05-19-2011, 08:11 AM
So most of you know i have been fishing pretty much nonstop for the last 7 days trying to get this river down............ still! Its hard tracking down salmon in the high blown out water (so i have found out.) well from last Thursday through Monday was a bust for me never touched a single fish. i never saw a single fish landed. most of my fishing up to this point has been bellow the mill. then i received recent info from a couple fellow forum members that changed everything. Tuesday i didnt make it out in the morning but i made it out for the late afternoon till the evening. i headed up river and ended up at the railroad bridge where the Potlatch River dumps in. it was a muddy mess. with logs and sticks constantly coming down but there was about 6other guys fishing so i decided to stay. i met a few nice guys there and preceded in chatting with them while we all fished. they told me how on Saturday they had hooked over 50 fish off the bridge and there had been close to 20 that were landed. i dont know why but i didnt expect the fish to be there yet. which was dumb on my behalf because i am aware at how fast they can move up when they want to do it in a hurry. the other thing they told me was that the potlatch river was down about 3 feet from the day before.i never touched a fish at the potlach river hole but stopping there did let me see the one thing that i needed to see. How much clearer the Clearwater was where it was meeting with the Potlatch. so it gave me a game plan for Wednesday i knew that with the number of fish those guys claimed to have hooked on Saturday and the clarity of the two waters that i needed to be up stream and i knew exactly where i was
Wednesday- a buddy of mine that has been begging me to teach him how to fish for salmon teamed up with me and we left my house with a little bit of a late start. we arrived to the hole that i had planned on fishing from the night before at 7:00am. ishowedmy buddy how to rig up a plunking line through on some roe and got both rods in the water and in their holders. we killed the next hour with chit chat and jokes watching our rods intently i studied the water a lot it was not the cleanest by any means but it had some visibility so i was confident 15 minutes before 8 my friend and i were talking about how i had told him that i had caught most of my fish in challis between 8:00 am and 10:00 am which might be a weird phenomena for just me. then 8:00 am came and............................... the tip on my buddy's rod he was borrowing from me sprang into the air as the weight was lifted off the bottom of the river and we both noticed it at the same time i kind of half yelled at him "grab the rod real it up and set the hook. He did it perfect started to reel and as the line tightened up slammed the rod back into a perfect hook set. (he has fished for halibut and other fish off of boats in Alaska so he has got hook set down.) BOOM! FISH ON!!!!! i grabbed the net and headed close to the water while coaching him on fighting on the fish as the water is still high and there is a lot of submerged willow trees in the hole. surprisingly the fish didnt fight all that much it basically swam right into the bank spun around when it saw me with the net made one short run back towards the current about 20 feet and then spun right back around and came right to the net. First springer on the bank gents............ after some high fives and a quick weight on my new scale the fish was a female and weighed just over 11 lbs . so now it was my turn and we sat till about 9 and watched my rod as small fish (probably pike minnows.) cleaned off the roe on it. then at 10:00am my rod tip went up and i got to it and set the hook and there was nothing there. so i put fresh roe on even though i was starting to run low. we sat till 11:00am and my rod tip bent down violently then straight up i got to the rod and set the hook and again nothing was there. i ran out of eggs so we hung it up for the day and headed in to town. .....................................................
..................................................... This is where the story get amazing ...............................................................................
