Sunday morning I was out to fish at the O dark thirty hour. It looked like Simax was going to be as crowded as it was Saturday night so I decided to head to the other end of the lake. I was about half way across the lake when I started second guessing how much gas I had left in the tank. I know my gas gauge isn't working and I had left my spare 2 gallons in the back of my truck. I started trolling at rainbow Point and within just minutes had a nice little 20 inch 3 pound brown. I trolled back to the resort and called it a weekend.

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Here's the final report from the big first weekend at Crescent of the year. Robert Achter made the long drive to Crescent from northern California along with his wife, Becca, sister Stacy, and bro-in-law Randy. It was great to meet these guys after a string of coorespondance in the weeks leading up, and even better to see them score some great fish for their efforts!

Hey Dan,
First off I'd like to say thanks again for all the great tips and info about Crescent Lake, it made our vacation/fishing trip a success. This is by far the nicest overall lake I have been to in a while, from the fishing, the lodge and the people, it was truly a great experience for all of us. We fished as much as we could each day, given our situation, by far not as much as you fished, your pretty darn hardcore when it comes to hours on the water. Anyway we got a few decent macks, my brother-in-law Randy hooked up first with a great fighting 5# Mac. An hour later, the rod went off again and it was Stacys turn, she battled the biggest trout of her life, a 9# Mac. This was fun to watch her catch this and Randy did a great net job, the fish was relased un-harmed, video to follow. I finally had my turn at a Mac, when I hooked up with him I could tell he was decent because he had a nice few pumps to start and then he camped out and i didn't gain much line, when I got him up towards the boat , he got an awesome second wind and peeled off 20 yards off line straight down and I could see him the whole way, got him to the boat and landed the 11# Mac. He took a minute to release but he finally took off in a fierce way.
As for the brown fishing, it was a little slow for us, we got a handful of dinks, but finally got into a good one on Sunday night just after we said bye to your friends R.D. and Brian and their Dads, who by the way are very nice guys. It was starting to get late and the sun was almost down, we went past Simax point in 20ft of water and BAM! The rod slammed down, and I could feel that it was a good fish, also hoping it was a brown. It was painfully hardbut I passed this onto Becca for her to get a good feel of this fish, she did great though, this brown came about a foot out of the water, literally 3 foot off the side of the boat, wit a nasty head shake, ut th rod bent back down and he was there still, we got this fish landed and finally got to do a high five brown celebration. We weighed him with the scale bouncing from 5.2 to 5.6, but we got the 5+ Brown!
Randy also was lucky enough to nail 4 different species, Brown, Mac, Koke, and Rainbow Trout.
Well thanks again Dan, I look foward to your reports in the future and hope to try again in the fall, were going to one of my favorite lakes down here this weekend which has an abundance of browns in the 2-5# class and plenty of 20+ Lakers in it, I'll shoot you some pics next week, hopefully.
Thanks, Robert

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Here's my first brown trout report of the year.

Wickiup Reservoir - May 2-4, 2008

Was this a dream, or did I actually just return from a weekend of fishing for trophy brown trout? Holy cow, It’s true! The long winter is over, and the season has finally arrived. All of the good lakes are still frozen besides Wickiup, but what else do you need? It seems like an eternity has past since the last time I went after a big brown, and it sure felt good to be back on the water.

After being sick all week, I wondered if it was crazy to hit the road at 12:30 am in hard core style with only one hour of sleep. Some would say yes, but there was no way I was going to miss the morning bite on Friday. Fellow trophy trout hunters Jimmy Lewis and Rick Palo were already there and the fishing had been very slow. Anyone who fishes hard for browns knows that the bite can turn on a dime so I was not discouraged. I arrived at a bit after 4:00 and had time for a 20 minute nap before waking Jimmy. We were on the water by 5:00 and started the typical early morning flatline drill. We trolled around in the Deschutes arm for an hour with no action and worked our way down past Gull Point. I had bagged the flatlining and lowered my Excalibur Minnow to around 25 ft with the use of my leadcore outfit. It paid off quickly with a solid tug and a few minutes later I had a skinny brown aboard that went about 23 inches. We let the lines back out, and within seconds of engaging my reel I felt a dull pull that grew increasingly harder. I looked back and saw some sort of diving bird pop up showing signs of struggle. Sure enough my lure had gotten into him. We slowly motored back to him and scooped the poor thing into the net. Fortunately only one hook was barely lodged into his foot and after a quick photo he was “released unharmed”.

