I hit the river again this morning, fairly confident I'd find another native or two. Sadly, I had no such luck. The water had a touch less visibility than I would have liked, but I was still somewhat surprised that I didn't even get a bump in a few hours of thoroughly covering water that almost always seems to hold fish.
I headed back for the car, but decided to check out one last hole before leaving. I've done fairly well at this hole in the past, but it sees a few more fisherman than most of the water I fish, especially now, so I usually avoid it at this time of year.
It had obviously been fished earlier in the morning (as evidenced by borax spills, etc), but it was deserted when I got there. I started out working the top of the run, but soon moved down to the tail-out. I fished through the "best" seams without a bump, then, for whatever reason, cast into some less enticing water only a few feet in front of the rock I was standing on (about 2.5-3 ft. deep, rather slow and boring).
You guessed it: the float pulled under (almost a chum-style takedown), I set the hook, and found myself fighting a fish. He really caught me off-guard.
He was nothing special--a 5 lb. semi-dark hatchery buck--but he put up a good fight, and prevented a skunking (the streak is still alive, I guess).
After I released him, I headed home, but I still find myself wondering whether this was a fluke, or if there's something about this water that I'm missing. I thought steelhead always had a good reason for holding where they did, but this water looked pretty poor to me. I think BC steel mentioned something awhile back about finding fish in "bad" water. Anybody have any ideas here?
In any event, it was another good morning on the water.
Andrew
