Columbia River- Oregon April 13-14th

[ronaultmtd]

Got a spring Chinook trip booked on the Columbia/Williamette in mid-April- wouldn't mind bringing home fifty or so pounds of fresh caught wild salmon filets like last year- yummm....

[kevinfry]

Do yourself a favor and eat here http://www.pinestatebiscuits.com/ while in portland. It's classic. and catch a couple nice spring chinook!

[ronaultmtd]

Meeting a couple of guys at Salty's on the Columbia for lunch the 12th- Great place to eat and have a cocktail or two-

[kevinfry]

Salty's I know it well.....

[mytmouse]

Oh my... that biscuit is mouth watering... Have fun out there Ron!

[chex]

Awesome. Enjoy!

Fly fishing? or.... trolling?

[ronaultmtd]

We usually anchor and back troll with quick fish

[tufnik]

Yeah, that Reggie looks really good. Don't forget to take and bring back lots of pics. Good luck!

[ronaultmtd]

You really need some good rain gear to fish the Northwest- I fish this every year- and I am on the west coast about four times a year- I have the Cabala's Guide Gear Rain wear and a good pair of rubber chukar boots- the preferred baits are Quick Fish with sardine wrap, big custom made in line spinners, wiggle warts, plug cut herring...

[ronaultmtd]

Well, the earlier post about having some "really good rain gear" was prophetic- it rained like a cow pissing on a flat rock- 20-50 mph winds, mixed with sleet and snow....and we were the only boat Saturday on the Young's Bay tributaries- Sunday was much nicer- colder but nicer- it only rained every thirty minutes to an hour between downpours- we were glad the Willie boat had auto bilge pumps- I can highly recommend the Cabela's Guide Wear H20Tech bibs and wading jacket- kept me dry through two days of hellish weather- the all rubber Bogs chucker boots were great, too- and we were the only boat that caught Chinook salmon both days- I'll re-post pictures later- got to go on my business work right now- some really nice fish- they fought super in the 46 degree waters- first year where we had to use all barbless hooks, so we lost a lot of fish (5) when they jumped and did the head shake flipping the the lure out- caught a giant native we had to release (can't keep native chinooks)

[ronaultmtd]

Here are a few of the pictures from this weekend's Chinook salmon fishing trip- we had nine fish hooked- four boated and one we had to release- not bad considering the terrible weather conditions- the pictures don't show it but it was miserable weather-


IMG code

[kevinfry]

Awesome RON!!! Looks like perfect salmon fishing weather! Or rather "Steelhead weather" as we used to call it...see famous silkscreen
Steelhead_Weather_green.jpg

[ronaultmtd]

Kevin- This is the first time that the Oregon Fishery regs called for barbless hooks- trying to get a chinook on barbless hooks in the landing net is a real treat- we lost some really nice fish trying to net them-

[chex]

Nice fish... that looks like fun despite the weather... In one of those pics, you look content, but cold

[ronaultmtd]

We had just boated a 28-30 pound native Chinook (no clipped fin) that we released during a downpour- biggest fish of the trip and had to release it, so while it was fun catching, I was a bit sad we couldn't keep it- Yep, I was real content and satisfied, especially when no other boats had a fish hit a lure much less three in the fish box- the secret was a particular spinner and a way of rigging it that our host makes- he is a real fisherman! shame was he didn't catch a fish the whole weekend- he had four at the boat and all four came unbuttoned-