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[wildmanyeah]

Double post

[Wiseguy]

https://sportfishingbc.com/threads/thompson-river-stories-share-yours.95148/

X2. Some great steelhead stories of the mighty T back in the day on that forum.

[RalphH]

I'm sure a lot of forum members have fished the thompson from the 1970's - 1980's. Those were definitely golden times for the thompson, maybe not in the late eighties but still night and day compared to today.

Well I apologize to you for writing something that lead the comments astray but I just wanted to say "Hey if you think the 80s was a Golden age for housing prices you should have been here in the 60s!" if you get my drift. 

Personally I don't think of the 80s as a Golden Age though that was a high point for ocean survival plus most of the hatcheries DFO built under the Salmonid Enhancement Program started to produce large and sometimes massive returns. However it also produced a lot of the rot that's left us where we are today... at least in my opinion.

Another Golden age you might want to look into was the Coquihalla River in the 40s and 50s (if not early). Before the 1st pipeline was built through there and all but wiped those fish out. There was a come back in the 80s which I was able to experience. The highway was a big negative as was the 90s crash in ocean survival. Pretty soon it was a good year if 50 fish came back.

[Silex-user]

Back in 80's there was awesome steelhead fishery throughout the Lowermainland, not only Chill-Vedder river, but rivers on north side of Fraser river, I have caught both summer and winter steelhead there. Even the local rivers in South Surrey has small run of winter steelheads. I remember watching the Hatchery guys would floated the upper part of Nicomekl river and  electrical shocked the waters to captured cutthroats and sometimes steelheads for brood stocks. Feel sorry  for the newbies  and who else who wants to chase the winter  ghosts will never experiences whats it like back the good old days.


Silex user

[RalphH]

This is edited from fishing journal dated July 18 1987 – Coquihalla River. In my journal I noted I was fishing despite having developed Bells Palsy that paralyzed the right side of my face.

The day was bright and clear and the water had dropped from the last trip.  After fishing a few spots above the 1st highway bridge I returned to the bridge to fish the water below a small drop where a turbulent pool below spread out into a smooth riffle. Below that the river runs down into a boulder strewn stretch to another low falls and into a pool
I fished a Grease Liner on a #7 long belly dry line, a Hardy Golden Prince and a 9 1/2-foot Loomis rod. I fished the water below the drop and the it’s boiling tail out then started on the top of the riffle. A fish rose on my first cast taking the fly in a neat little swirl. I just saw the head. Immediately I lowered my rod tip and moved it downstream so it was close to parallel to the bank so water pressure would slide the fly into the hinge of the fish’s jaw.
The fish immediately jumped 4 or five feet out of the water then followed with  2or 3 more leaps. It ran downstream into the middle part part of the riffle and jumped 2 or 3 times. It ran into the tail out then across near my side of the bank. It stopped behind a rock and I moved downstream of it to try to keep it from running out of the riffle and down the bouldered stretch to the next falls. I then stumbled into the water and the fish ran off downstream to shallow water seeming to hesitate to enter the rough water below. I tried to coax him back by feeding slack into the current but he was decided. It was a couple hundred yards down to the falls and the next pool and I ran and jumped from rock to rock to follow and saw him go over the falls into the pool below.
In that boiling water below the falls the fish porpoised twice perhaps pushed upward by rising eddys. Then followed a tug of war before he came close to me laying on his side. His back was grass green, with thick black spots, a heavy rainbow stripe on his side. I grabbed his tail, removed the fly and watched him glide into the jade green and yellow rock of the river then disappear.

I think that was the first steelhead I had landed on a surface fly. I noted in my journal it was about 30 inches and 9 or 10 pounds though now I think that may have been a bit of an exaggeration. It was one of the larger Coquihalla Fish I have landed

[fletcher]

I have a number of great Steelhead stories when fishing use to be good.  3 cast for 3 steelhead on the Nisqually River,  one chrome, one with a red strip and the last was spawned out.  Best part,  absolultely no one around.......the good old days.  Another was on the South Fork Nooksack, this section of water is now completely closed year round.  Hiked into an upper hole where there was a water fall that was impassible most of the year.  Hooked 18 summer run and landed 13 of them,  all catch and release and again,  no one around.  Another was on the lower Quinault River.  Hired a Indian Guide and my dad and I hooked over 20 Steelhead during the day,  most where spawned out but we did get a couple chrome ones to take home.
And then there's all the amazing days I use to have on the Fraser catching Chinook and Sockeye,  simple amazing fishing..................now all gone.

I've sold the boats and haven't wet a line in years.  Sure miss the time on the water. 

[iblly]

I began steelheading in 1990 which may not be considered the golden era of steelheading but I did enjoy some fabulous fishing in the 90s. One April in the mid nineties I had a seven fish day on the vedder. Biggest steelhead I ever caught was on the vedder in the nineties. Wild fish well over 20 pounds. Chehalis was pretty darn good steelheading back then as well. Caught some beauties on the Squamish in the early 2000s. Had pretty good  success on the Stave  back then as well.

[RalphH]

There were lots of steelhead in the Squamish & Cheakamus in the 80s. I recall seeing quite a number in the Cheak just above the Cheekeye. I hooked 4 on a Squamish Poacher 1 afternoon in April & lost everyone!

[iblly]

My dad fished those rivers,Squamish and Cheak, in the 70s and 80s. I unfortunately did not. He talked about huge coho back then as well.

[iblly]

Dad also told stories about nice steelhead in the little Campbell in Surrey.

[fisherforever]

Little Campbell was good back in the early 80’s, ghost shrimp were go to bait

[iblly]

Yup dad had the bug pump.

[redside1]

I'm sure a lot of forum members have fished the thompson from the 1970's - 1980's. Those were definitely golden times for the thompson, maybe not in the late eighties but still night and day compared to today.

from old timers I know or actually knew since they are no longer here, the end of the Thompson was in the late 1950's when gill nets on the lower Fraser changed from cotton to monofilament.

[RalphH]

In the early 50s steelhead caught and killed in the Fraser Fall gillnet openings was high - as high as numbers estimated in 80s which included 1st Nations by-catch. I have a copy of a letter from a DFO biologist on this which I have posted before so doesn't seem likely the switch to mono nets caused much of a change.

https://a100.gov.bc.ca/pub/acat/documents/r18317/Smith1955_1276104681962_4ed861c81acd4dfbe8d26b70385dd29227921f0e891532dad067913e2c89096e.pdf

[Darko]

In the early 50s steelhead caught and killed in the Fraser Fall gillnet openings was high - as high as numbers estimated in 80s which included 1st Nations by-catch. I have a copy of a letter from a DFO biologist on this which I have posted before so doesn't seem likely the switch to mono nets caused much of a change.

https://a100.gov.bc.ca/pub/acat/documents/r18317/Smith1955_1276104681962_4ed861c81acd4dfbe8d26b70385dd29227921f0e891532dad067913e2c89096e.pdf

wow... reading that made me very upset.