Capt. Jack Sprengel on N.Y Steel

After several conversations with Erich regarding the anticipation of shooting one again, we decided to make a quick 2 man strike up north for a 24hr window of springtime Steely action.

Running on little Intel we saw a weather window for Wednesday and decided to make the 6+ hour drive. Besides a change of clothes, we packed a couple of light setups, about 1lb of fishing gear and easily 80lbs of camera equipment. (It’s a sickness)

Upon arrival, we noticed that the past couple days of warmer weather in the region had caused much of the snow to melt and begin to wash down into the river. In addition to dragging tons of mud and debris with it, this had caused the level of the river to rise significantly and increased the flow rate to around 1800 cfs. Not something you want to try wading in.

A little concerned but not dissuaded, we pulled up to one of our familiar parking areas, loaded up the gear and began to make the mile and half trek through 2ft of iced over soft snow. You know the type “step-slip-crunch-sink-pull your self out” Repeat. Another setback, but again anticipation won out and before long we reached the slick soft muddy banks of the river.

Making our way down stream, we noticed a very different scene from what we were used to seeing in the fall. Far less anglers to be found and when you looked in the water, instead of seeing an occasional King or Coho salmon roll though…we saw nada.

Ok so at this point I was getting a slight decrease in optimism. Moving on, we arrived to a point in the river where it breaks off into several smaller branches. We set up a make shift gear camp and began to scout the area for signs of life.

I’ve developed a talent for spotting fish in moving water, even when they camouflage with the gravel type bottoms. Sometimes its consists of seeing a small shadow cast by the fish, other times it’s a change in color on a fin, and on the most difficult days I simply find and area fish are likely to hold or move though, and stare at it intently until some form of movement catches my eye.

In the initial stages of scouting, all three of these techniques were coming up empty handed. I could feel the stress of making the half-day ride up for nothing, beginning with well up inside. When sudden Erich (Whisper Shouts) “Jack, Get over here, nice fish” I crept over the 20 or so yards to him ready for some motivation. But by the time I got there, the fish has snubbed E’s fly and moved out into the deeper strong current and out of sight. But hell, it’s a step in the right direction.

“Ok Erich, how did you see it? What exactly caught your eye?” I asked him (Seeing as how both of us had on HD 580 Polarized lens on from Costa) I wanted to know which of my 3 strategies to employ, as I scouted further down stream. That’s when I got the best answer, Medenbach, or any other fishing friend has ever given for that question before. “What got my attention, was a huge F@#$ing fish swam right up in front of me!”

After taking a knee and laughing for a few mins, I said “Ok I’m gonna go patrol down stream until I see just that.

I made it about 50 yards down stream and then crossed over an island to a branch steam due west. As I crept up to the edge of the bank, there was a large log in the water, creating an ideal current break. Careful not to throw a shadow, I slowly peered out over the brush. Low and behold there were 2 “Big ######” Fish right there, holding in the current. A smaller kype jawed male steelhead and a monster female.

Interested in the colorful male, I made a perfect cast that presented beautifully along his field of vision. He moved at it aggressively then turned out and away from the lure and moved out to the edge of a sand bar about 10ft further out into the river. His bright coloration was still giving away his location, so I made another cast, this time further out past the sand bar to allow the presentation to swing perfectly ahead. As the lure swung sideways past his face the female shot across current, past the male and hammered me. I came tight on her and she began a ridiculous display of up stream, grey hounding. All I could do was wade out into the strong, but barely tolerable river and try to keep the line from fouling in all of the down timber. I begin to make a little headway and wade further up stream to the fish. Just as I get about 20ft away, she turns 180 and smokes the reel while rocketing down steam. Oh boy been here before, this takes a few guys to pull off. One of which needs to have a large net.

Unfortunately the river was making a lot of noise and Erich was too far away to hear my, arguably “girly” pleas for assistance. So it was just Chromie and me for the time being. I took a small turn to tighten down the drag a little more and began to move down stream as fast as possible. Eventually the fish gets about 40 yards away and was B-lining for a log pile. Remembering a trick Louie uses, I immediately opened the bait and removed all pressure from the fish. And in this case I achieved the desired effect, the fish stopped pulling with the current and turned 180 degrees facing into the current. Now the only other way I could “manipulate” the movement of this fish, was to pull on it in the opposite direction and with the resistance that I wanted it to move.

 

 

At this point both the fish and I are a little winded so one of us had to make a move. Facing down stream I had the fish holding in the current directly in front of the woodpile. And directly in front of that pile and to the right there was a calm shallow flat that formed a sort of wading pool. If I was going to pull it off “net-less,”that’s where it was going to be. So I fought the current perpendicularly across, to the left side of the river and pulled obnoxiously to the hard left on the fish. Instantly she began to pull towards the shallow pool on the opposite bank. “Beautiful!” I’m ready for this to end now. So I back off on the pressure and slow crept across to the fish, while taking up the line gently. The fish could see me, but she was gassed, holding in the calmer current and slowing jockeying towards the shore, into steadily shallower water. I closed in reached down and manage to cradle her out of the water. What a pig, she was pushing the very high teens maybe even 20, and had some serious length on her. I began to jog over to E and manage to make eye contact with him on the other side of the island. “I had a feeling, you were going to come back with one.” He said. I wined to him a little about the joy of landing her with out a net guy, before we got busy snapping some photos.