got to my house and went to pull the skeins out of my buddy's fish so i could cure them up and was shocked at how little they were only about 7 inches long well i cut them and cleaned them and cured them up. so i sat around the house bored for an hour after so i decided i needed to do something so i decided to get some gear ready for tomorrow morning i tied up some bait. well when i was done with that it was only 3:30pm and i didnt want to sit around for the rest of the evening so i asked my son if he wanted to go down to the river with me. Yes he yelled with a grin so we got our shoes on loaded up the gear and made a dash for the same hole as earlier that morning. well my son didnt even make it out of lewiston before he fell asleep. well we made it to the spot and the boy was still sleeping so i got all the stuff set up and woke up my son. we got to the water and got the line out. then my son decided he needed to number 2 real bad so we took care of that. we walked back to the rod and chair i had set up and as i sat down i glanced up at the tip of my rod just in time to see it bend down then go straight up in the air then bend down again and went straight up in the air i jumped forward and grabbed the rod reeled it up and set the hook hard. Fish on!!!!!!!!! Honestly i thought it was a jack at first it felt small and swam into the bank but stayed just out of view in the colored water then it came up a little and i saw some of the fish and saw what i thought was a decent sized fish around 15 lbs i guessed.then it moved out into swifter current and started down stream which is where i wanted him to go anyways so i looked at my son and told him to grab the net and follow me. we walked down about 10 yards just towards the end of the submerged willow trees and just as the fish goes to past the very last tree it makes a dive right into the willow and hung up. i kept tension because i could still feel the the fish on the end of the line. i tried to think how to get this fish out of this willow tree and could not come up with anyl solution so i did what felt natural i walked down stream a little and pulled my line over the top of the tree branches and reeled up at the same time. IT WORKED. then thats when i realized how big the fish actually was its tail came out of the water and then the fish ran for the fast water peeling line off of my reel that had the drag set to where i could barely pull any line off of it. i turned the fish before it could use its weight and start heading down stream. the fish held for a second and then started letting me gain on it. i realized that there was no way i was gonna run my rod with the fish attached and run my big salmon net with one hand and land this fish. so i had to get my 4 year old son involved who was standing by patiently with the net. i told him to hold the net in the water and to tip the front down and he did it perfect. all the while i was letting the fish hold just off the bank in a back eddie i began to work the fish up to the net i got the fish right in front of the net then i told burton to slide the net under the fish and he did then i half yelled lift it up and he did perfectly i lurched forward reaching for the handle of the net while yelling hold it hold it hold it to my son i grabbed the net and drug the fish out of the water on to the bank while my son never let go of the net and helped pull the fish onto the bank. it wasnt until the fish was on the bank that both my son and i realized what we had both done the fish was big real big a female we didnt even say anything we just looked at the fish then grabbed each other and hugged and i asked him excitedly do you know what we just did? and he said WE JUST GOT THE BIGGEST FISH EVER!!!!!!! i laughed at him and said yes we did!!!!! i notched my tag and had my son snap a picture with my phone real quick then we hauled it up to the gear. it was crazy feeling the weight of the fish as i held her under the gills and carried her up the little hill we had come down during the fight. i busted out the scale and through the fish on it. when the fish bottomed out my 25 lb scale i was a little sceptical because spring scales are not very accurate none the less i knew the fish was big we loaded up our gear and headed home. on the way home my son says daddy i have to tell you something. and i said whats that. he said i was really scared of that fish. and i said i was too burton and i thanked him for being so brave for netting the fish for me.
we got home and my wife couldnt even believe the size of the fish we through it in a laundry tote and put it on the bathroom scale it said 27.6 lbs the laundry tote weighs close to a pound so it puts the fish just over 26 lbs. i wanted to put the fish on my wall but i couldnt get a hold of my taxidermist and my fridge is not big enough to store the fish whole wrapped in a towel so after about 30 minutes of deliberation with my wife who wanted it mounted also we decided to cut up the fish. it took almost an hour to disassemble the beast and get her into freezer bags i dont know if im gonna need any more salmon this season.[laugh]
but all in all i have to come out and say this is probably the single most memorable thing that has ever happened to me in all my years of fishing. the fact that my 4 year old boy netted a 20 plus pound salmon for me is unbelievable too me and i am completely grateful it happened. i will rememeber it for the rest of my life and i hope my son will also.
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Wednesday- a buddy of mine that has been begging me to teach him how to fish for salmon teamed up with me and we left my house with a little bit of a late start. we arrived to the hole that i had planned on fishing from the night before at 7:00am. ishowedmy buddy how to rig up a plunking line through on some roe and got both rods in the water and in their holders. we killed the next hour with chit chat and jokes watching our rods intently i studied the water a lot it was not the cleanest by any means but it had some visibility so i was confident 15 minutes before 8 my friend and i were talking about how i had told him that i had caught most of my fish in challis between 8:00 am and 10:00 am which might be a weird phenomena for just me. then 8:00 am came and............................... the tip on my buddy's rod he was borrowing from me sprang into the air as the weight was lifted off the bottom of the river and we both noticed it at the same time i kind of half yelled at him "grab the rod real it up and set the hook. He did it perfect started to reel and as the line tightened up slammed the rod back into a perfect hook set. (he has fished for halibut and other fish off of boats in Alaska so he has got hook set down.) BOOM! FISH ON!!!!! i grabbed the net and headed close to the water while coaching him on fighting on the fish as the water is still high and there is a lot of submerged willow trees in the hole. surprisingly the fish didnt fight all that much it basically swam right into the bank spun around when it saw me with the net made one short run back towards the current about 20 feet and then spun right back around and came right to the net. First springer on the bank gents............ after some high fives and a quick weight on my new scale the fish was a female and weighed just over 11 lbs . so now it was my turn and we sat till about 9 and watched my rod as small fish (probably pike minnows.) cleaned off the roe on it. then at 10:00am my rod tip went up and i got to it and set the hook and there was nothing there. so i put fresh roe on even though i was starting to run low. we sat till 11:00am and my rod tip bent down violently then straight up i got to the rod and set the hook and again nothing was there. i ran out of eggs so we hung it up for the day and headed in to town. .....................................................
