Memories involving great fights with fish usually end with me never putting a hand around their tail.

Oh well...I've got a couple differnt fish that stick out.

The first one came while I fishing the Stilly right around the 5th of July. To this day I dont know if it was one large 3-salt hatchery fish or a summer-run king.

A night or two before (4th of July), a tree, via dynamite/m-1000, had been blown up at the trunk and dropped into the river at the side from which I fished.

It made landing fish extremelly difficult because it was on the downstream side of where I hooked all my fish and to wade around it would require me to wade to my chin.

I hooked this fish and he cleaned my clock like no other fish has. In the process of stripping me deep into my backing, he had thrown 7 of the highest & longest jumps I have ever seen a fish jump. He serioulsy looked like a mini-sailfish out there and because I was waded up to my chest, the jumps seemed even higher and I felt even more powerless.

To make a long story short, I finally tired him enough to where I could control him. I did whatever I could to guide him around the tree but he refused.

I finally gave up and dipped my rod into the river as deep as I could to force him under the tree and under all the branches.

I thought I had him cleared when I felt the heartsinking dead weight of a heavy branch. He managed to catch the very last branch before freedom (death to him) and bust me off.

Trying to explain something like that is pretty much unexplainable and is never easy and I did a sh*tty job...did not do the fishes true power, speed and leaping ability any justice.

Sometimes I wonder if you guys actually read some of these. I was on this board as godzilla but we bought a house in Puyallup and I couldn't get back on under my old login, so I reregistered under my boat name, redsharks. I noticed you guys tend to keep to your little groups but if you're interested, I caught a 200lb striped marlin with a 500 jig master 30lb test fought it for two minutes. It blew the drags and shattered the gears. Talk about hell at sea. I also caught a 150lb blue fin. That was the best fight of my life (so far). No salmon or steelehead could equal that anyday. Would like to get to know you guys better. We may see each other out on the rivers I'm the one with the red truck with a black roof rack. It would be good to talk to you guys in more depth than just this site. I usually fish on Fridays and Saturdays. See you out there.

It must have been 1990 or 91 I was fishing for trout on the Mashel river. Throwing a Mepps spinner at he end of 4lb test on a U.L. rod. A fish hit it, hard, and took off down river. Reel screeming like mad as a summer was trying to end my day fishing by spooling me. Made an attempt to fight it but end up breaking it off.
The hardest fighting fish I've ever caught was this past Sept.. Casting a Buzzbomb from the beach underneath the Narrows bridge I hooked and landed a 22lb King. It made several water clearing leaps and a string of dolphin like jumps as it was ripping the 8lb line off my Sedona. I saw the bottom of my spool twice. 20 minute late she was beached. I'll never forget it.

Sweet dreams Godzilla...ah I mean Redshark. In mine anyways ! :p Would love to fight any one of those...ever tried Tarpon? The third fishstress of my dreams! Now you got me a little bummed about the sub 40 #ers I catch...but that's OK...I'll feel better once I get a little sleep.

Your need to present an explanation for the moniker change makes you an honest man...a good thing...I'll BS with you!

Bankmag'n Hot Mid Teener Summerrun Freight Trains or the arial 8's on the hook and run in the day or night brings one thing to mind...shear pandemonium

Red, I'm just up the South Hill and around the corner a bit from Puyallup. Some are lead to believe that I don't work Fridays. I'll keep an eye out for Redshark...

FJ...out.

Two years ago, I hooked into a 28lb King in the mouth of the Green just off Todd Shipyard. This fish spooled my ten pound test line for about a half an hour up stream. She took almost 200 yards of line off of my level line downrigger rod.
In the end we managed to bonk the King and had a photo session afterwards. It was unbelievable!!

I was standing around BS ing with a couple of Oreos, and having some whiskey, one hot afternoon. Our fishing buddy pulls up to give us a message that the girls called. He looks down into the tailout and sees this large fish. He says, I'm going to get that fish, grab your pole. He tries for 10 min and then I cast and fish on! This chrome summer hatchery buck jumps and then tears off downstream over the break to the next hole. I fought this fish for 20 minutes. I thought he was going to break off. My arm is really getting sore and I get some help landing him from one of the guys I was BS ing with. He gilled him and pulled his gill. The blood pumped out about 5 ft. I cleaned it and took a picture. I caught one that was larger a month later but it didn't put up as big a fight but I didn't take a picture. See the picture (May 1999 buck) on my homepage - www.netbyte.net/steelheadman

