Hey guys went out fishin today. Little cold to start but it warmed up to be a pretty day.
Started off in the West Fork Carson but didn't have any luck. Caught 1 little native rainbow bout 7 inches long and released it. I tried several of the usual spots but couldn't find any fish.
Decided to just go on over to the East Fork on the other side of Markleeville.
First hole I tried I hooked into a nice one, The river flow was goin pretty good but runnin clear and not TOO high.
I fought it for maybe 5 or 6 min and then was able to get it on shore. Was about 18 inches and 2 1/2 pounds.
I rebaited and retied the hook, good thing cause I broke the hook gettin it out.
About 15 min after I landed the first one I was back in the water.
It took me a few min to get another bite but it was a HEAVY fish and it was stayin out in the fast water and was deep.
It took me bout 15 to 20 min to land it and I really didn't think my 6# line was goin to hold pullin it up on shore, but it did. It was 25 inches and bout 5 pounds. Looked the size of a small salmon or decent steelhead.
Fished there a little more but only got 1 more bite and it wouldn't bite again.
Moved on to a few other holes and only had another small native hit but it came off so I left. Didn't want to catch it and possible have it die so I went to another couple holes.
The last hole is the hole I wanted to start at but a survey crew was workin there so I didn't stop.
They were still there when I came back through but I stopped anyway and pulled 2 more fish out of that hole. One was just a decent keeper but the other one was bout 17+ inches and bout 2 pounds.
I had to pull them up through a whitewater shute to get them to me and I really didn't think the big one was gonna stay on but it did.
I decided to call it a day after that. I didn't need to try for a 5th one. Those 4 were plenty.
I tried to fillet the big 25 incher and it was nearly a total disaster.
Was nothin like the Stripers I fillet all the time.
I decided that I wouldn't do that again.
I wanted to take some pics of all the snow still on the mountains and of the river, BUT, I left my ph at the house so no pics till I got home.

Well it’s been springtime in Montana, which is just an extension of winter, lol. Example, last 48 hrs winds been blowing steady 20-25, with gusts 50-70 in some parts of the state, then this morning woke up with 2-3 inches covering the ground and mountains with much more.
Anyway I found a day last week with relatively little wind and high of 60, and finally got the boat out. I trolled up and down the river with bottom bouncers and crankbaits, and threw crankbaits and jigs to no avail. I finally got a bite but it just stole the night crawler. This kept me out there for at least another hour.
Eventually I relented to that ‘smell’ in the boat.
Well as I got closer to the ramp I see three guys that pulled up in there boat and with fly rods started fishing from the docks. They were just killing the rainbows that were stacked up in spawn mode. I got in there and docked my boat, and those guys were really nice and shared with me what they were biting on.
After getting my boat out of the water, I said to myself that I got skunked in the boat but darned if I’m getting skunked for the day! Of course I didn’t have my fly rod with me, nor any flies. The guys said the trout were eating small black leeches or woolly buggers. So I matched the hatch with what I had with me and tied on a little black maribou jig. Walked down to the docks and first cast, bam a nice fat 20” probably 3 lb rainbow.
I don’t know if the smell is out of the boat, but I sure got it off my clothes!

Saw1 (Steve) said it first, “quantity, not quality”, that’s what day 3 brought us! Initially the bait (mackerel) was harder to get but we got what we needed. Went to a reef that we fished on our way back in from the sea mounts (much closer to port) and the fishing was hot! All the boats from the Baja Pirates fleet was there (our charter company) as well as a few from other charters. It was hot fishing at the beginning, a bit slower in the middle and finished off nicely. Our boat limited out on the yellow tail and scored a bonito, our group partner boat nearly limited and scored a nice dorado! The largest yellow tail of 25lbs was caught on the last drift and the last of our bait. I personally had a difficult day initially being unable to hook up and losing a number of fish/bites, but it did improve and I was the one that landed the last and largest fish of the day, not bragging, just saying it really made up for the crappy start by me. At this rate (fingers crossed) we’ll be bringing well over 50lbs. of filets each back with us.

Here’s to crappy starts and fantastic finishes!! Report on day 4 tomorrow!!