Can anyone tell me what the fishing has been like on the Kalama for Springers? What is the best method for hooking these beauties?
Thanks

------------------

Fished it last weekend without any luck on the springers. We and most everybody else in boats were running shrimp behind divers (mag warts) with a spin & glo head. Had a hard time keeping any bait on for long since they must've released a million smolts upriver. Also tried chucking spinners as a last resort and hooked up more of the smolt buggers.

Bruce

the smolt are realy thick this year.i was out yesterday smolt 2doz.rvrtramp 0 .it must be a good sign for the coming years.FISH ON!!!!!!!

O.K. I said I was probably not going to go this weekend but now I got the itch and I might give it a try. so has anybody been on the Kalama the last few days? have the smolts cleared any? how about the bigger fish are they getting to be more of them with this rain? I might end up going or I might go look for Elk horns.

dcrzfitter

Question for B.Gray.You mentioned that you were using Mag Warts for divers.With the difficulty in finding 3/4 oz Hot n Tots do you find these a good substitute? or do you think they are better divers? do you feel they dive as deep,or deeper?Thank you in advance.ReiterRat.

ReiterRat,

I've never used Hot n Tots so I don't really know what to compare the mag warts to besides the jet divers. Bob D. had painted and rigged the mag warts and they seemed to work great for us running them through deeper holes. We had the lines out about 50 feet and the action off the warts gave us a lot better idea of whether or not the baits were down and working in the right places. Just give it a couple cranks in when you get to the tailouts. Seemed to do the trick for us. Not that we got any springers though...

bg

Hey reiterRat if you need some of those Hot-n-Tots in the medium size just give Blue creek bait and tackle a call. The tackle shop on the Cowlitz. They've got a whole assortment of them in all colors if he's out of black just buy the purples and blues and paint them black it works just as well. He's also got a few of the little hot-n-tots left which are my favorite of small river winter steelhead. They beat the hell out of wiggle warts and hot shots.

------------------

Stlhdr1,
Don't you mean Barrier Dam Campground?? The Blue Creek store has been out of business for a couple of years.

hi, i was wondering why did the blue creek store go out of biznus anyways..ive wondered that for over a year...well..g'day..

[ drrzfitter, I was wondering if you went fishing or horn hunting. What part of the state do you hunt horns?

dcrzfitter[/b][/QUOTE]



[This message has been edited by steelyhorn hunter (edited 05-03-2000).]

Didn't go fishing. was going to hunt horns but ended up showing a buddy the era and just put on lots of mile (allmost 200) just driving and looking around. We went to the Mt St. Hellens part of the state. we got stuck in the snow up really high and just had fun. we shot our rifles and enjoyed the awsome weather. I am going fishing this weekend. only seen about 30 elk. normally we should have seen well over 100. but the feather heads have done the same to them as the fish. it's really sad. we covered alot of country and only seen a few animals when we normally would have them in the road allday long.the ones we did see were about 1/2 mile away. very SAD


dcrzfitter

isn`t the Mt. St. Helens herd protected still?

yeh, it is proctected from us, the people whom pay all the bills.
my neighbor took his family down to st helens visitor's center 2 years ago when the indians mutilated over 30 elk just inside the boundry and only took the heads for ceremonial needs.just left everything else laying on the ground to rot. hides, meat and guts, just beuatiful to drive by on a sunny sunday with the family.

elmtree

i said no more as, well!!!!!!!!

Hey Reiterdude, aren't you the guy that works at.... I think I'm heading south this weekend. Want me to pick you up some?

Blue Creek Tackle and Barrier Dam Campground are owned by the same folks. With the relatively poor runs over the past several seasons on the Cowlitz, I think they just weren't pulling in enough biz to keep both shops.