We continued on our troll and eventually worked our way to the dam. Jimmy had a couple of missed strikes along the way using an old school Rainbow F18 Rapala. Finally my rod went again while I was towing a Lyman plug painted rainbow by my friend Jordan. It pulled a little line and I was hoping for my first brown over 5 pounds for the year. The 24 inch male missed that mark by a half pound, but a fine fish none the less.

The sun was now high in the sky and we decided to troll our way back to camp for lunch. Along the way I stuck another nice brown of about 3 pounds. The deeper water drill was slowly paying off bigger than the flatline program. These fish were holding tight to the bottom.

After lunch we worked our way up the Deschutes arm to Sheeps Bridge and worked a little shallower water. On the way back down my rod bounced hard and I was into another good brown. This hen went 4 pounds and fell for one of the new Lucky Craft Real Skin Pointer 78’s in Aurora Black. This lure has been hot for me in the past at Wickiup (without the Real Skin), and it was nice to see it do the trick. Still looking for one over 5.

The sun began to fall and we opted to spend the evening in a middle stretch of the D. arm that was holding tons of small kokanee. It just seemed right to keep our lures where all the bait is, despite having to weave around all the kokanee fishermen (who were all doing very well, by the way). I decided to mix things up lure wise by putting on a certain lure in a bright firetiger pattern, and lower it on the leadcore. I picked up a dink, and on the next pass around the same spot, my rip was met by a powerful tug followed by a surge of line stripping from my reel. This one felt good! I won the battle and as the fish came close to the boat, I knew my goal for the trip was in the bag. The golden hookjaw measured 24 inches and went 5 ½ lbs. A couple of pics and he was back on his way to chomp some more kokes. On the next pass over that spot I picked up another small brown, and the pass after that I lost another fish that was probably over 5 as well as it too stripped line before coming unbuttoned. The last hour of the day, true prime time by most brown trout standards, was dead. I ended the day with 8 fish and 5 of them were over 21 inches. Thanks to my guide, Jimmy.

Needless to say, I was totally wiped out tired. Remember I had one hour of sleep and had gotten on the road at 12:30 am followed by a 16 our day of fishing. I went to bed right away, and the 4:30 alarm came way too quickly. This is brown trout fishing!

We started off in the same run we had worked the night before. The first hour and a half put a small fish in the boat for me, and a 19 incher for Jimmy. The next hour and a half was dead, and we decided to work our way down to Gull Point again. Just short of the point my Lyman got hit and another good fish was shaking it’s head. Another nice hookjaw came into the net, and he went 4 ½ pounds. Most of these fish are running on the skinny side, but will break that 5 mark once they thicken up a bit. Water temps were ranging in the mid 40’s and once they hit 50 the fish will start feeding more aggressively. We trolled around below Gull Point for a couple more hours and then headed in for an early lunch.

The plan was for Jordan and his friend John to show up at noon, and I decided to take a short nap while waiting for them to show and then jump in Jordan’s boat. We got on the water at about 1:00 and trolled our butts off for the rest of the day with one small brown to show. Tough fishing to say the least. At the end of the day I had to look at my camera to remind me of the nice fish I had caught so many hours before and I didn’t feel so bad anymore.

Sunday morning we fished the D. arm again and picked up a couple of small browns. We saw Jimmy coming in from working the dam and he reported no fish and nasty wind. The dam can be a very sketchy place to fish when the wind is blowing hard, but we really wanted to spend the remainder of our day down there. So we decided to troll our way down hugging the shelter of the shallows along the northern shoreline. The wind was being kind, slowly subsiding as we made our way, and soon the water was flat. Jordan finally got on the board with a 22 inch brown that struck his F13 in the shallows.

When we got to the dam we made some shallow passes tight to the rocks and as I stood on the bow, I was able to see several fish in the 5-9 pound range spooking away from our boat. This got us pretty worked up and after several trolling passes with nothing, we decided to get out on the dam and cast from shore for a while as not to spook the fish we were targeting with the moving boat. In an hour Jordan had picked up another brown over 20 inches and I got a nice surprize in the form of a 20 inch male brook trout. The sun was behind me so the photo is only fair, but here he is. The day was winding down and it was going to be a long troll back to camp to we had to call it. Jordan picked up one more brown of about 18 inches on the way in. Our efforts had put us onto 9 fish for the day. I think my total for the trip was 14 browns with 7 of those going over 21 inches and the 20 inch brookie. Pretty good averages.

