The weather has gone to hell rapidly this fall and today we are on the third big storm and flood of the last few weeks, kind of crazy. Not much fishing opportunities around here at the moment so what is a fisherman to do? Well, over the last month I’ve managed to get in some great fishing off Catalina Island in SoCal and several good hunts to gather food as well as fly tying material.
Cooke Canyon Pheasant Hunting
In mid-October Chris and I went over to Cooke Canyon to go on the first bird hunting trip of the season. We had pretty much perfect conditions, sunny and calm in Ellensburg with short-sleeve weather. We started the morning doing a bit of trap shooting and I SUCKED to say the least, I think I hit 3 clays in about 30 shots, not a good percentage. Chris, on the other hand, was spot on hitting about 95% accuracy so between the two of us we stood a chance. We hit the field and did indeed find birds and get some, we ended up with five of the seven birds that day, not bad for a first trip out of the year. I vowed to hit the trap field.
Western Washington Pheasant Hunting
After the Cooke Canyon trip I mucked with my gun a bit and headed back down to Seattle Skeet & Trap one afternoon to do a few rounds of trap. There I did much better, hitting about 75-80% of my targets in 50 shots, it got my confidence back up. I decided to hit a few local pheasant areas including the Stillwater and Crescent Lake pheasant release sites. At Stillwater I have yet to see a pheasant, just a few ducks days before duck season opened, and I’ve heard very few shots fired. A friend recommended Crescent Lake so last week I headed up there for a morning. After walking the perimeter while a guy with dogs worked the big field with standing corn I decided to walk through the corn on the way back to the car. Going down one row I was flushing small birds everywhere and then saw something running ahead of me – pheasant. I chased the hen to near the end of the row, circled around to cut it off and had to repeat this game a few times before the bird flushed and I got a perfect shot off. This was the first pheasant I’ve ever taken totally solo and we really enjoyed it for dinner the next night.
Red’s Pheasant Hunting
This last weekend my friend Mark and I headed over to Red’s for a morning hunt. Mark had gone through a horrible accident five years ago and this was his first chance to get out hunting in all that time. Combined with my illness of the last two years this was kind of a “let’s celebrate” hunt since finally we both were well enough to go tromping around the fields for a morning together. We went out with Camron and his two German Shorthairs – Katie and Teddy. We had a spectacular morning, getting 11 of the 12 roosters that had been planted and only missing one which decided to fly up such a steep hill that no one felt like trudging up to try and get it. We had some great shots and it was good to see Mark excited about tromping up a smaller hill to go after one bird that we had previously missed. Needless to say, we have a LOT of pheasant in our freezer now.
Catalina Island Bonita and Bass
Catherine and I went to SoCal to visit the triplets at the beginning of November and I took a day to head out fishing with Capt. Vaughn Podmore of Salty Fly Fishing. I had fished with Vaughn several times over the years, once in Newport Bay and this February out on the Long Beach break-walls. This time I wanted to get to Catalina where the real action is at and I was finally well enough to be able to handle the full day on the water and the hour long ride to and from the island.
We met early in the morning before dawn, loaded up the boat and headed out of Sunrise Aquatic Marina an Huntington Beach. First stop was a bait barge just out of the breakwater where we loaded up on some sardines while watching the sunrise. A perfect morning with light winds and clear skies which made for a very nice ride over to Catalina. On the way we saw several groups of porpoises which I took as a good omen for the day.
We arrived at Catalina and set up at the first spot, throwing bait overboard and trying to get the fish going. Within a few casts I was into some Calico Bass which always start feeding first. Then a few boils and the water and boom, I was into a serious fish that was off on a tear. This was the first of many Bonita for the day, strong little fish that even put a good bend in a 9-weight given their size. Each spot we fished was a mix of bass and bonita all day long.
The hardest part of the day was all the seals and birds we had to deal with. I ended up catching a gull and a cormorant during the day plus we had one seal that would follow us around and after I’d get 6-12 fish he’d pop up and chomp a fish. Then I had a seal on a 9-weight for a while until the seal finally ate the fish leaving me with just a head. I’d reel the head in, toss it overboard and the seal would come up and eat the head right at the boat. We had to move a lot to keep away from the seal but he seemed to find us every time.
At one spot I managed about 12 bonita before the seal showed up, it was crazy and I was tried by then. At one of our last spots I got a hard hit by a strong fish but it didn’t tear off at hight speed like a bonita but was fighting much more than the 12-13″ bass I’d been hooking. Finally I got him to the boat and it was the biggest Calico of the day, maybe the biggest one I’d ever caught. Overall I probably landed 20-25 bonita and another 30 or so bass during the day. Perfect day on the water.
So, here I sit watching rain and wind pelt the house. I’m hoping to get out again locally for pheasants before the Western Washington season closes but floods and heavy rain are making it tough, a few weeks left so hopefully it dries out one day soon. I plan on getting over to Eastern Washington about once a month to hunt through the season and am back to contemplating a dog in our future. Hopefully these three floods we’ve had abate and the rivers will be full of winter steelhead when the water goes down. Last year I did well on the Snoqualmie so I have hopes of getting a fish or two again this season. We will see.