I spent close to a week and a half down on our Humboldt County rivers. I started out fishing the South Fork Eel for four days where fishing was ok. 2 to 7 hookups a day was the range here. These fish were a mix of downstreamers and fresh fish with a ratio of about 70:30 in favor of downers. I relocated to other rivers starting last sunday due to the excessive crowds on the south fork. My move intitially got me into more crowds unfortunately, but that improved over the week as we made other adjustments. I ended up having my biggest day of the winter on Tuesday as we hooked 16 and landed 11, most of which were chrome bright.

Tuesday evening the rain returned and I was back on the Smith yesterday. Fishing was pretty tough for the day. We put one on the boat and I saw only one other fish hooked and lost for the rest of the fleet, although I did here of a few others caught.

Anyways, here are a few pics I took since the last report. Unfortunately my camera disappeared for a couple of days, so no pics were taken for most of the week. Thats what happens when you have a toddler running around the house!

As a side note, I have an opening for sunday, which looks to fish good for the Smith. Let me know if your interested.

Mike

Wet weather has continued our winter fishing on the Smith. Fish have continued to consistently come in, but I personally have been in an interesting pattern. It seems that every other day for the last week I have a tough day while the next day I am one of the top scores on the river. This up and down experience has been a little frustrating for me. Sometimes in life we get in strange grooves, but eventually they work themselves out, just as this one will.
That being said, We have been catching some beautiful fish, with a big fish for the week a 16 pound buck caught by Mike Davis. Mike and his fishing partner, Richard Spears caught some other quality chrome steelhead that day including a 13 and 14 lb hen and buck, respectively. Above are some pics from that day, and others from the week.

It looks like another weather system is coming in on thursday, and will again make it tough for our humboldt county rivers to fish. Hopefully we get a crack at them at some point this year.

Mike

I fished yesterday on a clear and quiet river. There weren't many boats around, but there were plenty of fish! Our boat went 5 for 6 hookups with a handful of double digit fish including the one pictured above. My trip for today fell through, but I'll be back on the river tommorrow. See you out there.
Mike

I started the week in high water and tough fishing. As the river dropped fishing improved. However, yesterday was a bit of a struggle. With clearing condtions on the river and relatively crowded conditions, fishing seemed tough. We only ended up with one fish and I didn't hear of any really good scores, lots of 1s and 2s.

The weather pattern is starting to clear up and we may have opportunity to fish in humboldt county by Tuesday or Wednesday. The Smith will continue to drop and clear and this may mean tough fishing, but you never know. We'll let you know how it goes.

Mike

I've been up on the Smith since this last series of storms has hit and fishing has been good. Depending on the day, we've been hooking between 2 and 6 fish a day. Yesterday we fished in high water and had a short day, but we still hooked 3 nice steelhead. Not bad considering conditions and the short time we had on the river. The Smith has been fishing good this January, unlike the last couple of years, so our year is off to a good start.
Coming up, it looks like Sunday will potentially blow out, but the rest of the week looks like we will have solid fishing conditions a good fishing. I do have space this week, so don't hesitate to give me a call if you want to catch some of these chrome beauties. Above are some pics from the last week of fishing.
Mike
707-601-8757

I fished some days in Humboldt county this week and fishing was decent. The fish were all super bright and very mean. It looks like we're going to get some weather here starting tommorrow and tuesday. This will mean that I will be headed back to the Smith later this week. I still have space for the next couple of weeks so if you're interested give us a call or email and we can set something up.
Mike
707-601-8757

I fished the Smith yesterday and it was a wonderful sight. Fishing was great, as we hooked 8 and landed 6 chromers. While we had a good day, we were not the only ones to experiece good fishing. Lots of bent rods and nets flying all day! It was great to see after a couple of pretty slow years on this river. This bodes well for a great steelhead season!

Starting tommorrow, I'll be back in humoldt county. All the rivers down here are starting to fish, and with it being early January, fishing should be great. I'll let you know how it goes.

For those of you interested in fishing, give me a call. I do have space available this week, and this is prime time!

Mike

I stayed pretty busy the month of November. The fall salmon run on the Smith has been an excellent one. Overall, fishing has been great, with lots of big, quality fish.
It is fabulous to see spawning salmon everywhere on the river. This doesn't mean that the run is over, however. I think we still have a week or two of quality, bright fish if we get some more water. We will also see some more steelhead start to enter the river along with the last part of the salmon run. This can be some fun mixed bag fishing in uncrowded conditions. I have space in december, so give me a call and lets go catch some beautiful fish!
Above are some photos from the last couple of weeks of fishing.
Mike