Crescent Lake is about to ice off and there are plans for the gang to hit it hard on May 16 for a few days. That could be an interesting trip for sure so stay tuned.

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RD sent me this report on his recent trip to Wickiup. 

Dan,
Took my neighbor and fellow co-worker, Ken Harris, with me to Wickiup
this past weekend.  We arrived too late to fish prime on Friday night
due to a separated tire on my boat trailer in Oakridge.  We hit the
lake early Saturday morning, and I landed a 16" dink in the first few
hours of the morning troll.  The day seemed brutally slow, as Wickiup
often can be for Browns.  Ken is more of a Kokanee Specialist than
myself, and I could tell he was anxiously wanting to pursue what we
typically refer to as "BAIT"!  I personally LOVE the taste of Smoked
Kokes, so after hours of nothing trolling for the Browns, I caved to
the thought of fresh kokanee in the Little Chief.  We noticed lots of
people jigging/trolling/bait fishing for these little sockeye up in
the Deschutes Channel, so that is where we anchored.  In an hour and a
half's time, we landed 6 and probably lost another 5 or so.  I found a
crocidile spoon in rainbow color to be working.  We were in 32 feet of
water jigging right off the bottom.  The Shoepeg corn on the hooks
probably added to our success.  I was growing anxious to get back to
the browns, so we went into shore, cleaned our catch, and hit the
evening bite.  Once again the brown bite was painfully slow, but we
stuck with it.  Finally, right at 8:30 p.m., Ken's rod slammed down!
Fish on!  Ken battled a short but scrappy hen brown to the boat.  She
taped right around the 20" mark and weighed in just a hair under the
3lb. mark.  I snapped a couple pics of Ken's personal best brown, and
we let her swim back home.  That fish seemed to ease the pain of a
long day, and we were satisfied with our catch for the night.
Sunday morning came early, after a night of drinking and telling
stories around the campfire with good fishing buddies!  Ken and I hit
it early hoping for an improved day of brown trout action.
Unfortunately, more of the same slow conditions continued for us.
After 5 hours of trolling without a hit, we decided to start a little
earlier on the "BAIT" jigging.  It proved to be a wise move, as Ken
and I slayed the Kokes landing 25 in a 4 hour span.  We easily lost at
least 10 to 15 more of the little torpedoes.  Most of them were in the
8 to 12" range, but we lost a couple right at the boat that were
probably pushing the 14" mark.  I'm sure they will put on more growth
as the Spring moves along.  We caught this group of Kokes on multiple
jigs.  Ken used an orange buzz bomb, and a pink/white nordic jig.  I
had luck with a fluorescent orange and pink/white nordic jig, as well.
 I'll have to admit..........those little guys go Ape $**t when those
hooks hit their lips!  Pretty fun to catch on light gear, and I can't
wait to gnaw on some while fishin' for their predators whenever
Crescent thaws out.
Take care buddy, and hope to fish with ya soon.
R.D.
"Browns - Coyotes of the Fishing World!"

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My buddy Andy sent me this report from his recent trip to Lake Billy Chinook. A shame that the only trophy trout lake that is accessible in central Oregon is just not fishing well this year.

March 8-10, 2008- Lake Billy Chinook
 
We pulled up to the day use area at a decent hour, but didn't get on the water that early. We buzzed down by the Dam to start out our day. My Uncle Ron was the first one to hook up with a fish, but a little different technique  was used. We were idling in a circle, trying to set up to  flat line the shore line. My uncle had his Rapala floating on surface about ten feet behind the boat  when a fiesty 14" bull hit it. It didn't take long to get that one in. We had high hopes after that, but they quickly faded after trolling for hours without a strike. I  wanted to try the Metolius arm by the island, but there were so many boats you could'nt hardly find a lane to troll. So our next option was to check out the Deschutes arm. I lost two small bulls and landed one with brother losing one while casting smaller plugs. About 3:00
we headed back down by the dam. My dad hooked into what turned out to be the best fish of the trip (20" 2.5lb bull trout).He was flatlining a F-13 rapala in about 150ft of water. Then shortly after that my dad hooked into what appeared to be about an 20ft Alumaweld. The guy was going about 30mph and only about 40ft away when he cut across behind our boat and snaging my dads line. The drag was screaming  before it ripped the whole rod and reel into the lake. Luckily my Uncle and I both snagged his line when we were reeling in and we pulled his rod and reel in by hand. He lost his lure, all of his leader and some of his braided line, and also had some nice burns on his hand to show for it.
 
