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June 6-8, 2008
by R.D.
| TTH Team member R.D. with his dandy hookjaw |
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Hookjaw,
Got off work at Noon last Friday and hustled
up to the mountains to fish one of our beautiful brown trout lakes in Central Oregon. The plan was to meet up with one of
my childhood friends, Brad Noyes, who lives in Central Point. Brad and I grew up taking rides in our dad's drift boats. Mine
on the Coquille River, and Brad's on the Rogue River. Our Dad's were childhood friends who pioneered the drift boat craze
on our rivers. Some of the first to own them and run plugs down the river for winter steelhead. Lots of steelhead and fond
memories from those days are part of the driving force that has lead me to pursue these trophy trout. I was excited for this
trip, as it had been quite a while since I'd seen Brad. Brad's biggest brown to date was a 16", and I was looking forward
to getting him into a personal best. My mission for the weekend was to get Brad one brown over the 5lb. mark.
It was soon 7:30 p.m. and I thought I better
make another swing by the boat launch to see if Brad had showed up yet. Through the wind and snow, I could make out my buddy
standing on the shore and he called out "R.D. is that you?". I hollered back my confirmation, and Brad was amped and ready
to go. We got settled into my Smokercraft and were ready for primetime. The evening bite was tough for us, but finally at
9:10 my rod slammed down in the holder. FISH ON! The fight was on. Brad reeled in his gear and stood ready with the net. Out
of the darkness rose a nice hen brown that I knew would push the 5lb. mark. At 23", this hen just barely made the 5lb. mark.
Brad and I were stoked to have met every trophy brown trout fishermens goal so quickly in the trip. After some pics through
the snow and darkness, this female was set free to grow bigger. We decided it was too late to start another flatline
run, so we called it a night on that HIGH note.
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I was on the water and fishing by 4 p.m. As
soon as I got the line in the water a front was coming up and over the hill, and soon thereafter snow started pelting me in
the face sideways. After the long crazy winter we have had, this really didn't surprise me! Here it is in early June and still
snowing………..go figure. I was amped and motivated to stick a good one. While trolling, I saw Rick Arnold
pull up beside me, and we had a nice conversation. It had been a while since I've talked to Rick, so we chatted for some time.
He told me that they had caught a couple of 5's last night so that got me pumped. I then told Rick that I had just saw some
BIG arcs on the graph at 25 to 30 feet deep and it looked like the browns were coming up for an evening bite. Rick took off
and I continued on. Later that night Rick scored two back to back 7+ pound hookjaws. To see these beauties you'll have to
go to trophytroutguide.com Way to go Rick!
The night was cold and snowy, but a campfire
with Jimmy Lewis, Mike Scott and his son Tyler, and friend Chuck, and Mr. Bret Martin sure eased the numbness. Brad and I
learned that we had missed all the "bad" weather. We looked at each other and said "Oh darn!!". Yeah right! We finally hit
the sack around 11 or so and knew the 5 hour nap ahead would go fast. As soon as the morning came, I got the coffee on, and
we headed for the boat. As you can see from the picture, my frozen boat was there to greet us. I quickly got her thawed out,
as we headed out for our first trolling pass. I was still letting my gear out when Brad squealed " I GOT ONE!". I looked over
in the darkness to see his rod slammed hard. I said "RIGHT ON", and quickly reeled in my gear. Not long after a nice looking
female brown of 4lbs came to the net. We hadn't had our gear out for 2 minutes and this………..hopefully this
would be a GREAT day.
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Unfortunately, it turned into being a pretty long day on the water. I caught another brown of 3lbs. off the rigger and
Brad caught one the same size right at 9 p.m. flatlining and that was it other than a dink I caught during the morning hours.
The 3lb. hookjaw that I had caught was one of the prettier males I have ever caught. This fish was beautiful and had some
of the brightest RED spots on his adipose fin that I have ever seen. These fish were all released, and we called it a night.