Trinity and Klamath season is winding down now. We've been experiencing challenging fishing on these rivers since the shot of rain we recieved a couple of weeks ago. That being said, I've still managed to catch adult salmon or steelhead everyday on the water, including some very large salmon on the Trinity.
Speaking of very large salmon, it is soon to be that time again on the Smith as soon as we see another shot of rain. The storm we recieved this month triggered some of the most epic salmon fishing I have ever seen. I spent a day on the smith after the rain and literally spent more time unhooking fish in the net than fishing! All were large fish, with five of them over the 30lb mark and a couple of those pushing 40. All were very bright fish. Pics from that day are seen above.
Once we get some more rain, I expect more great fishing as the word is there are lots of 'em down in the tidewater reaches.
Mike

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Well, I haven't updated in a little while. Im staying in Willow Creek and I don't have access to a computer, but I'll try to update when I'm home, like I am today.
I've been fishing the Trinity the past couple of weeks and fishing has been slow to fair, with most days seeing a handful of fish hit the net. I've been catching mostly King salmon, but some steelhead have been showing too. The word down on the Klamath is that there are plenty of fish there but they have been tough to get to bite. Also the mouth has been sanded shut, so once that breaks open there should be another push of fish. All in all there are more fins headed my way.
The weather has finally cooled off and fall time is here. I am mostly booked for the rest of the month, but call anyways if you want to fish, as I can find a guide to fish for me and cancellations in my calender are also a possibility

We started out a little slow and snake bit today, but by our second hour of fishing we were hooking fish every pass. Limits were no problem today. Our catch was mostly salmon but we did land a nice adult steelhead for a little variety. It also seemed the ratio of adult salmon to jacks was up as the majority of hookups were nice, fat fish, with our biggest being close to the 20lb mark.

Guys, fishing is as good as it gets right now. I have several dates available next week, now is the time to call if you want to experience uncrowded salmon fishing at its finest!

Mike

Fishing on the Klamath over Labor Day Weekend was fast and furious! Our catch was mostly comprised of chinook salmon from Jack sized fish up to 17lbs. A few steelhead were also in the mix. It also sounds like there are a bunch of fish moving in the Klamath estruary and the commercial gill nets are officially out. This means that the season is living up to predictions and could be one of our best in awhile.

I have some dates left in September. Give us a call!

Mike

Everyone,
I'm starting my season on the lower klamath and trinity! There are fish in the rivers and it looks to be a great season. Over the next day or two, they are releasing a ton of water out of lewiston dam on the trinity river. When the river drops over the next few days, this should be a great thing as it will lower water temps and pull fish into the river.

For those of you who aren't familiar with the routine this time of year, I'll be fishing both salmon and steelhead on the lower klamath river and lower trinity river. I fish out of a drift boat and do my best to get you guys into uncrowded fishing. I do not put in with the other 100 jetboats on the lower Klamath. The stretch I fish is upstream of most of the jetboat pressure, which makes for peaceful and excellent fishing. I also will fish the lower trinity at this time and it is some of the most beautiful scenery in all the state. We'll go where I think we have the best opportunity to catch fish.

I do have some dates availabe for this weekend and next week, so if your interested give us a call.

good fishing,
Mike

It's been awhile since i've had an entry. I would really like to thank all the people that came fishing with me this year. You make it possible to do what I love and make a living! I hope for many more years fishing and sharing amazing experiences on the river with you guys and gals.
Fishing wise, I spent late february and march working on the eel river system when rainfall and riverflow has allowed. If conditions dictated that we go to the smith, I cancelled due to a lack of fish. Fishing was decent down south for the most part, with most action being provided by downrunner steelhead.
While most of our rivers closed at the end of March, I will continue to fish a couple of places that legally remain open. Fishing can be incredible during this time of year and completely uncrowded. My calender for the most part is flexible for this time frame, so a last minute trip would be easy to arrange, just throw me a line if you're interested!

Pictured above is Eureka resident Carl Casale with a nice steelhead we caught on Monday, 3/30/09.

We are finally in the midst of the big flush that was so needed for all our rivers. This storm is a warm, pineapple express and is melting all the snow the last series of systems dumped. I ventured inland for a couple of days last week with a two boat party. The first day went ok, with both boats hooking multiple adults and lots of half pounders. We switched locations the second day, looking for a little something different, and it was a mistake. The half pounder bite was nearly non-existent and the adult my boat hooked and lost was the only one seen between the two groups. On Friday, some buddies and I put the boat in on a coastal humboldt county river and managed to pull a couple of adults out.
It looks like there will be nothing worth fishing through the rest of this week. Hopefully, our Humboldt county coastal rivers will come back into shape soon. The coming days in March in this area will probably be the best fishing of the year, numbers wise. This is due to the fact that we will still be recieving some fresh fish, in addition to the downrunners that this storm will flush to the lower reaches of our rivers. Until then.......
Mike