A Beautiful Fish Fights An Ugly Fisherman: First Kayak Springer of 2016

Its been a whirlwind this past couple months getting settled into a new fulltime job and launching a new business. I had been patiently waiting for catch rates to improve and water clarity in the lower Willamette to hit decent conditions. Unfortunately, just as things started to improve I got a nasty cold BUT after seeing positive reports from "dberd" killing them in his blue yak I just couldn't take it anymore.

I had to work at 1 PM so I arrived on the river predawn and was one of the first boats on the water. I was still running a mild fever and not feeling on my "A game". A quick pass near shore revealed 0 marks on the fishfinder so I pushed out deeper and started marking a few fish suspended at 25-30'. I set my gear down at about 28'. On my 3rd pass I marked 2 strong marks at 12'. I cranked the reel up to 15' on the line counter and just after I stopped the retrieve the rod shuddered....oddly. Then for a brief moment nothing happened when suddenly the rod loaded up! Sweet! FISH ON!!! It was pretty cool to mark and target a fish and then catch it.

The fight went smoothly up until I short stabbed the net twice, then lost the fish in the glare a couple times, then the fish hung up in the rudder, and I also managed to snag the net on the kayak once as well. I was getting really pooped by the end of the fight but somehow even after screwing everything up I still managed coax the fish in the net.



This was my 2nd kayak springer trip of the year (or my third if you count Chile!). Happy to have that monkey off my back. Looking forward to salmon kayak fishing for the next 8 months!

 

and you even kept the sunglasses on  ,  well played and way to hang in there!

Nice 

Nice work!!!!!

So good...thanks,Tyler. Most of my net jobs resemble this.  Nice springer,man

Loved the video! Looks like herring aren't the only lure for springers; was that a mini-brads?

Loved the video! Looks like herring aren't the only lure for springers; was that a mini-brads?

Yup. I've found the Brad Minis to be highly effective for springers.

Nice work!!

Nice work!!

That was awesome. You made us all feel good about our own netting experiences.


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  Glad you got that fish in the net .........finally.
  Patience is a hard thing to learn when you have a hot fish on your pole.
  But you did land the fish. Way to get-r-done.



  By the way--- I done a lot more ugly landing job many times. And a few knock offs too.