By Catch

 Spring has been slow to come here in Moooontana. But finally we got us the storied non freezing nights and 60 to 70ish days so we just got done with our first two days of chasing. Every fishery has a rumor mill and I'm sure this one's alive and well, I'm just not connected to the coconut telegraph here like I have been in Mexico or  Alaska. I just gotta meet the right people, the guy that knows the guy that knows....So in my search for Wally's, the southern Halibut I have to rely on what Keith tells me and You Tube video's.  I start on a point, 12 to 16 ft. of water . I got live bait and the Berkley flicker shad as well as a Hot an Tot and Medium diver Chartreuse plug. We troll 3 minutes and one of the 4 rods goes off.  The fish is heavy and fights pretty good at first and then kinda lays down like I've been told the Wally will do. I'm excited, my first Wally .....turns into a trout,, but a nice one.

mmmm....it's on the chartreuse Wally plug so I cut out the Hot N Tot and put on another Wally plug. In another ten minutes MP has another but bigger trout to the boat. So, I change out once again and now I have all plugs out one of which has been hanging in my garage peg board for 25 years that a customer gave me because it said ' salmon on it. The third fish comes to that plug and I'm kinda dumbfounded, do you suppose these trout will eat anything ?

So having 3 or 4 to the boat and several misses in less than an hour guide # 003 decides to take my own advice that I offered to the young guys time and time again on the world famous " do what you do and always trust your own intuition "....So, next thing you know I'm salmon fishing again. MP and I decide to run just three rods ( in this place you're allowed 2 a person , I know that seems strange but what isn't around here ) and I'm pulling all salmon plugs, Hot Shots , Mag Lips , Tadpolly's and my best catcher turns out to be a gold Wiggle Wart just like the one I snipped off Herb Good's line at Stewart's Landing Boat Launch 40 years ago.  ( and that's another story ) . As the years went on we used them for trout when the beads and flesh flies weren't working so I shouldn't have been surprised. And lucky me, I got boxes full of them.

So eventually we get down to fishing just two rods and have many trout to the boat that are 3 pounds. Even on the world famous that would be a pretty good two hours of fishing. Of course we all know MP being the original mind wanderer is usually only good for a couple of hours so we're getting ready to call it quits and have a beer at the 19th hole. Here's another typical.

As I'm putting the gear away a boat pulls up kinda close and wants to talk, get a fishing a report. I tell them they gotta get closer because I left my earing aids at home. They've got a brand new boat and when I tell them I don't have the foggiest idea what I'm doing they say they don't either. But I report there seems to be a lot of fish around and they're only down about 10 feet and they love Alaska salmon lures. I offer to give them some but they say they got a Qwikfish or two and some Lazy Ikes. 

Being a little compulsive ( I like that description a lot better than using the word ' anal ' ) it takes me a bit to clean all the lures off and put them nicely away, dried off of course. Then I gotta lock the rods into the rod holders so they sweep back behind the boat and look cool when I run back. Just as I leave I look over and snap this pic with the telephoto....they catch a  nice trout and I watch them release it. I idle within ear shot and tell them I'll have the pics for sale in the lobby this evening.....they say " we'll see you then "......this is kinda fun.

And it's BEAUTIFUL