Sunday we got on the water alot earlier and we had all depths covered, with one in the downrigger, one lead core, one deep diver and one flat line. But still after a few hours of that, no takers. We then headed back up the Deschutes arm to try for some action with our spinning rods. With only a few more small fish we called it a day.
 
We didn't catch that many fish but it was nice to go fishing again, and it was nice to test out my dads boat before heading to Crescent in April.
 
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Here's a report from Lake Billy Chinook from TTH reader Brice.

March 7-9

Went to Lake Billy Chinook this past weekend. Arrived Friday about 11:00, decided to fish the lower part of the crooked arm that day then try the metolius side on saturday. We mostly used herring as have had some success that way in the past. Turned out to be a tough trip. Did not get a bite on Friday, or Saturday. Finally on sunday we went upstream of the bridge on the Crooked River arm and managed 3 small bulls and one small brown. Bites were very soft and seemed a bit timid for bulls and browns...All fish were 15"-18" with the largest one being the brown. All fish were carefully released. Weather was great and it is always fun to watch the bald eagles, but the fishing was a little tough. I definitely needed the fishing therapy though.

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Feb 9-10, 2008 - Lake Billy Chinook

After a busy winter of mostly work and not enough play, it was finally time to get on the water again for some trophy trout opportunities. All of the lakes that hold good populations of brown trout are socked in behind many feet of snow, and our beloved Crescent Lake has frozen over for the second year in a row. The only option left was to head to Lake Billy Chinook which hangs at a much lower elevation. The bull trout population at this lake has been on the decline for a few years now, right behind the falling numbers of kokanee, the bull trout’s primary food source. Four years ago, a guy who knew the game could show up for a weekend and have a good likelihood of scoring a number of fish over 5 lbs and a very good shot at one over 10. The reports this year have been worse than ever, so we went into this trip with the old standby goal of just seeing one trout over 5 lbs to the boat for the weekend.

Brian Sanchez and I made the long drive around Mt Hood to avoid snowy passes and arrived Friday night to meet RD and Brian Wildish at Sonny’s Motel in Madras. Jordan showed up not long behind us and after some good fish talk to get our blood heated up, we went to bed in hopes of seeing someone get a monster bull the next day.

We were pleased to find the water levels on the rise and despite reports that the Cove Palisades boat ramp was closed, we launched there with no trouble and got right to fishing. Within 100 yards of the launch, we started to see big schools of kokanee on the graph and good numbers of bulls hanging around them. Most were holding in the 50-100 ft range so we spread our artificial offerings throughout those depths using downriggers and lead core line. Hopes were high with these textbook conditions, but after towing our lures through a dozen of these large groups of fish with no hits, we realized this might be a tough game after all.

Hours passed, and we had worked our way down to the dam. Jordan and I were trying out some of the new AC production lures for the first time. He was running a 6 inch stickbait with a swim tail, and I went with the 6 inch Skinny. We were very pleased to see the sweet action on these lures and the finishes are top notch. We just needed to troll across a big bully who felt the same. Finally, Jordan’s rod went off! It had bobbed hard several times, but by the time he had the line released from the downrigger clip the fish had thrown the lure. It hurt to miss the first take in hours, but we got ‘em back down and turned back thru the same run. Again, the AC stickbait got slammed, and again the fish shook the hooks free. That was the extent of the bite for the first half of the day.

We were still marking tons of kokanee and bulls in deep water, but they were just not responding to our methods. Wildish had been running herring all morning, and had only picked up two small bulls, so it did not seem that bait was the answer either. We were tired of trolling over lock jawed fish, so we mixed it up with some casting along a nice rip-rappy shoreline near the dam. We drifted along a couple hundred yards with no hits or followers, and I declared “Well, I guess we know that this shoreline is void of fish”. That is when my Fat Rap got slammed. After some nice headshakes, the fish peeled off some line and I knew this fish had some quality. It  fought aggressively, and I was prepared to see something over 5 pounds as my first trout of the year. “Not this time” I thought as the fish slid into the net. 22 ½ inches, and a bit under 4 pounds. Finally, a noteworthy fish aboard!

