I used to enjoy going down there and watching the plunking show.
I saw some nice steelhead climb the steps to a wood shampoo......
SF

First steelhead was a 12 lb buck on the Pilchuck - also around '78ish, 12 yrs old, first day ever steelheading. Last cast of the day at dusk. Had just re-tied after a snag and was going to hang it up so didn't add any yarn or eggs to my pearl/pink corkie. Got tired of waiting for my buddy so "practiced my casting" and tossed it back out - fish on! That was the first of many great days/years on the Pilchuck.

Sight fishing steelhead in clear water is a blast - but most of my success with that has been on the fly.

What a bunch of pups.

WDFW caught his first steelhead back in 1929 on the upper stilly on some greased gut line and a hand tied orange heron. Later he would go on to pioneer the ray bobber ,when he was a young 32 years old back in 1966

Not even sure when I caught my first steelhead, probably on a Quinault trip with my dad. But I will never forget the first one I broke off. I fished a small creek that got a lot of hatchery brood stock released into it. I would routinely catch trout up to around 24 inches. In between I caught some other nice native cutthroat. My best was about around 20 inches that was probably close to 4 pounds, even had a seal bit in it. I gave it to a neighbor who freaked out about how big it was. But...one day I was free-drifting a worm through the deep hatchery hole when the line tightened and an approximately 40" brute tore through the hole and snapped me off in a second. It could have been a huge brood stock too, but I never saw anything in the creek, even among the kings and silvers, that came remotely close to being that long. That was around 38 years ago and I have only caught one steel head that big since.

I caught my very 1st Steelhead, opening day stream trout fishing on the Mashel R. (Nisqually trib), totally accidental. Dark downstreamer Memorial Day weekend, or was it earlier? when streams used to open early, on a light spin rod n reel w/ a worm for bait. My Dad took the rod from me and landed/released it cause he couldn't believe it. I don't count that.
The counted 1st was Plunking the lower Puyallup w/ my Grandpa who showed me the ropes. I learned on a Winona Reel, and eventually graduated to drift fishing w/ the same reel...."What a bunch of pups".... Hows that, WDFW? The Winona really helped transitioning to level winds.... backlashes. Moved to flyrod & reel w/ mono strip fishing for years before I realized how a deficient method it was. Still fun fighting fish but levelwinds and spinning setups were the [Bleeeeep!], and move to them. Like talking fishing, and miss those days.

Anybody remember when they used to plant skate and the Tilton with trout?

I sure do miss runnin a crawler or a single ball-o-fire (green label) under the smallest float I had in my arsenal.

That's what all started it for me right there.

Your Dad shoulda let you land that fish.

My first steelhead was at the mouth of Barnaby Slough on the Skagit in 1996. I was 15. I was on a friend of a friend’s sled casting a spoon. It was awesome! It was a 12lbs hen that cartwheeled all over. I remember thinking how I’d never seen a coho do that. I was hooked real bad after that.

Sky River, late March, mid 90's. Driftfishing. The next week, landed a mid teen buck first week April. Great memories

Ya. I vaguely remember the details, but I think I asked for help because it was a log to pull in. But when your about 7 and older bro of 13 is there, either he would have stole it from me, or just let Dad handle it. I probably would of lost it, got harassed,and learned nothing anyway.

My first steelhead (2 fish limit ) was on the Duckabush way back in the med 60's. 5 lb. and 8 lb. on eggs and a piece of red yarn. I really miss those days when so many streams were planted with steelhead. I used to fish the Skokomish, Hamma Hamma and Duckabush on Hood Canal. Now only memories.

Spoonfedhead,


I grew up as a kid fishing Skate creek and sometimes the Tilton river for the stocked rainbows. Many good memories there as a kid with friends and family. Driftin’ a single egg with a split shot or free driftin’ a small crawler caught a lot of fish. Caught some of my first trout on flies there also.

I showed up in late fall to the Tilton with a buddy early in high school hoping that we could find some holdover sized trout... little did we know that they stocked the river with salmon. We were able to hook and land a few with the trout gear. Boy was that a hoot.