April 97, Rogue river springer.
We were anchored in a hog line with 4 other boats. Our boat was the second boat from the left bank if you were looking down stream. The sfish takes a spinner and when I grab the rod out of the rod holder the fish just sits on the bottom like a I hung up. I reel down and jerk up hard on the rod to see if I cant free my spinner from the "snag". Upon doing that the fish starts a slow run to the right and up stream. When this happens my buddy throws off the anchor line so we can drop down and fight the fish. As he is tossing off the anchor line the fish hits warp speed up river and to the right around the end boat in the hog line. Im using a Loomis HSR1025C (15 to 30#) With an Abu 6501 spooled with 50# Tuff Line with a 35# Maxixma UG leader. I try putting the skids to the fish but it just keeps going. Next thing we know is we have 75 yards of line out going over the top of 3 boats as the fish screams upriver as we are drifting down. It was a good thing the guys in the other boats were paying attention, The would grab my line and hold up over thier boats as the fish screamed on by. My buddy got the kicer motor fired up and tried to go out and around the 3 boats that were anchored to our right. The kicker wasnt strog enouh to get out and up stream so he had to fire up the 200 horse Yamaha and give chase. Once we got out around and upstream of everyone and I gained back a bunch line, the fish made a mad dash to its right peeling off another 50 yards of line beore beachin its self. Before we got a look at the fish we figured it was a hawg, It wasnt. It wieghed out at 25 lbs...... Anyways..... I figured the fish was whipped so I drug t back in the water planning to reel it to the boat. By this time we were just about where our anchor was set. When the fish got about 10 feet from the boat it made another run. This time it was downstream between the 2 boats we were anchored betwen. As the fish passed our anchor line he crossed over it and ripped on down river. At this point I figured it was gone because I couldnt feel it anymore due to the fact my line was over our anchor line by the float. When that happened my buddy killed the big motor and used the kicker to manuver the big 22' sled around our ancor line and between the 2 boats. As we passed the float untangled my line from and reeled up the slack to discover the fish was still on. The rest of the fight was pretty basic, Pum the fish in, net, apply wood shampoo and toss in fish box.

The coolest thing about the whole ordeal was, the 4 boats in the line with us were all guide boats with clients. I guess we gave them a pretty good show, because that night at dinner at a resturant someone was talking about it. The guy I was fishing with is a guide friend of mine that didnt have any clients that day.

Thats my most memorable battle with a fish. Another good one was short but exciting. I was on the upper drift on the south Santiam just below the put in. I dropped just below all the bankis and ran out the divers with sandshrimp. I made about 4 strokes on the oars when my rod gets slammed. I drop the oars, dup the anchor and grab the rod and set the hook. The summer steelead jumps once, runs strait at the boat jumping 4 times with the 4th time landingon the fly deck of my drift boat. My fishing partner had laid out all his stuff on the deck, it was now spread all over the boat by one pissed off still green thrashing steelhead. He grabs at the finally getting a hand on by the gills and punches it out. This all happened in about 20 seconds in front of about 30 people. We all got a good laugh out of that one.

Fishing Cabo in 96', we hooked a 130lb yellowtail that took 3hrs to land on 30lb test. 7 runs of 600yds,down to probably 100ft of line each time. 30 minutes to recover the line,just to watch it disapear in 60 sec. The Capt. wanted to cut him loose 3 times cause he said we couldn't land him. I'm glad he didn't, I wouldn't have the pictures or all those grilled tuna steaks, HMMM!

My best fighting fish was 2/2/01 on a Aberdeen area river. We had just started floating that morning with my uncle, and my dad. We were all using custom built (by my uncle) 1141s, with matching Spirex reels, and 6 lb leaders. I hooked this fish in a slot in the middle of the river, and it proceeded to head up stream and jumped 3 feet out of the water. I proceed to fight the fish for the next 1/2 hour. We had to follow it for more than a 1/4 mile downriver. It turned out to be a gorgous 20lb hatchery buck.

Guess who got to row the rest of the way. It was worth it.

Ryan

Elkman

Used to fish on a commercial boat in Hawaii. The worst fish ever to battle was a 900 + pound (16 footer)marlin. I see the fisherman in shows grab the rod and get in the fighty chair. This fish took the 130 lb. rig 16/0 senator and bent the rod double. Pick up that rod and you are water skiing. It burned the washers out of the reel so it smelled like burning oil with big black clouds pouring out. Ran off over a quarter mile of line on the opening run. It was akin to fighting a Volkswagen.