Name that fish!

Okay, here we go with yet another round of the Name that Fish Contest!

The rules are simple: In the comments section at the end of the story, give us your best guess as to what this guy is. The first correct answer wins a pack of C.A.L. jerkbaits from DOA Lures.

Let’s see if our most recent winner, MJP (you never sent me your address to ship you your lures, by the way) can make it two in a row.
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Right! RIGHT! I said TURN RIGHT!

This lovely piece of trout habitat has been in Northern California’s Yuba River (just below the Parks Bar Bridge) for a good couple weeks. I’m not sure what the guy who owns the Jeep was thinking (not much by the looks of things), but he eventually had be to rescued by helicopter.

The water had been too high for the county to pull the vehicle from the river until Wednesday. Now, a bunch of trout are homeless…

Thanks to fly fishing author ad instructor Ralph Cutter for the photo.

Yes, Virgina…there will be a “Salmon Claus” this year!

All the news lately about California salmon fishing has been gloom and doom, but there are a couple bright spots: the Klamath and Trinity rivers are expected to have very strong runs of big, 4-year-old kings and the sport quotas for the system have been set at 2 to 3 times the normal number! In other words, we’re fishing this season!!!
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World’s Greatest Sweatshirt

The charcoal gray skeleton fish hooded sweatshirt by G•Loomis may just be the best piece of clothing ever made!

General Overview

With all apologies to the black cocktail dress, the leather bomber jacket and blue jeans, I have to say that this baby is numero uno when it comes to the best-ever invention in the clothing world.

With GLoomis’ famous skeleton fish logo on the front, the hoodie is a smart-looking little devil, perfect for fishing on cool days, hanging around…or even crashing your ex-girlfriend’s wedding (listen to the voice of experience, mt friends!).

The best part, however, is it’s absolutely bulletproof (not literally, but it did stop a ripbait armed with 3 dozen treble hooks from puncturing my chest when it came back at me at 107 mph after I yanked it out of a tree).

Key Features

• 80% Cotton/20% Polyester
• Charcoal gray with a skeleton fish on the front
• GLoomis down the right sleeve and a G•Loomis logo on the back of the hood

On the Water Test

This one’s been a looooong time coming. I originally obtained the G•Loomis skeleton fish hoodie in the summer of 2003 while guiding in Alaska. It survived 2 full seasons of daily use up there, where it not only kept the mosquitos off the back of my neck (already worth its weight in gold!) and also suffered daily dousings of fish blood, egg goo and slime…

Then, the hoodie went straight back to work on the Sacramento River when I got home from Alaska and got used every morning in the fall.

The sweatshirt survived a bazillion washes…and, let’s just get something straight here: it’s not like I ever looked at the washing instructions on the label, either. Hot water, cold water, mixed with different fabrics and colors — it didn’t matter. I also ran it through the dryer just as many times and it didn’t seem to hurt anything. My laundry skills could be best described as “barbaric.”
“Hoodie” made another run to Alaska in ‘04 (yes, we’re on a first name basis, here!) and handled another brutal king season with no problems. As with the previous year, we came home and went to work in the fall chasing kings in California.

During Chinook season on the Sac, the shirt got worn as many as 30-40 days straight without a day off (though there would have been a washing here and there — my wife would confiscate it and toss it into the washer, using a basic rule of thumb: if she could smell me coming home before she could hear the rumble of my diesel, then it was time to get the shirt clean).

The same scenario played out in 2005, so let’s jump ahead, here.

By the California fall king season of 2006, Hoodie was still hanging tough, although its charcoal color had faded quite a bit. The integrity of the garment, however, was still very much in tact and it put in another solid season of every day fishing.

I didn’t guide in Alaska in 2006, but FISH ALASKA Magazine sent me up to Juneau on assignment in the fall, where I did my best to ruin Hoodie by completely immersing it in herring scales, coho blood, halibut slime and salt spray. It didn’t work…and the sweatshirt actually got a little face time on the cover of the magazine.

The Central Valley’s Chinook run took an absolute header in 2007, so Hoodie got a reprieve from egg goop, sardine juice, salmon blood and slime.

Instead, it got a taste of Delta water, which isn’t exactly what you’d call clean and pure (my buddy once got a staph infection from it) on striper trips and also spent a long summer in the intense Lake Tahoe sunshine as we ran mackinaw trips.

Also on the docket that season were landlocked salmon and stream trout, so needless to say, ol’ reliable got another workout.

And, as in previous seasons, it kept right on going, though getting more faded.

One day in early June, a freak storm caught me without rain gear on Lake Oroville while doing a landlocked coho trip, but Hoodie kept me from having to bag the trip early.

That fall, a September coho trip to Alaska gave it another chance to prove its worth.

Conclusion

Fast-forward to the spring of 2008, and the world’s greatest sweatshirt is still hanging tough. It’s no longer charcoal gray — more of a whiteish gray, I guess. My wife’s tried to throw it out several times because the color’s faded, but there’s going to be trouble if she ever does!

Through all the abuse from sun, various fish fluids and poor washing and drying practices, the sweatshirt still fits perfectly and is holding up extremely well. Usually, after one season a hoodie of mine is in tatters — the cuffs are typically eaten away and the stitching is coming apart at the seams. Not this thing — here’s a photo from May 2008 — aside from some roe stains, the seams, stitching and cuffs are still in excellent shape.

I’m not sure what kind of steroids they feed the cotton in these hoodies, but G•Loomis is really onto something with these. Now, if they only made pants…

Five stars!

Shad Times on the ol’ River

Here’s a pic of trusty sidekick and deckhand, Reilly, with a jumbo roe shad from the Feather River.

We did a guide trip upriver Tuesday and, on the way home, decided at the last second to drop the boat in below Shanghai Falls and do a little fun fishing. After approximately 1,472 shad in about an hour and a half, Reilly hooked this big hen…his biggest to date. Also a first for me was having to run back to the boat..at his urging…to grab the net and BogaGrip. Can’t say I’ve ever Boga’d a shad before…
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How to wrap a Kwikfish

Here’s a step-by-step demonstration on how to wrap a Kwikfish (or FlatFish) just in time for summer kings…

To learn how to make the wraps themselves, check out my Sardine Wraps video.

Big Fred Contaoi catches record largemouth bass

FLW Touring professional, Big Fred Contaoi got his name into the record books with this huge largemouth bass from Percy Priest Lake in Nashville, TN…sorta.
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Fluff-Chuckin’ for Brown Bonefish

Nine-year-old Spey Master

Okay, so most 9-year-old kids are happy fishing with a red/white bobber and a worm. But not Austin McKean of Terrace, BC (shown here with dad Gill). Nope, “Austie” prefers the spey rod and may be the only kid on the planet his age who owns one.

A couple weeks back, the little dude caught what scores of adult fly anglers are still looking for — his first steelie on the fly. Way to go, eh!

Get ready for the Klamath!!

So, with the Valley rivers closed this year, we’re off to the Klamath this fall. The river has been allotted its largest sport quota in recent memory and DFG biologists are forecasting a big return of jumbo-sized 4-year-old kings! Throw into the mix a bunch of steelhead and you’ve got a fishery that’s as good or better than Alaska. I’ll be there all fall. Here’s a little steelie action from last season to get the juices flowing…

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