Richard, my son, and I went over to the Murphy's Riverside Lodge on Monday in Port Alberni for a couple of days of guided fishing. Got over there Monday afternoon and the rain was coming down. Went to the Lodge and got settled in. Some guys had been out fishing and said that the Stamp was high, dirty and in the trees. During the night it poured and poured. Not encouraging for us but we were committed to make it happen.
Our guide, Kevin, met us at the Lodge at 7:30 am and said that the rivers, Sproat and the Stamp, were high. We got into the boat and proceeded up to the confluence of the Sproat and Stamp. Fished a little there then went up stream. It was raining hard. There were three other boats on the river fishing too. We started to fish the water against the shore and along the bushes. Tough casting into small holding areas as you are being held in position by the guide battling raging water and waves. Between 9 and 11am we hit 3 steelies, not being able to hold them in the turbulent water conditions. Did land a steelhead smolt of 12 inches.
Moved down a little more on the river and hit a beauty under the bows of trees. Landed her, a 5 lb hatchery doe, and bonked her. A seal lion bite was on her back. Of note: one of the guides last Saturday had a huge male seal lion take a steelie off of his rod right at the boat. First sea lion of that size to be seen in the river. While we were fishing, the Sproat rose 1 1/2 ft in height and was making it tough to fish.
Drifted up and down a couple of more times and hit three more steelies. Released one hatch male of 7 lbs, kept two hatch does 6 & 8 lbs. Fished down at the confluence pool and hit two more steels, lost the one in mid flight and landed the other to release it. Finished our fishing by 2:30 pm. Only one fish was landed by the other boats. We never fished the Stamp because it was so dirty. We were kingfishers for the day. I kept 2, Richard 1. We caught our fish on roe and egg sac.
Next morning, we went out with Rollie, who we had been with before over the years. It had rained all night and the Sproat and Stamp rose some more. We went up to the falls on the Sproat and fished from there down but it was just too hard to position ourselves and the holding water was minimal. The Stamp was actually clearing up even though it was so very high. Rollie said, We are going up to the Falls. So, off we went. At the Bucket, where the river conditions were crazy, he put us on shore and told us to walk upstream to where the path comes back to the river. He was going to take the boat up through the Bucket! Insane but he did it.
We hit the water around the island below the falls and spiked 4 or 5 fish but no holds. Finally, I hit one, a 7 lb wild buck and released him. Then I hit a 6lb Summer Hatch doe and released her. Richard hit two then landed one hatch doe 8 lb and bonked it. I hit a nice wild doe 7 lb and released her. I hit a good size fish fought it for 5 minutes but it took off into heavy water and got hung up on a branch or something in the monstrous waves and lost it. Hit into another another and it did one flip and was gone. Landed 3 steelhead smolts, one about 2 1/2 lbs and released them. Richard hooked into a nice steelie buck of about 8 lbs Hatch, and bonked it. So, our day came to an end. We caught our fish on pink worms and gooey bobs. Coming down the river was a wild ride, a little scary and intimidating. Rollie let us offer to walk down the path as he came through the Bucket again. Richard kept 2 and I kept none.
Back at the Lodge, we found out that we caught all the fish among 4 boats that day. We decided not to fish on Thursday but head home, Richards back was quite sore from all the pounding in the boat (issues from previous car accident).
We enjoyed our stay at the Lodge and catching fish in what I call Turbo Combat Casting in crazy water conditions. Hope to go back in February.
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Topic: Steelies on the Stamp (Read 6562 times)