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Gosh, a friend and I fished that area real hard on
Saturday - Hood Canal up by Belfair State Park, as well as Puget Sound around
Allyn and further east, and just couldn't drum up any searuns. We saw lots of
chumlies around too, but didn't have any real luck in
getting any biters either.
Glad someone was having some luck.
Teeg Stouffer
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Sunday, November 28, 2004 8:24
PM
Subject: Re: Hood Canal, 11/25 to
11/27
Good post Brent.
You actually were a bit luckier than me. I tried my luck at Carkeek
Park in Seattle without any luck. There is a nice little creek flowing
into the Sound but there were too many dads teaching their kids how to throw
rocks in the water. At least that's my excuse for getting skunked.
(11/25/04)
I went to a family Thanksgiving celebration
on Hood Canal this weekend. I
couldn't believe my
luck. We stayed in a place about 9 miles up the
road
from Belfair right on the canal. As I put my turn
signal on to
turn into the driveway, I noticed a small
creek running out toward the
beach. After we got
settled in, I walked out by the beach to check out
the
fishing situation. By the debris on the beach, I could
tell that
the tide was definitely down several feet.
As I was surveying the
situation, a chum jumped two
times just off the beach. I tried to act
casual as I
went back to the van to get my fishing equipment.
I
strung up a dry line on my 8-weight rod with an 11'
leader. I tied on a
chartreuse comet. The tide was
slowly starting to come in. I started
fishing at about
11:30. I tossed the comet out to passing chum
for
about an hour. I couldn't get any fish to take. They
were swimming
by in singles and groups of up to 10
fish. At about 12:30 I tied on one
of Leland's poppers
and worked my way up and down the beach. I
tried
various fast/slow retrieves to no avail. I decided to
try a fly
I had tied for pink salmon. It was a simple
woolly bugger tied with pink
chenille and a pink
marabou tail on a size 6 barbless hook. Around 2:00,
I
hooked a hard fighting fish. It was a large sea-run
cutthroat. I
landed it and my dad snapped a couple of
pictures (luckily, my dad had
seen me fighting the
fish and came out with the camera) and watched
the
cutthroat swim off strongly. The fish looked like
a
battle-hardened veteran. He was heavily spotted, his
back was a dark
olive color. His golden sides had a
streak that looked almost like the
pink stripe on a
rainbow trout. He had some sort of sea lice
attached
to his back. I decided to give the littl! e estuary a
break
(actually me).
I took off my waders and sat enjoying the sunshine
for
about half an hour. I was feeling a bit lazy, so I
decided to make
a few casts without putting my waders
back on. After a few casts over the
oyster vein off
the beach, I started working my way toward the
sea
grass (eel grass?) near the mouth of the creek. Around
2:45 to
3:00, I got a hard strike. I couldn't believe
it, this fish was fighting
noticeably harder than the
first one. It was another sea-run cutthroat.
It was
smaller than the one I caught earlier, however it
fought much
harder. This fish was a bright golden
colored hen. I'm guessing she was a
hen by the shape
of her head and jaw. I decided to call it quits
for
the day. What a day.
(11/26/04) I fished for an hour or so
with no results.
I did manage to get a couple of pictures of a
large
chum that I adopted as my fishing buddy. He showed up
nearby
whenever I was wading.
(11/27/04) The family piled into a van for a
tour of
the surrounding areas. We drove by the Tahuya River.
Yikes!
There were guys lined up fishing there. We
drove around to Rendsland
Creek. There was a bunch of
chum milling around near Rendsland Creek. The
fish we
could spot from shore had seen better days. After
exploring a
bit, we headed back around to the Dewatto
River. I would like to take a
boat out and fish the
Dewatto Estuary some time. It was teeming with
chum.
Every time we crossed the Dewatto we would stop and
look at the
salmon spawning. We also saw numerous
lakes on this adventure. We made
the loop back around
to Belfair and headed home to eat some more
turkey.
Brent
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