Extreme Steelheading: Wind, Rain, Sleet, Snow And Hot Steelhead

Extreme Steelhead Video

Sunday October 29, 2006, Salmon River NY. Air Temp: 36, Wind: 25-35 with gust to 55 mph, Water: 2900 cfs (basically over the banks).Our wives called us crazy to go steelheading given the forecast. Any reasonable person would be home, but then again steelheaders are not reasonable people. After all we had a sound plan of attack. Hit the river in some sheltered areas and enjoy the solitude. The only crazy person we saw was the guy launching a drift boat in Altmar as we drove past. We knew there were lots of steelhead in the river and that fact was the most pertinent part of the plan. The urge to connect with those hot fall steelhead sealed the deal. As hooking into these fish is like hooking onto a live power line, all hell breaks loose. When we arrived at the river the wind was brutal as was the ever changing combination of rain, sleet, pea size hail and snow. We quickly settled into our fishing routine searching for steelhead. After fishing the most sheltered areas to no avail, we ventured out to less sheltered areas and there we found our quarry. The morning provided the most action with each of us hooking multiple steel, but each being fortunate enough to land a steelhead and Shaq also landed a nice brown. The afternoon was more challenging as we really had to work in order to pick at the fish. Over the course of the day each of us got abused by multiple steelhead. They either broke us off or took off downstream in the heavy current. With little slack water and no way to walk down the river banks in places we could only hope for the best and given the conditions the steel ate us up and we loved it. In the final analysis we were in steelhead heaven.