Yes!
I'm not kidding about the strippers!
I think it was all staged though,the chicks then began to make out with each other!
I leaned over to my buddy and told him to enjoy it as neither of us were likley to ever see that kind of thing ever again while salmon fishing!
I also read a story about two "anglers" that got into a beef there and so one of them returns with a machete' and hacks into the other guy!
I think any place that you combine large quantities of salmon and idiots you see all kinds of crazy sh*t!

Now we know "the rest of the story" behind Paranoid's moniker!!! I'd be paranoid too if that was happening upstream of me!

Dollars to donuts that was on the Vedder.

The worst "Combat" fishing I have ever seen is Lake Washington during the Sockeye fishery. I've never seen anything like it anywhere. From the crazies fishing in float tubes to canoes to huge cruisers. Luckily most of them are in good spirits! The worst one I saw last year were the 4 large guys crammed into a 7' Livingston. A single small wave would have swamped them easily as they only had about 4" of freeboard. Everytime I passed them the guy in the back was bailing water. And not one of them had on a PFD!

The other amazing spectical of combat fishing is Lake Lenore during spawning season. You will have a row of people standing on shore, another row of people standing in the water in their chest waders just out beyond the casting distance of the people on shore and then 1 or two rows of people in float tubes all going after the spawn laden cutts milling about the north shore. I watched as one guy litterally got knocked off his feet by the fish hitting him in the legs! Funny as all get out!

I caught my first steelhead at Rieters in 1984. At that time the crowds weren't too bad on a weekend. I haven't been back there in 15 years though.

I'm a little suprised Tillamook Bay hasn't been mentioned, when I fished it (Ghost hole) you had to fish your rods straight out the back of the boat, if you fished off the sides you risked either tangling lines of other boats or even hitting other boats rods, some guys even leave their bumpers out in case they bump other boats, though there were some close calls I never really saw anyone get to upset and when fish were hooked it seemed as though most people tried to clear a path. I've fished Lake Washington on numerous sockeye openers but never experienced anything like T-bay.

One Winter break from college a friend and I drove out here from Bozeman. He had never seen a steelhead and desperately wanted to hook one. I convinced him that if he spent a couple of days out here we would find some fish. I could see his chops watering the whole way out here as I told him of the fish I had caught growing up here. As luck would have it the night we got into town the rain started coming down in buckets. All the rivers blown. We tried a little on the Sky the next morning as it went out. As we left it was starting to float logs (not those kinds of logs Paranoid - the wood kind )

I told him your only hope at a fish with the water conditions is a little gem of a river called Tokul Creek. I tried to describe the scene in the most positive light I could. "You only get to fish about 500 yds of this creek. There will be a crap ton of people fishing with you. You will be so close to other guys that when you do hook a fish people around you have to get out of the way so you don't tangle lines etc, etc." I don't think he truely understood what I meant by "fishing in a puddle" because he seemed way to eager to try it. I felt a little bad about the fact that he had come all this way and that this was his only real choice for a fish.

We got there at about noon with about a million other guys. Looked like there was quite a few fish on the bank and I could see a few guys with fish on from the bridge. I spotted a fish right under the bridge where the little hatchery creek come in. I had my buddy walk down and I was trying to direct him where to cast from above. His first cast was a little long and could see his pencil lead laying on top of some grass that had folded over into the water. He was using a bare hook with a little bit of egg yarn in the loop with a very short leader. Just as he started to raise his rod to pull his gear off the grass a fish came out of nowere and blasted his hook. It rolled out into the middle of the creek, but it seemed to be fighting a little funny. When he finally got the fish up on the bank we noticed it had another hook in its mouth. To my disbelief that hook was not broken off, but was attached to a guy directly across the creek from my buddy. The fish was pinned in both corners of the mouth from the inside out. It looked like that fish had eaten both set of gear and not been flossed after it had already been hooked. My buddy really wanted the fish, and the other guy was understanding once he found out that it was his first. I couldn't believe it one fish two hookups!

