"Amigo, that's the black butterfly…lot's of people say it's bad luck mang!" The hotel concierge noticed that a brown, not a black, butterfly was crawling on my hand the night of our arrival in Cabo San Lucas and just had to mention this little trollip of good news. The Brady Bunch "Tiki Idol" episode snapped…
We're off to celebrate Christmas in warm and sunny Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. Everyone keeps asking "Are you chartering a boat while you're there?" and at this very moment we likely won't be heading out on a marlin charter. With trips to Panama and Costa Rica on the calendar the next few months I'll get…
After a few phone calls to some fellow steelhead sicko's like Bob Ball from Piscatorial Pursuits, Steve "The Legend" Maris at Enumclaw Auto Rebuild, and Justin Crump of AEG Media fame I settled on the Salmon River as our destination for this weeks steelhead expedition. Our original destination was the Bogey, but Bob wasn't sure…
The books are closed on the 2009 season for the Oregon Tuna Classic. The upside down economy had the organizers wondering if they’d see a decrease in participants and sponsors as they worked diligently through the spring making final preparations for the first event in Newport on July 18th. That question was answered by a…
Fishing sand shrimp or eggs under a float is an excellent way to target both hatchery and wild steelhead in Washington's rivers. Floatfishing is easy on the gear and using bait for steelhead is a no-brainer, but if it's rigged straight up without any weight it tends to flail away in the current and isn't…
This coho has a serious case of Elephantitus of the Schnauz! With winter steelhead cruising the rivers right now most Northwest anglers have put this years huge salmon run in the rear view mirror. Our friend Bill Swann from Swanny's Fishing is stall schwacking his share of fit-for-the-table bruiser coho, however, and thinks the fishing…
Here's a recipe that produces one of the best tasting dishes I've ever had for ducks or geese. I took the Huggin's honey mustard recipe and tweaked it by braising the goose breast's a hot frying pan before they go into the oven. The outcome is a combination of flavors that really makes for a…
I just returned relatively unscathed from another eventful Snoopy Rod Classic on Washington's Bogachiel River. Every year a bunch of us knuckle dragging, mouth breathing, cross eyed steelheaders get together in early December to fish for hatchery steelhead with Snoopy rods. Snoopy doesn't get all the glory…there's also Tweety, Spiderman, Dora, Scooby Doo, Mickey Mouse,…
A total of 17 hunters rendesvous'd in the Skagit Valley near Conway on Sunday for the Outdoor Line Thanksgiving Waterfowl combo. The parking lot was full of camo at the Shell station in Conway at 5:30 a.m. on Sunday before the gang from North Sound Waterfowl rounded up our herd of excited hunters for the…
Backtrolling plugs has become somewhat of a lost art with the recent explosion of side drifting, but if you want to put trophy steelhead in the boat plugs are still the way to go. Plugs accounted for the majority of the truly humongous metalhawgs I put my customers into over the years because they are…