Some more good conversation and fish stories around the campfire, and we caught another 4 hour nap before the last day of
opportunity.
Sunday morning was
clear and calm as could be. The nasty front had finally
blown the wind and snow on through, and we were looking at
smooth conditions. I was excited about this actually, because I knew I would finally
be able to work a certain part of the lake HARD, that I really hadn't been able to up to this point
due to big waves and strong winds. Brad and I hit it early,
but an hour had went by with nothing. DANG! Was this not the day? Out of nowhere, Brad hollers I got one. I look back as he struggled to get the rod out of the holder. As soon as he got the pole, he felt headshake and then SLACK.
I took my time with him and check the drag. For some strange reason, this fish didn't fight like I was anticipating. It was just a solid heavy
weight slowly coming at me. Finally he came up by the boat but stayed really
deep. A few headshakes ensued and some bulldoggin' under the boat.
At last we caught a glimpse of this dandy. I knew he was easily over 5lbs.
He was hooked to where his mouth was wide open and he couldn't breathe well.
No wonder he didn't put up the epic battle! Brad layed out a perfect net
job, and my Biggest Hookjaw Brown Trout in 8 years surrendered to the net.
I gave out a "WHOOP!" as Brad and I high-fived one another. This
mighty hookjaw taped out at 26" and had a husky build to him. Just a dandy
specimen. It had been a long time since I have personally hoisted a brown
trout of this level. I was stoked to say the least. Still riding
high from that fish, in fact. After some good pics and a killer release,
this Big Buck swam back to the safety of his deep water world. This
capped a hard-core trophy trout fishing weekend. We ground it out through the
wind, snow, and waves to tally up 7 browns for a total weight of 28.5 pounds.
Not a bad average at 4.07 lbs/fish! Most of our browns were caught on Caliburs.
I would personally like to thank Mike Scott for all his ground pounding and scouting
work for us, and for Jimmy Lewis who sealed the deal by paving the way home on
this trip. Without you guys, I may have never caught my third biggest brown to date or have gotten my good buddy Brad into this personal best
hookjaw. Thanks again guys, and it was really nice meeting Mike's son,
Tyler. A great kid with Big Browns in his future!
Until next time,
R.D.
"Browns – Coyotes of the Fishing World!"
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Oh man……. A lost opportunity. We were disappointed, but not
discouraged. We quickly went right back at it. This time we worked
deeper water as the sun was coming up.
Just as I was started to second guess my decision about moving into deeper
water, Brad hollers "R.D. look at my rod". I look behind me and see the tell-tale sign of the quick bob up and down,
and tell Brad to get on it! He quickly jumps up and pops the rod off the release into a strong fighting fish.
By the looks of his steelhead rod, I knew we had a good one on here. I quickly took care of getting all the gear cleared,
and stood by with net in hand. At the first glance, Brad and I were like little kids in a candy store. Legs started
shakin' with excitement, and I could tell by the sound in Brad's voice that his adrenaline was raging. This brown fought
like a champ, bulldoggin' under the boat, and taking a couple runs. Finally the beautiful 5.5lb. hookjaw slid into the net.
Brad was glowing with pride as we took some nice shots of his first trophy brown trout over the 5lb. mark. We forgot
to measure the fish in the celebration of the release, but I estimate him at around 24". Just a stacked dandy of a fish.
We forged on and I had renewed confidence in my decision to go deep.
This time it would be my turn. We had been trollin' in blue bird skies and calm conditions for a couple hours with nothing. As we were shooting the @##%, I hear a POP and look over at my rod just in time
to see it buried and throbbing with line peeling out. I immediately jumped
to my feet to get my favorite North River steelhead rod out of its holder.
As soon as I grabbed hold, the weight of this fish and heavy head shakes gave
me the shakes! I knew I had a truck on, and instructed Brad to get his
gear in quickly and clear the balls. With everything squared away, it was
just me and this brown.
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