We made some more casts, and then decided to get back to the deep water drill. The fish were bound to go on the bite sooner or later, and we wanted to make sure our lures were there when it happened. Hours went by with more of the same. At 4:00 we trolled our way back to where we started. There had been plenty of fish around, and we might as well end the day closer to the boat ramp. We had switched lures up throughout the day, looking for the right ticket, and Jordan had just put a rainbow pattern Lyman plug down to about 70 ft. It didn’t take long for a hungry bull to find it, and Jordan was hooked up solid this time with a hard fighter. Once the other lines and riggers were cleared, I rolled some video of the last couple minutes of the fight. Click here to see the clip. The dandy bull taped 25 inches, and weighed just under 6 pounds. We all gave a round of high fives after realizing that our dedication had paid off with our 5 pound goal being achieved. I was excited to use the underwater feature on my new Pentax Optio camera for a subsurface look at this beautiful fish swimming away, and I was really impressed with what a great job it did for a 7 MP camera that cost me less than $250! Click here to see the release clip.

That was the last bite of the day, and we all went to bed early after a warm meal. Maybe the good bite would be found in the morning…

Not so! Sunday morning was slow as molasses, and we fished until 11:00 with one missed strike on the downrigger. In the past, when the going gets too tough on this lake, I have managed to put up some numbers of smaller bulls and browns in the upper section of the Deschutes Arm. We agreed that we desperately needed to feel some tugs, so we made the long boat ride to a fresh piece of water. We threw plugs and Kastmasters, and the Kastmasters were getting the action. In 2 or 3 hours we caught 5 browns and bulls in the 14-20 inch range and they were scrappy little fighters. We lost at least as many fish and Jordan had a fish in the 5 pound class hit his lure a few feet from the boat. Time ran out and we decided to make the long ride back to the boat launch with lures in tow. The troll home produced one more 20 inch bull for Jordan off the downrigger with his rainbow Lyman plug.

Our boat’s tally for the trip was 10 fish, with the 4 and 6 pounders being the biggest. Now it will be a waiting game for access to Crescent Lake. With a little luck, I will be reporting on some brown trout action by the end of March

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Feb 9-10, 2008 - Here's the report from the "other team's" boat from Brian Wildish

LBC February 9th and 10th
Ryan Daniels and I headed out this weekend for our Annual Super Bull Weekend.  This would be Super Bull II, with last year’s reigning champion Brian Sanchez awaiting to defend his title.  We had been postponed for our trip by a week due to the horrible weather making it virtually impossible for us to get to LBC.  RD and I were definitely looking forward to getting on the water and landing our first trout of the year.
Saturday morning came very early after we spent the prior evening celebrating the beginning of a new trophy trout season with Dan, Brian Sanchez, Jordan Whitton, RD, and myself.  We launched from the Cove Palisades Ramp (be careful if you have a boat larger than 18’ long) in the wee hours of the morning. 
We decided to start trolling straight out from the ramp.  We saw fish all over the graph, with most kokanee balls ranging from 60 to 120 feet deep.  We set our lures in the downriggers to the appropriate depths and began fishing.  At about 8:30 am, I landed a 2 lb, 19 inch bull trout.  It was nice to get the skunk off early. 
About an hour later, RD and I were trolling towards the confluents of the Deschutes and the Crooked and we decided to check our lures.  I thought I had seen a couple bumps on my rod tip about 10 minutes earlier, but with the wind kicking up and creating a lot of chop on the water, it was really difficult to tell.  As I popped the line out of the release, I noticed my line was way over by RD’s lure.  “Just great” I thought to myself.  “We must be tangled”.  RD was telling me to keep my line over by me, but it was staying over by him.  Getting frustrated, I told him “Man, I’m trying, but it’s just staying over there.”  About a minute later, I see a splash and sure enough “FISH ON!”  It was a short-lived fight, but still scrappy nonetheless.  I landed a very nice 21 inch, 3.5 lb male bull trout.  After a couple pics, back in the water he went to go put on some weight.
We fished the remainder of the day with very little success.  Besides a short bite that lasted about ½ hour around 3 pm (we landed a 17 inch bull and missed 2 hits), there wasn’t too much to get excited about.  However, around 5 pm we were able to witness Jordan land the largest bull of the day of just under 6 lbs, and consequently, be crowned as Super Bull II champion.  Way to go Jordan!  Don’t buy too many lures with your winnings!
The next morning, we decided to do a similar drill that we started out with the morning before.  However, this morning we noticed a lot of kokanee jumping.  After about an hour of downrigging and seeing all of these baitfish on top, we decided we’d just flatline our lures and see what happens.  It’s kind of crazy to flatline in 250 feet of water, but what the heck, right?  10 minutes later, RD’s rod got hit.  After a scrappy little fight, he nailed a chunky 2 lb, 18 inch brown.  That’s the first brown that he’d ever caught at LBC.  5 minutes later, my rod get’s hit.  An almost identical result commenced with a 2 lb, 18.5 inch brown.  Are you kidding me? We’d never caught browns here before and now we caught (2) nice little chunks in matter of minutes? 
We trolled the rest of the morning with one more small 17 inch bull trout off the downrigger.  With the wind getting kicked up, and us needing to get back into town, we decided to call it a trip.  It was a random mix of lures that we caught all our fish on.  We used a Pro-Troll Bait Holder with a Wigglefin Action Disc with herring.  Excalibur Minnows, a custom-painted Rebel F-30 by Jordan, and Black & Silver Lyman also worked well.  It was really tough to pattern the fish as we caught them at depths from 10’ deep all the way down to a depth of 110’.  From the sounds of what we were hearing from other anglers, we actually faired pretty well.
No 5+ lbers this time, but hopefully I get that skunk off on my next trip fishing for browns.  The best part of the whole trip ended up not being on the water, but when I returned home.  I received a call from my fiancé Saturday night telling me my 12 lb 9 oz hen brown trout mount was at our house.  RD and I must’ve looked like kids at Christmas when we opened up the packaging.  We reviewed and analyzed it for about ½ an hour.  We were both very impressed with how realistic it looked.  The paint job on the head and the scale patterning is what impressed us the most.  I’d like to thank Rande Orton of the Fish Tail Gallery in Bend, OR for such a great job.  His enthusiasm to mount the fish was definitely exemplified in his work when I received the final product.  Nice Work!
Take care,