..................................................... This is where the story get amazing ...............................................................................
got to my house and went to pull the skeins out of my buddy's fish so i could cure them up and was shocked at how little they were only about 7 inches long well i cut them and cleaned them and cured them up. so i sat around the house bored for an hour after so i decided i needed to do something so i decided to get some gear ready for tomorrow morning i tied up some bait. well when i was done with that it was only 3:30pm and i didnt want to sit around for the rest of the evening so i asked my son if he wanted to go down to the river with me. Yes he yelled with a grin so we got our shoes on loaded up the gear and made a dash for the same hole as earlier that morning. well my son didnt even make it out of lewiston before he fell asleep. well we made it to the spot and the boy was still sleeping so i got all the stuff set up and woke up my son. we got to the water and got the line out. then my son decided he needed to number 2 real bad so we took care of that. we walked back to the rod and chair i had set up and as i sat down i glanced up at the tip of my rod just in time to see it bend down then go straight up in the air then bend down again and went straight up in the air i jumped forward and grabbed the rod reeled it up and set the hook hard. Fish on!!!!!!!!! Honestly i thought it was a jack at first it felt small and swam into the bank but stayed just out of view in the colored water then it came up a little and i saw some of the fish and saw what i thought was a decent sized fish around 15 lbs i guessed.then it moved out into swifter current and started down stream which is where i wanted him to go anyways so i looked at my son and told him to grab the net and follow me. we walked down about 10 yards just towards the end of the submerged willow trees and just as the fish goes to past the very last tree it makes a dive right into the willow and hung up. i kept tension because i could still feel the the fish on the end of the line. i tried to think how to get this fish out of this willow tree and could not come up with anyl solution so i did what felt natural i walked down stream a little and pulled my line over the top of the tree branches and reeled up at the same time. IT WORKED. then thats when i realized how big the fish actually was its tail came out of the water and then the fish ran for the fast water peeling line off of my reel that had the drag set to where i could barely pull any line off of it. i turned the fish before it could use its weight and start heading down stream. the fish held for a second and then started letting me gain on it. i realized that there was no way i was gonna run my rod with the fish attached and run my big salmon net with one hand and land this fish. so i had to get my 4 year old son involved who was standing by patiently with the net. i told him to hold the net in the water and to tip the front down and he did it perfect. all the while i was letting the fish hold just off the bank in a back eddie i began to work the fish up to the net i got the fish right in front of the net then i told burton to slide the net under the fish and he did then i half yelled lift it up and he did perfectly i lurched forward reaching for the handle of the net while yelling hold it hold it hold it to my son i grabbed the net and drug the fish out of the water on to the bank while my son never let go of the net and helped pull the fish onto the bank. it wasnt until the fish was on the bank that both my son and i realized what we had both done the fish was big real big a female we didnt even say anything we just looked at the fish then grabbed each other and hugged and i asked him excitedly do you know what we just did? and he said WE JUST GOT THE BIGGEST FISH EVER!!!!!!! i laughed at him and said yes we did!!!!! i notched my tag and had my son snap a picture with my phone real quick then we hauled it up to the gear. it was crazy feeling the weight of the fish as i held her under the gills and carried her up the little hill we had come down during the fight. i busted out the scale and through the fish on it. when the fish bottomed out my 25 lb scale i was a little sceptical because spring scales are not very accurate none the less i knew the fish was big we loaded up our gear and headed home. on the way home my son says daddy i have to tell you something. and i said whats that. he said i was really scared of that fish. and i said i was too burton and i thanked him for being so brave for netting the fish for me.
we got home and my wife couldnt even believe the size of the fish we through it in a laundry tote and put it on the bathroom scale it said 27.6 lbs the laundry tote weighs close to a pound so it puts the fish just over 26 lbs. i wanted to put the fish on my wall but i couldnt get a hold of my taxidermist and my fridge is not big enough to store the fish whole wrapped in a towel so after about 30 minutes of deliberation with my wife who wanted it mounted also we decided to cut up the fish. it took almost an hour to disassemble the beast and get her into freezer bags i dont know if im gonna need any more salmon this season.[laugh]
but all in all i have to come out and say this is probably the single most memorable thing that has ever happened to me in all my years of fishing. the fact that my 4 year old boy netted a 20 plus pound salmon for me is unbelievable too me and i am completely grateful it happened. i will rememeber it for the rest of my life and i hope my son will also.
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