My first steelhead was caught on the Green River when I was 5 years old on a corky and yarn. Got my first cutthroat out of chambers creek up near the mouth of flett creek when I was a little older. Caught several that day. I loved fishing that little creek as a kid.

I wish I could go back to those days.

First steelhead was on the Lyre in the late 70s. The week before I had, temporarily, hooked a male. He stuck his head out of the water and spit the hook back at me. The one I got was in a pool below a big logjam. Took the cookie and yarn and ran a round the pool a bunch. That river (used) to put out lots of fish and was very accessible. Coworker lost 10 on the last day of the season (Feb 28) before finally bringing one to the beach.

I had reeled-in a bunch when I was a young kid with the old man (from 3yo on), as he always had me with him wherever he went. Plugging out of his Whaler in the Columbia or in the drift boat on the West Side rivers. If he went drift fishing off a gravel bar I was always chasing birds with my BB gun, but he'd take a break and say "let's have a sandwich"..I'd amble over, and sometimes he'd hand me his rod to hold while he'd eat his sandwich, all the while he'd have a fish hooked, waiting for me to get over to him. Then I'd lose my chit when the rod would JERK as we'd talking, was so cool how he'd set me up like that!! I've done it with my son too.

1st winter run I drift fished up myself was in January 1984. It was actually a kelt summer run right below Snoqualmie Falls above the "Big Rock" on the restaurant side. 3rd cast with a #10 50/50 lettuce/tomato spin-n-glo. Snakey little spawned hen that I let go. We went to the OP on Presidents Day weekend after that and I caught several fish on the HOH and Sol Duc drift fishing if I remember correctly, plus several more trips that winter.

1st summer run I drift fished up myself was June 3 or 4 of 1984. It was a high water year. LOTS of fish in early that year. We were on the Reiter side of the Sky, and had driven in from the horse rental place. Several of you guys know as there are no secret spots up there. I'd been losing fish in the fastwater, but finally landed a dime bright 6-7# fish on #14 orange scale spin-n-glo.

I caught my first Steelhead back in 2005...on my very first cast fishing for Steelhead. A very dark summer run caught in December. Float & jig. My buddy who was showing me the river hadn't even tied up yet and had his back turned to me on the bank. I told him I was hooked up and I hear a "yeah, right". Told him to turn around and look at me. He did and just shook his head in disbelief.

Great story about your pops. That is what it is (was) all about.
SF

The chosen one...

We moved into the Puget Sound area in the summer of 1977, and that winter my old man and I took up steelhead fishing. He had done it several times in the Klamath River.

The technique of choice there was casting #30 HotShots and retrieving them, so that was his plan around here.

My first day was mid-March, 1978. I was 7 years old. We went out to the Skykomish, and since he wasn't sure if I was going to be up for casting all day, he set me up with a pyramid sinker and a spin-n-glo.

I casted it out about 20 feet, and he turned and walked away to start casting himself...and by the time he got ten feet away I was hooked up. I drug the middlin' size fish right up on the bank in about ten seconds, and while he wrestled with it the line broke and it flopped back in the water. That was my first cast steelhead fishing.

It was also the only fish we hooked that day.

The next day we took our rowboat down what became my #1 steelhead stream for several years...the Sammamish River. We put in at Marymoor Park, and floated down to what used be "60 Acres"...all the soccer fields. We would float along and cast #30 HotShots.

On that, my second day, I hooked another fish casting that HotShot with a 6'6" AbuGarcia spinning rod combo...trout rod and Mitchell 300, with 6# line.

After a remarkably long fight with a hundred lucky turns, the fish was in the net...my first steelhead on my second day of steelhead fishing.

I'll dig up a pic of it some day. It was 40# long and a two tone snow belly.

I was 17 before I caught another one that big, and there were a LOT of steelhead caught in those ten years...and a LOT of them came from the Sammamish River, pre-Herschel days.

When that run ended...man, it just ended.

Was lucky enough to catch fish in the Green, Puyallup, Nisqually, Stilly, Snoqualmie, Sky, all the rest of the Snohomish Tribs, the Sauk and Skagit, even in the Wenatchee (including Nason Creek )...before I ever even ventured out to the OP...there wasn't much need for it, Puget Sound was loaded in the 70s and was even better in the 80s.

Fish on...

Todd