This is the story I told Dennis and Mike, about my big trout in Alaska I caught on a Cop Car. They asked that I retell the story for the fishing report.
I was fishing on the Kanektok River in Alaska with Dave Duncan and Sons. They have an awesome Alaska tent-camp operation for both many Salmon species and large Rainbow Trout. ( I do their web site too.) I was on a two week adventure fishing both their lower and upper camps. The lower camp for Salmon and the upper camp for trout. These are not just any trout, they are the Leopard Rainbow. (Highly recommend checking them out.)
I caught
this beautiful Leopard 'Bow earlier on a mouse pattern skated on top
- it doesn't get any better.
I always get in touch with Mike and Dennis before I go to AK to get their recommendations for hot flies. Mike always has a good selection at his on-line flyshop. I still had a pretty good selection from last year so I only picked up a few dozen egg flies to add to my arsenal. Big mistake.
For some reason this year, the Cop Car was a super hot fly for the rainbows. Probably because the Kings and chums were on their redds and the trout were hanging out just below them - opportunistically waiting for a meal. Egg flies would work great except the Arctic Char would usually beat the rainbows to the egg. The fly of choice was the flesh type fly. The cop car fit the bill nicely. I only had about a dozen left from last year - I should have got more.
I was using them sparingly trying to make them last all week. The other flesh type flies were working too, the cop car was just working better. They seemed to take bigger 'Bows.
It was the last day and there was about an hour of fishing time left, so I put on my last cop car. We were fishing the main river now. We had been fishing side channels earlier - mostly fishing structure with mice - as there were no spawners where we were. Here in the main river, the kings were bedded up in the center of the river. The river was about 80 feet across and the kings were right in the center. The river was about six feet deep there and the river had a good speed, though not too fast.
We had stopped the boat near the bottom and walked to the head of the 300 ft run on a nice gravel bar. My brother Mike walked to the very top and I stopped about 50 feet below him. We started throwing our flies - mine the cop car and Mike a fly called "meat and potatoes" - a dirty flesh fly with a red bead. We were using floating lines - 8 foot 12lb. Maxima leaders a big split shot added to help get the fly down.
We were nearing the boat when my fly suddenly stopped. I gently raised my rod and felt resistance. no tap, tap, tap - more like bottom. I gave it a good set - just in case, but still nothing. Great, bottom I thought. I gave it a couple of more good tugs - then I felt the bottom move. It didn't move far, just enough to let me know there was a fish there. I had hooked a king maybe. Hopefully not foul hooked, which is always a possibility when you drag through behind the redds. Cool - I thought - I may be able to get the fly back. I was using a strong 6wt. but not exactly the rod you want to battle a big king. Even a feisty chum would be a big challenge in this water with this rod - especially if it was fouled.
I kept tension on it hoping it would do something - upstream would be good, as I didn't have far to go down stream without getting in the boat and chasing it through all kinds of snags and trees. Still nothing... so I'm thinking - this fish has no idea it is hooked. So I gave it a couple of more tugs to get it moving - I wanted to get back to trout fishing. It gave a couple of head shakes and I thought for sure I had a nice chum that didn't know it was hooked yet. Well - all of a sudden this fish decided it had had enough and it exploded on top right in front of me and my guide Adam. It took me several seconds to catch my breath as this was the largest Rainbow I had ever seen up here. I honestly couldn't say how big it was but it was huge - scary big -as big as the big chums we had caught earlier. I thought Adam was going to pee his waders as he just stood there watching this monster. Adam is a very mellow guy from Tennessee with many years experience on the Kanektok - I have never seen him get excited - ever.
The big rainbow ran upstream - then across - then down - then jumped (all this in about 10 seconds - or so it seemed.) Then it jumped again, and again, and again - then once more. These were not little jumps - it looked like a tarpon to me. My hands were shaking by now - and all I remember saying was - "please stop jumping!" I guess it heard me because that was his last jump. He was now back to hunkering on the bottom. I knew the longer I had him on, the greater the chance of losing him, so I tried to get him to move in closer to shore. He was not buying it... but he did start moving again - not much but some. I thought I actually had some control now - not a lot, but at least a little. The battle had been going on now for about five minutes I think. It was all a big blur.
I finally got his head moving toward shore and Adam stepped in the water to see if we could get lucky and bring him in now. The guides at Duncan's camps don't use nets, but they are very adept at landing trout as well as salmon. This was more like a salmon than a trout. They like to get the fish in shallow water, but not shallow enough for them to feel gravel on their bellies. They do this thing where they grab the leader and tail at the same almost time and they get the fish. Do not try this at home... if you do it wrong - like grab the leader too early - then it is all over.
Adam reached for the leader as the fish swam by him, but he couldn't grab the fish so he didn't grab the leader. I tried again - the fish was getting tired, but still had more fight than most fish ever have. I brought him in shallow again - and again Adam couldn't get it as the fish was just too fast still. I'm thinking this fish is just playing with us. He lets me bring him close then with one flick of his huge tail he is out deep again. This dance with the guide and the fish went on a few more times - then we said - it's now or never - let's do it now before we lose him. This time I brought him in a little shallower and swung him right next to Adam. He reached for the tail - he had the tail - he reached for the leader - he had the leader - the fish said no way - he made a huge flip/spin thing and he was gone - with the last cop car..
There were high fives all around. It would have been nice to actually hold this fish, but we got everything but the picture. I couldn't have asked for more - except maybe to get the cop car back.
Sandy Lockleer
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