Cutting to the Chase

I know you all want to hear me wax poetically about the majesty of Alaska. Unfortunately, you'll have to wait a bit for that sorta stuff. Here's the stuff that fisher people normally want to see.

This time of year on the Kvichak 75% or more of anglers have come to target large Rainbows. The 'bows come down from the lake and are laying behind the thousands of Sockeye and Chum whose sole focus is getting it on. The Rainbows are waiting for eggs and the decaying flesh to come downstream and they grow very large. Allegedly, it's not uncommon for the largest fish of the week to be measured over thirty inches. The 'bows were there though not in the numbers that apparently they were last year. I think this is a common lament of lodge owners everywhere.

The remainder of the anglers are there for the Silvers (aka Coho). Well, the Silvers ran early this year and the run was small. So, only one Silver was caught in the lodge all week.

We caught fish. Lot's of them. We hooked many more. Some days were better than others but even the slowest day, when I landed only one fish, the other guys made up for it. We caught Sockeye, Chum, Rainbows, Grayling, and one, lone Char. Here's a few of the better ones.

Tony's 28 inch Rainbow (Shane, the guide, looks

even more pleased than Tony)

Me and a 29 inch Rainbow (Top fish at the lodge until it was
 unseated by a 32" fish caught on Friday)

A bycatch of all that Rainbow fishing was plenty of
Sockeye and Chum. This is one of the larger Sockeye

A larger Grayling. We caught them to twenty inches. Lot's of
fun on a dry fly.

A smaller Rainbow, 22 inches. Shane was downright
disappointed when we hooked a fish smaller than twenty inches.
It was similar to catching salmon parr on the Farmington

Jerry and a large Sockeye.