Hello everyone!
The last 6 months just blew by way too fast, in fact so fast I didn't even get a chance to float any rivers this fall. If you knew me you would know that just doesn't happen!
First off I'm 48 yrs young and a native of this wonderful state of Oregon. Born and raised in Pendleton and moved to Portland in 1988 (job). Have been fly fishing since I was 6 yrs old and started Steelhead/Salmon fishing on regular basis the same year I moved here.
Now that the introductions are done I want to say how much I appreciate many memebers on this board with their good advice and willingness to share. I will be counted amoung those in the future.
In particular I want to give a great big THANKYOU to Tacklebuster
as he is personally responsible for my 1st time story.
Last year before Memorial Day a friend at work setup a Sturgeon fishing trip for me and my nephew as this is something I had not done before and due to sports, my nephew, missed the springer season. As luck would have it my friend's wife got an unexpected day off and 2 days before we were to go he had to cancel. After 2 weeks of building this up for my nephew I was frantic to try and salvage the trip even if it was just the two of us. I decided to look into IFISH and see if there was any information that would instill confidence in proceeding with the trip. I can't begin to tell you how excited I was to see Tacklebusters posting on the very subject. There wasn't any GPS coordinates but his detailed information regarding general areas and what to look for and how to approach it was excellent and I knew I could do this.
We lauched from Hammond and went down river. Our first stop only produced 3 crabs (using sandshrimp) but I remembered Tacklebusters advice to move on if nothing happened in 20-30mins. Off we go to the Astoria bridge, the 200 Merc opened up enough to bring a big smile across my nephews face in spite of the light rain that began to fall. We anchored in 4' of water down from the dolphin and below several boats. Stayed there for an hour without any bites or seeing anyone else hookup either. Decided to move down along the flats and fished 4 more areas from 6' to 2' searching for the elusive Sturgeon. Well by now 12yr olds start to lose hope and get that "boy its warm and dry in the Jeep" look on their face so I knew I had only one more shot at it. Off we go back down below Hammond. As we come around the point we see 10 boats about 600 yards further down but I noticed one boat off by itself tucked in behind the point close to the current line. It was about 40 minutes to low tide and I was thinking we only had one more shot, where should I go? That's when I noticed a Sturgeons nose just barely poking up through the surface, attached to a rope tied off to a forward kleat. Looks good to me!
We anchored and had a flounder on in 5 minutes. Another 5 minutes and we had another flounder and a crab. Looked at my nephew and said "I think the sandshrimp are attracting the wrong fish, lets try the anchovies". Wasn't more than 5 minutes later we had our first shaker. Just after that my nephew hooks up and then loses one just as fast. There is nothing like the look of a young kid when he is struck by fishing fever! Just as I got his line back out in the water he yells at the top of his lungs "Uncle Jeff you got a fish". I look over and sure enough the rod tip is doing the tap, tap dance. Ever so slowing I moved the rod forward out of the holder and wait. Tap, tap, tap, tap, oh now he's tugging - WHAM. I have caught large Chinook and Halibut but this was something else! Too make a long story short the fish was kicking my behind! 3 long runs, four times around the boat, lots of advice from our neighbors, plus my nephew running back and forth from side to side shouting at the top of his lungs. One burned thumb and about 20 minutes later it comes up to the side of the boat and we both drop our jaws! My nephew looks me straight in the eyes and says "He's huge!, look how big he is!, what are we going to do now!, etc.etc.etc. His eyes were the size of quarters and the pitch in his voice had raised at least two notes! A quick check with the measuring pole and we lifted the fish into the boat. The tape said 55" and the two of us were in heaven. "You know Uncle Jeff a fish that big could pull me in!" "Yes and now you know why I tell you to hold on tight and be ready". "Oh I'll never forget, don't worry!"
Its now Feb. and he still talks about it everytime we get together (which is often, a true blessing). Even though he never got to land one he can't wait for our next trip.
Tacklebuster I will never, ever be able to express how grateful I am to you. I know you have taken some heat in the past because of postings such as the one I mentioned but I hope this one will pop into your mind everytime they do and you can just smile and glow warm inside [img]graemlins/hearton.gif[/img] knowing they just don't get it! Thank you, you are a credit to this board and thank you Jennie for making it possible! [img]graemlins/applause.gif[/img]
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