At this point we are losing light and day 1 was coming to an end. (Bearing in mind we didn’t arrive until around 230pm) We clean up the gear, pack up and head back to the truck so we can check into the lodge for the night and redial in for the next morning.

Next morning we set out before sunrise and do some more intense scouting, now that we had a better idea of what were up against. We searched to find some slightly less powerful water off of the main river and began to scout some of the larger feeder creeks.

Eventually we came across one that seemed to line up with the current Steelie Run. The bad news was that the water was just as strong (if not worse) than the rest of the river. The good news was, we found a small waterfall formed by a dam that was creating a sort of pit stop for fish moving up the river. We walked up close to scout it, and out of the corner of my eye, I spotted a pair of fish volleying for position in a small clearing amidst all of the intense white water.

Erich and snuck over to the edge of the dam and fired off two casts. But these fish were even spookier than the previous day. They fired back into the current and disappeared.

Back to the drawing board.

For the next hour and a half we crept up on fish along the shoreline but were sabotaged by our shadows and the clarity of the creek’s water. Eventually I got frustrated with the angle of the sun and hiked up river to find a place “Remotely Safe enough to cross.” Eventually I found such a place and made my way gingerly across to the other bank (Which happened to be a super steep 30 degree slope of soft mud and briars.

I slipped and slid my way down stream, until eventually I reached the opposite side of the falls. As I thought might be the case, there they were, four of them sliding in and out of the current seam. I made a cast with a small marabou jig and let it glide past the strike zone. Instantly one of the larger females turned on it, but to no avail, I missed the hook up. Then to make matters worse, the strong current swept the jig into a large snag in the river, forcing me to break off and retie. Like a clown, I kept it lightweight for the hike and brought nothing more than a single rod and lure.

Dough!!!!!

The river was too wide to attempt a throw, and crossing this deluge is nowhere near an option. Thinking quickly Erich took a 4” Ronz still in the package and lodged the hooks of his lure into it. After few adjustment casts, he manages to get the lure across to the other bank where I could grab it and retie.

The bait was silver and white, the same colors I had done well with on the previous day so I figured “why not?”

I laid low for a minute, and thanks to the favorable angle of the sun on this side, it wasn’t long before the fish showed again. I cast the lure directly at the base of the fall and lifted slightly on the tip of the rod, giving a couple of pulses down stream. I saw a flash, the rod doubled over and a gorgeous female Chromie came launching three feet out of the water, completely inverted. SICK!

Then before I could blink, she angled off into the current and began to dump the reel at mind-blowing speed. I mean gone!

At this point the reality of the “what now” scenario I hadn’t considered, became all too prevalent. I had been in this situation before with large salmon in the river, only this was the deepest and nastiest conditions I have ever encountered.

To hell with it, I thought and in I went. BIG MISTAKE.

I’m 235lbs and once I got into that water I was like a leaf in the wind. I have never felt so helpless in my life. The river threw me violently down steam, into rocks snags and occasionally a few packs of Steelhead. Naturally I kept the Rod in perfect position and made a mental note of every fish I spotted along the way at Mach 5. But the reality was, aside from my proper rod form, I literally had to alternate between reaching for debris along the shore to slow my speed in deep water and then trying to stumble to my feet and hold my balance for 3 seconds at time, to avoid getting keel hauled along the unforgiving rocky bottom.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, the fish was heading into every possible snag that it could along the way, forcing me to attempt to stop my descent for brief moments to untangle the before it ran again and potentially broke me off. I can count on one hand, the amount of $h!t I had to go through to stay connected to this fish.

Eventually I reached a series of “S” curves in the river and managed to get to my feet. By now I have traveled over 100 yards down stream, and was far away from camp and all of the gear. Further down, there was an entirely new set of rocks and rapids. So it was now or never. Like an angel of mercy I saw Erich running along the bank in my direction with the landing net and his camera in hand. What a guy, I think he was shooting the whole event while sprinting along the untrekable bank for a hundred yards and to boot, he had the where-with-all to remember the net.

Its now or never at this point, I cupped the spool to increase the drag, and began to lay into the fish. As she paddled her tail harder, it caused her to swing like a pendulum, across the current and thankfully in the direction of Erich. He puts the camera down runs over to the edge of the river and jumps in. Surprise! The water is neck deep and he too begins to get swept down river. Oh boy!

At this point I had discovered that the fish is now entangled in a tree that was sitting in the bottom of the pool. “No not now, not after all that I thought!

“Hand me the rod, swim down and noodle her a$$” E yells!

Admittedly I considered it for a moment, but as fate would have it the fish managed to clear the snag on its own and rose to the surface thrashing, about a rods length away from me.

I looked to Erich to scream for the net, to see that it’s already airborne in my direction. (Nice to fish with a crew that’s dialed into the program like that) I caught the net and managed to slide it up under the fish. Then I performed a controlled float across the deep water to the edge of the bank, rod in one hand, netted fish in the other. Erich reached down into the water and drug me out like me out like a shipwreck victim. LMAO!

I rolled over onto my back and reached for the fish like a mother with a new born infant, put her on my chest and gave her some noogies before snapping a few pics and releasing her.

That was a top fiver for me any day!

We stuck around for another 2 hours playing with some smaller fish and trying to hook up with a nice kyped jaw male, but as larger fish went that was all the love we were going to get from the river this trip.

A hell of a lot of work for only a few fish, but it was totally worth it. Think I’ll skip local trout and move strait on to carping, until the bass show! Or Cod….or Tautog….who am I kidding, I’ll be trouting tomorrow!