Short Story:

Decided to hit the river again this morning and was rewarded! Hooked a nice chrome hen on my trusty ol' Blue Fox spinner. Size 3 blue bell silver blade.

Long Story:

Started off the day nice and early arriving about a half hour before sunrise. With all these hens I've been catching lately, I wanted to try out my eggs searching for one of those nice Kings that I've been seeing jumping heading upriver. So, I started fishing some home cured eggs and kept getting some real light bites. Nothing big enough to set the hook on...The dang things were stealing the bait! I'd reel in and there'd be nothing left.

So, I kept this routine up for a while and was about to switch over to my hardware rod when I had a couple pretty decent bites on the eggs. Chomp Chomp Chomp, Chomp Chomp Chomp Chomp....Almost like a trout bite on a night crawler. After the second bite I figured there wouldn't be hardly any eggs left and so I went to set the hook and missed him.

I'm running a double hook setup with the top hook point cut off and holding the eggs. I'm almost wondering if I should just get rid of that and fish a single hook with the eggs near the point. I'm gonna try that set up soon and see if that helps me get some bites.

So, after missing that fish I rebaited and continued fishing my home cured eggs for a spell until I ran out of them...

After watching numerous Kings and Silvers jump on their way upriver I finally decided to start throwing metal at em.

I already had a twitchin Hootchie Jig on my line and so started jigging that through the hole...There's a number of snags there and that's where the fish are and so even though I risked losing some tackle I kept casting in that slot...Eventually, my hook found a snag and luckily I was able to pull er loose. Good thing I'm running 15lb test and can tie good knots. I managed to straighten the Gami hook out and while I surprise to see that, I was happy to get my lure back.

Knowing I hooked that Coho the other day on a Blue Fox, I decided to tie that very lure back on the line. That's when things got good :)

I started casting and swinging my spinner through the hole and couldn't get any bites...So, I figured the thing to do was cover a little ground...Don't be married to that spot, even though I've caught quite a few fish from that one hole.

I couldn't help but think of the days fishing trout as a kid and covering lots of ground looking for the Rainbows.

So, I kept moving further and further down the bank...

Kept seeing lots and lots of jumpers and rollers and quite a few that looked pretty fresh. That got me hankerin even more for some fresh chrome.

I was just about ready to switch over to a different spinner when I cast out 3/4th across the river and let the spinner swing, it's blade thumping on it's own by the force of the current. I reeled ever so slowly just enough to keep some of the slack out of the line. I still had a little bend in the line until all of a sudden the line went straight and as I reeled down I felt resistance...For a quarter-second I thought maybe I snagged something but then I felt the head shake. So, I promptly raised the rod tip setting the hook.

She was pissed! She made a run upriver and I kept a tight line on her, keeping my rod tip low...I was fully expecting her to fly up out of the water like a missile and wanted to be prepared. She did just the opposite at first. As she swam upstream she started diving towards the bottom. Next, she spun around and started a run downstream. When she did that, she tried jumping but I wouldn't let her. Her upper body came out of the water and she shook her head trying to throw the hook. Not this time I said :)

I promptly looked for a place to land her and kept reeling her in closer to the bank. She was hooked a good 40' out in the middle of the river. Once I got her close enough to the bank I set my rod down, grabbed the leader and landed her at my feet. She was super bright, no doubt fresh from the salt. A few scales were even falling off her. I pinned her head down and ripped open her gills. She was flopping all around splashing me in the face with her tail, blood flying everywhere :)...Then I grabbed a rock and bonked her upside the noggin'. That settled her down a bit.

It was then that I got a really good look at her and thanked the Lord above for blessing me with such an awesome fish. I took her back to the water, washing the blood off and massaging her a little to help pump more blood out.

Since I wasn't close to my pack, I went up the bank about 10' and found a spot to place her. Not wanting her to get away I took a rock and pinned her down.

Then I picked up my rod, inspected my leader and went back to work searching for another biter.

Had another bump on the lure but turned out to just be a drive by.

The sky conditions changed and the sun started coming out and I remembered up the bank, I had left a jar of store bought eggs out and so I didn't want the eggs to get cooked, nor the fish to get heated up and so I marched back up the bank 50 yards to my gear.

First thing I did was put that fish on a stringer. Then I covered my eggs up. Was starting to get hot in the raingear I was wearing and so I took the jacket off...No sooner did I do that, it started sprinkling on me...I was like, what the hell! I started to cover my gear up and grabbed the jacket to put it back on and then I looked at the sky and was like, it ain't gonna rain much, so screw it...If it does, I'll just get wet!

I grabbed a couple more Blue Foxes out of my tackle box along with some twitchin jigs and figured I'd work my way back down the bank again...

As I started doing that I noticed how beaten up that Blue and Silver Blue Fox was getting and I was like, Cool! This is a fish killer! So, I kept fishing with that for a while but then as the sun started getting brighter, I figured I'd change it up...So, I went with an all brass one and also and orange and brass one. Was hoping to hook into another one using a different lure...

No, such luck. Did have a fish bump the lure though...He hit the thing and then proceeded to jump right next to it...Basically saying...Nah nah nah nah nah nah!!! I was like, okay you sucker...I kept casting to the fish I saw and swinging through the run putting my rod tip in the water, trying to get as deep as I could. Saw a few swirls next to my lure but no bites. Had another one bump my line though so I knew I was in the strike zone.

After no more luck with the spinner, I tied on a 3/8th oz twitching hootchie I made up. Worked the water over pretty good with that and no luck and so switched to a different style...Still no luck...

Finally, had to call it a day and so fished my way back to my gear..

Got the camera out and took a few more shots, cleaned and gutted her out noticing how awesome her eggs looked. I'm getting better at bleeding them out too so hardly any blood at all in the skeins.

Before I gutted her, I weighed her at 5lbs. Pretty nice fat hen.

There's some decent sized Coho's starting to show up...Not sure if this was a resident or ocean run but she sure was bright and fresh! Very happy and blessed to have caught this hatchery coho today. Looking forward to grilling her up tomorrow.

Tight lines y'all!

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