Spey Fishing for Skeena, BC Steehead.
Posted on May 12th, 2009
Tracey John Hittel reports: As predicted the past 10 days have been the highlight of the season for our guests. Making predictions for Steelhead on the fly is a dangerous choice of words, so lets say we had to produce the past few weeks.
Attached are a few of the monsters we captured on the Spey. Mr. Yamada a regular at Steelhead Heaven landed and hooked into 1-4 fish per day, a dream come true for any angler on the fly. Not to mention watching as 100m of backing line is pulled off his reel, twice, and landing both fish. Patience is the name of the game here and lets not kid ourselves, luck as well. Yamada also fished with a 30ft Japanese telescopic rod with no reel, a traditional and very old technique used only by Japanese anglers. Last year he broke a rod on a big fish and this year he pulled out a few nice ones as well. Again, fly selection was key to the Spey fisherman as Yamada chose pink and was rewarded each pass he fished a special pool that we targeted for consecutive days.
When you’re a fishing guide your client will follow your direction as he feels you know the water and the pools the best. Well sometimes we are right on the head with pool selection as high water conditions mean the fish are moving, so why move as the fish will come to you and that is exactly what we did. The key to success is first finding the fish, then once you do that, don’t leave the fish, target the pool and stick with you guns and you will be rewarded. This lesson I learned this spring when fishing some very productive water for 2 hrs without a bite thinking the fish are not there, then having a dyed in the wool bait fisher pass thru and smack three fish, so do not give up on your selection of water, change flies, sink tips etc until you get a fish, then the others will follow.
Another great week was with Tomio, his 3rd trip for Steelhead on the Spey, this trip he will never forget. Fishing a black intruder he fooled 5 Steelhead in one day and snapped one of them off. Again fly selection was key as the pink flies did not work but when he changed to a black the game was on. Tomio is a excellent Spey caster and when you fish with T-14 and other sinking tips your cast has to be perfect. Tomio hooked 10 fish in 3 days and commented to his friends before leaving for Canada that he would get a 3 fish day, we’ll Tomio your friends can eat crow now. Attached is a picture of Tomio and a small taste of his trip.
Guests Sara and Cristian from Italy, spent some days with us and attached is a chrome bar that Cristian landed on his single hand fly rod.
The Diva of the season was Mrs. Hak who landed her first Steelhead on the Spey and was top rod for the week, in a very cold and snowy week. Attached is her pic with a Steelhead. With the tough times we face this season with the credit crunch we were fortunate to have a nice group of Steelheaders and look forward to our August to October Steelheaders who have booked for the autumn season.
Now that the middle of May is closing in on us, so are the Chinooks and they are trickling in small numbers. A friend told me that he saw a fly angler with a ultra-light set-up, reel in a 25lber on the Kitimat River yesterday, fresh from the ocean.
June and July and peak for Saltwater and Freshwater Chinook out of Kitimat and July and August to the 6th for Skeena record fish.
Space is limited for the summer fishing season so please let us know if we can book you a trip.
You can contact Tracey John Hittel at, thittel@uniserve.com .
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