this fish to calm down in so little water (I think it was actually using the gravel to boost itself into the air), but I eventually managed to bring it to hand. It was chrome 10 pound wild buck, and I think this pretty much explains everything about what he did.

To this day, if you ever go summer-run fishing with me, you'll see me tossing spinners into some pretty unlikely places. I guess I could say "I've got my reasons." 


(*fish out of water to protect eyes and gills from shallow gravel)

Andrew