Steelhead Fishing Begins

After weeks of wind, we finally got a mostly calm day to get out on the Columbia to do a little smallmouth bass fishing. The air was full of smoke from multiple large wildfires in the area, but it was sunny and not too hot. The water level was even a little high for this time of year, the flow of the Columbia River is completely controlled by the many large dams so you never know what you’re going to get.

I got one small bass on one of the first few casts so I thought we might be in for a good day, but it turned out that was the only fish I caught in five hours of fishing. The fish were just not biting at all. I might have done better if I had a working fishfinder so I could find where the underwater dropoffs were. Sometimes, you can tell where they are by the water color, but if there is wind chop and you’re drifting around, a fishfinder helps to keep you in place. Even with a fishfinder, I still might have not caught anything. It was one of those days, where after a couple hours, you knew the fish just weren’t biting. There were a few guys fishing for steelhead, I didn’t see them catch anything either. This past summer has been pretty bad as far as smallmouth bass fishing goes. I don’t know if it was the low river water levels during the spring spawning, the fluctuating water levels because of the drought conditions, the extremely hot weather and warmer than normal water temperatures or what, the usually reliable and active smallmouth bass fishing has been dead. It’s been mostly windy for the past couple months so it’s not like it’s fished out either. Who knows?

If you’re going to fish all day and get nothing, the best fish to go after is steelhead. They are probably the hardest fish to catch around here. Most of the time, if you get one or two a year, that’s pretty good. Last year, I caught more steelhead than I ever have. Maybe it’s beginner’s luck, but I think it’s time to get the heavier gear out and start going after them. Most of the steelhead I caught last year were native fish. They are beautiful fish and strong fighters, but you can’t keep them. Anyway, time to dig out the steelhead/salmon fishing stuff. I’m hoping that all these heat and water issues don’t have an adverse effect on the fall steelhead and salmon runs. Maybe that’s why they are letting more water out of the dams.

We finished up making an inexpensive, removable stern light for the kayak. During steelhead and salmon fishing season, I’m out on the Columbia River in the dark, I want to be sure that power boats will see me and not run me over. I’ll be posting how to make it on the watermanatwork.com website.

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