John Kelley

I arrived at the Oak late morning and was on the lake around noon. All by myself, so I decided to to motor out to about 150' of water to set up shop, and troll her north to the open water. The lake was a little bumpy, so I decided to fish two riggers with spoons and the 400' copper with a herring twinkie rig behind a white with green dot 11" DW paddle. The spoons I was fishing were Carbon 14 on the starboard rigger and Double Trouble on the Port side rigger, with matching sliders on each rig. I set the riggers at 90' & 100'. I did not have much action until I hit the 29 north line, and then I could not keep the steelhead off of the doublet trouble slider spoon. After 6 steelhead of various sizes, and one open water brown trout, I finally left that slider off of the port downrigger. Shortly thereafter, I took a real hot rip on the copper, and it was off to the races, with line screaming off the old Okuma 55L. 5 minutes into the fight, the line went limp, and one of the three hooks on that treble had been completely broken off. I switched out that hook with a new treble, and was back in action again. This was all taking place in about the 540' to 570' area. Fifteen minutes later another screamer grabs the copper, and it is off to the races once again. I had this one on a little bit longer than the previous fish, but it cut through the 50 pound leader, and was gone soon, too. It was about at this time that I opened the windshield, and the wind grabbed it and slammed it into my net, knocking the net into the drink. Now I am sitting 11 miles off shore with no landing net, in a hot fish zone!! in the meantime I had boated 3 more steelhead, two more on the double trouble, and one on the carbon 14 slider. I figured out that the salmon wanted herring strips, so I re-rigged the copper setup one more time, and set up a herring rig on the starboard rigger as well, and sent it down to the 120' mark. Now I have the Double trouble spoon down 80' on the port rigger, the copper 400 pulling herring, and the starboard rigger @ 120' pulling Herring. Copper fires again, and this time I land a nice little 15 pound king on it, and have to gill the fish to get it into the boat. I was quite proud of myself for that maneuver, and threw that fish in the box. About a half hour later the port rigger fires hard and instantly starts screaming the clicker on the old Sealine 47. This fish was a lot bigger, and a little trickier to get my hands in its gills. When it was all over, I hoisted a nice 26 pound hen into the boat, and was thinking quite highly of myself. My digital scale was jumping between 26 and 28 pounds, so I called the Cove to see if I could use their scale just to see what it actually weighed when I got back. They said sure, as long as I made it there before 8 p.m. It was about 5:30 or 6, and I had 2 nice salmon in the box, so I just decided to troll south, toward shore and be happy with my afternoon. I think I was about at the 450' area, heading south, when I noticed some nice hooks on the screen @ 100' of water. I raised the starboard rigger up to 100', reeled in the 20' of slack, and just turned around to look ahead of me, when I heard the clicker on that sealine screaming hard and fast. The rod was doubled over, and I had a real hard time getting it out of the rod holder. I socked the fished good, set the rod back in its holder, then reeled in the 400 copper and the other rigger as fast as i could, and grabbed the rod again. I could tell this was a good fish, and circled him to gain some line on him. Pretty soon I was looking at the biggest salmon I had seen all season, lying on the surface behind the boat. I struggled a couple of times to get him close enough to gill him, and then hoisted his big body into the boat!! My first Tyee, and I was pumped!! I shouted out Tyee a couple of times as loud as I could, and was quite stoked!! Landed without a net, even!! Yeah!! Back at the Cove it weighed 30 pounds 3 ounces, was 43 inches long, and 24.5 inches around. It is now safely at the taxidermist shop! Caught a bunch more salmon and steelhead Saturday and Sunday, but nothing that nice. Thanks.

Nice fish man, great job!

Victorinox Forschner Cimeter is the best knife for slicing off each side in one swipe. I own the 14" model and could not be more happy. The heavy blade slides right through the ribs on the largest salmon. Check ebay for the best deal on them.

Nice, I will be out at the Oak this afternoon. Keep 'em coming to the boat!

Nicely done!

Nicely done guys and gals! That ED is on it, dog gone it!! Great results and nice report!

Nice!

Nice fish!!

Nice job.

Nicely done, and good report.

Nice work, fella!

Great job, and nice report!

Wow, very interesting on the smelt! Were they big smelt, like 8 or 9 inches or better?