Before we headed back to school theweather calmed down and we were able to spend a day on the OP. We found a couple of brats to take back to Montana and a whole lot more peace and solitude. I was glad I was able to show him what steelheading was all about.

Steve

Hoodsport can get pretty hairy and so can kmart hole on the puyallup.

Sure am glad that I dont have to endure all that crap all you city slickers have to, doesnt seem like much fun to me.

Worst "Combat Fishing" areas, by species:

Steelhead:
Below Nimbus Dam at the hatchery -- American River (Sacramento, CA) &
Blue Creek (Cowlitz River) TIE

Kings:
Samish River

Chum:
Hoodsport Hatchery Zone

Sockeye:
Lake Washington

Silvers:
Pt. No Point shoreline

August on the Skok. (when it was open) :rolleyes:

I have fished most of the ones mentioned above and the biggest pin heads I have encountered yet have been at Blue Creek.

Does anyone know the guy about 55 years or older with the long grey beard that talks in a high pitched voice, we had a few choice words for each other. He basically lives at Blue Creek you have to have Heard him if you have ever fished there.

Cowlitzfisherman? :rolleyes:

AkKings,

Fished T-bay in the late 70's and again in 98,I'll never return during salmon season. Once in the water the crowds are somewhat tolerable, the boat ramp,an excellant facility,is made IMHO unbearable by some of the so called fishermen trying to put in or take out.

I can't imagine any bank fishing worse than the NF Alsea, inland from Waldport,central Oregon coast.

ever been on the dungeness....its shoulder to shoulder like all the other rivers listed before, but its real snaggy, and theres brush that the crackers through into on the other side, so they end up pullin there lead out of the bushes or the rocks, and swing them right at you saying look out when its 4 feet away, in one day i got hit in the face once, 4 times in the body, and twice in the nuts. I then left after luckily not throwing a punch at some guy with a fly rod who called me a f#$%ing baitcaster(even though he was using a baitcasting reel 20 mins before). I have vowed never to return to this river for the rest of my life. Oh, and i hated watching all those snaggers walk out with their 4 silvers "with pride" as salmonella said.

How about the Carbon - What a Jack A$$ fest. I was up there a couple of years ago. It was a couple hundred yards to the river and it was just littered with trash. Saw a couple of guys walking out with some "smokers". Yikes. Get to the river and it is lined with jokers snagging kings with eyes missing and bright red silvers. Took one look at that and pulled a u-turn. My fishing opportunities are to few and far between to put up with that crap.

Steve

Q: "Ever Partake In "Combat Fishing"?"

A: No. I have no intention of joining a crowd of fishermen as they stress the hell out of themselves. Serves no purpose.

I would rather fish alone, in a remote stretch of water with 2% of the fish that a "Combat Hole" has...and go home empty handed..than fish in a crowd.

To me a crowd is any more than 5 other fishermen within vision distance.

Yep..I'm a Lobo.

Mike

I thought I knew combat fishing from various locales in Washington, and then I tried the Russian last July. Literally miles of shoulder to shoulder, sometimes 2 deep - unbelievable, but I think I'll go back next year.

I've done the Russian a half dozen times and had a great time every time. There were lots of fish and the people around me for the most part were courteous and also out for a good time. I'll be back in 2005. People's hole on the Kasilof is the same way - mostly courteous fishermen fishing close together in high density fish holding water. Blue Creek on the other hand tends to have more a$$ho's per square inch. Sometimes the crowd is a good one and other times there's the locals with an IQ pushing 60 that can make things trying. I survive by keeping a sense of humor no mater what (doesn't always work). I have had more 20 fish-on days at Blue Creek than I can count with a high percentage being 3 salt fish. For me it makes it worth it in the end.

Unfortunatly, The behavior from these fisheries seem to be spilling into the areas outside these fisheries.

Ive been lucky the few times ive fished blue creek. Never had a hassle. Keep in mind I was fishing for summer run steelies. I noticed a few loud mouths down there but kept away from them. Funny thing was, the loud mouths werent any better than the other idiots on the bank, myself included.