Did anybody notice that there seemed to be a few more wild fish around early on this year? Or am I the only one.

It got tired of the slow fishing for the brats so I started fishing my wild fish spots the first week of December. Didnt expect to catch many fish but to my suprise they were in theese places in good numbers. Im not saying they were there like Feb and March but there were allot more than I expected.

Has anybody notticed the same thing. Im not gonna say it looks like a trend but rather a fluke. I havent seen this many wild fish around early on since the mid eightys.

I haven't been to the forks area for a month, but some friends of mine over there told me there has been a few of our wild buddies in the rivers already,but not in any great numbers yet. Heard of a 18# bad boy last weekend. here in my neck of the woods I've only got one small hen nate, still made a nice picture. Hopefully I'll be out in the next couple of weeks for some more photos. Good luck Rich, see you on the river.

[This message has been edited by FISHNBRAD (edited 01-10-2001).]

Hey Rich, you seem to be correct. I've had the opportunity to prowl around the OP alot more than normal (due to all the low water we've been experiencing)since October and yes, I've ran into a satisfying number of natives. No big fish, just beauties! Started finding them in late November/early Dec., primarily in the waters south of town.

I have seen lots of nates being caught on many rivers. I think these come from hatchery fish that have spawned in the rivers. That is why they have no "size" to them, and are returning at this time.

Back in the good ole days, our rivers used to support strong returns of wild fish all winter. In general the March and April fish were the biggest of the year.

With the onslaught of hatcheries and the massive influx of fish, December and January became huge steelheading months. Along with the large amount of hatchery fish that were caught, were the majority of our early returning natives.

The native steelhead took it hard because they were much more aggresive than their hatchery counterparts.

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Ryan S. Petzold
aka
Sparkey and/or Special

Frankly ... it seems kind of like a repeat of the hatchery run so far (lots of brats ... relatively speaking for the date ... at the end of salmon season). There seemed to be decent numbers of nates around during the brat season, but save for a few banner days, I hardly see their numbers increasing right now in those places where they should be.