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North Santiam River - July 29th, 2009
supplied by: The Patient Angler
RECORDED: 
95 °
FISHING: Good
I went back over to the North Santiam River last weekend to continue the search for summer steelhead. The water was still in great shape with clear conditions and temperatures in the low 60’s, which felt great to wade in since the air temperature was about 95 degrees during the heat of the day.
I arrived at the camp ground on Wednesday evening and quickly set up what would be home base for the next four days, in hopes of being able to make a few swings in camp water before dark. I finished setting up camp (well close to finished), with about a half hour of light left, strung up my trusty 7136-4 Z-Axis and made my way up to the sweet spot of the run. I worked my line out to distance needed to swing the heart of the run and through the structure that has produced fish about 20% of the times I’ve fished it. Having fished it 4 or 5 times in the last couple of weeks without a grab, I felt like my odds were getting better. The sun was setting fast and with just a slice of a moon out, it was getting dark really fast. I finally was at a point where I was sending a cast out across the river into in increasing darkness, mending by memory and feeling the speed of the swing by the pull of the current on my line. I seem to be the king of last cast takes lately, because as soon as I told myself to reel in after the end of this swing, my line went tight with the head shaking of a streelhead. She splashed on the surface and ran to the other side of the river where she held her ground. After working her a bit, she started to give a little and I was able to start taking line. She was a bright 5 lbs fish and made a couple of short hard runs when I got her close, but soon came to hand for a quick release. Don’t get me wrong, I love to catch steelhead, but I hate to catch fish in the first 30 minutes of a trip. You naturally think, This Is Going To Be Great, a fish in the first 30 minutes…I’ll have 10 fish landed by lunch at this rate. More times than not, you bang one at the start with high hopes and the rest of the trip is a big goose egg.
I headed out the next morning in spite of my goose egg fears, to one of my favorite morning runs. Since it was just getting light and I had the place to myself, I started high in the faster boulder field water that led into the classic water of the run. I have often overlooked this pocket water and started just below where the sweet swinging water starts. I worked my line out 2 ft at a time, working my fly through the potential small buckets in front of every boulder with my breath held every time the fly would pass through the sweet spot. With about 40 ft of line out, my fly swung in front of two big rocks, ten feet from the bank that formed knuckles on the surface and a smooth triangle pillow of water in front of them. With my finger on my line I felt the soft take of what I thought was a small trout. I lifted my rod lightly and saw a wide silver flash of a big fish as violent protest jolted my rod. The big fish bolted out to the middle of the river leaving a roostertail of line ripping across the water and jumped spotlighted in the first few rays of morning sunlight. This nice chrome steelhead was at least 30 inches and took me a while in the heavy currents and line snagging boulders to get some sort of control. Unfortunately, while holding the fish close and trying to get my camera out for a picture, this beautiful fish was evidently done with me and came unbuttoned with a head shake. Now I really knew I was in trouble, two hook-ups in the first hour of fishing…I was surely doomed for the rest of the trip.
Thu joined me for the last couple of days and we only managed one grab during the rest of our fishing. I have to admit that we didn’t hit the water that hard, only fishing 4 or 5 runs each day in the mornings and evenings. We would take the hot middle of the day off to rest, read and play cribbage under the trees at our camp along the cool river. As always, we had a great time and enjoyed one of many beautiful places Oregon has to offer.
The question is now, where to go next week? North Santiam, North Umpqua or the Deschutes? I let you know next week.
The Patient Angler patientangler.com
Peter Bowers
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