Brian

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January 12, 2008 - Jimmy Lewis sent this report

Hello Dan,

I wanted to share with you my first fishing trip of the year. A few months ago I was making fishing plans for 2008. In the past Lake Billy Chinook has always been kind to me in the middle of winter. I made plans for this year to fish LBC once a month for the first three months of the year. My first trip was this weekend with my old friend John Fleming. John and I arrived late Friday night after driving over the Santiam pass with high winds and a lot of snow. Saturday morning we got out late and fished a few hours down by the deadline by the dam. This area has been very good to me for a few years. Not on Saturday. Not one strike at all. We went in for lunch around noon and took a hour break. When we got back out on the water we fished out in front of the cabins. If your readers have never stayed in a state park cabin I would highly recommend staying at the cabins at LBC. There is still a link to them on your links page. Saturday afternoon we covered a lot of water fishing the Crooked arm for a while and the Deschutes arm also. Neither John and I had a strike. We had made it back down by the dam area and our weather started to change. We had a cool day on the water,but mostly clear blues skies and a strong wind from the east. The wind had calm down and there was a front coming from the west. We could see the showers coming down the metolius arm at us so we called it a day. We were discussing the tough day on the water we had and decided with only a few hours to fish Sunday we would start fishing a new area. At day break we got out on the water. The weather was nicer than Saturday. You could see a dusting of snow in the cliffs around the lake but there was little wind and clear skies. We ran all the way up to the head waters of the Crooked river arm and tried fishing for a few hours. We seen a few fish rising but not a strike for our efforts. It was getting late and we decided we would troll back to the cabin. Just as we passed the bridge on the crooked arm John hooked up. His new fishing rod was bent over hard and I was happy to see that we were not going to be skunked. After a few minutes battling his fish he had caught his largest trout ever, a 28 inch 8lb Bull Trout. He decided to keep his catch and bring it back for his family to have for dinner. Most of us all practice catch and release but I have no problem keeping a fish or two a year for guys who don't get out on the water much. I never had a strike all weekend but it was fun to guide John into his largest trout ever and I think we might see him turning into a trophy trout hunter soon. Dan, I am looking forward to fishing with you next month at our Super Bull weekend tournament at LBC.

--
Jimmy Lewis
www.hookjawhunter.com
First one on the water
& the last one off.