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Recently an acquaintance asked for my
greatest fishing experience.That was easy. It was the
day in June, back in 1990, when a brother, Michael,
netted the largest salmon I ever caught--a 51-pound
chinook.
Today, as on that day in 1990, the thrill is in remembrance.
It wasn't the taking of the 51--pound buck that rang
bells of emotion. It was the fact that family shared
in my finest fishing hour.
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I blabbed to the world as soon as I returned to write my
first post-vacation outdoors column for Victoria's daily newspaper.
The five-day vacation took root about six months earlier,
during the previous Christmas period when another brother,
Bill, suffered a massive heart attack and died a few days
later.
As brothers, the three of us were close but we really didn't
do much together. One always thinks of the things he could
have done, and never did, after it is too late.
Greater togetherness should have prevailed because both brothers,
sister Lola and my dad all were enthusiastic fishermen. Oddly,
all of us were smitten in our adult lives almost as if one
was infected by another.
A happy thought surfaced during the sadness of Bill's funeral:
"Let's go fishing" was the suggestion I fired at Mike, hardly
recognizing the fact it might not have been the time or the
place.
Mike, also responding instinctively, agreed to go for it.
Up to that point in my life, I had only one previous visit
to the Charlottes, to fish late-autumn coho. I had never experienced
the magnificent mid-summer chinook fishery.
I had to listen to others brag about their Langara conquests,
the 50, 60 and 70-pounders. The Charlottes, therefore, had
great priority on my list of things to do for some time.
Langara appealed to my Edmonton-based brother as much as
it did to me.
Ideally, the final weeks in June are the hottest ones but
a vacancy came up on the resort vessel Marabell in the final
days of May. We accepted the opportunity.
The travelers had an uneventful flight from Vancouver to
Langara. Any nervousness showed the day before we left when
we encountered four Puerto Ricans in the Delta River Hotel.
That hotel, I should explain, is "Grand Central Station" for
the thousands who transfer for the flights to the many salmon-fishing
resorts on the BC coast.
The four had just returned from Langara. "Disappointing,"
they chorused. Chinook were not jumping into every boat.
The nervousness remained after we reached the Marabell.
Randy Wright, the worried northern operations manager for
the Oak Bay Marine Group, admitted fishing was sub-standard.
A superb fisherman himself, he felt unseasonable southwest
winds were keeping the big chinook off shore.
The blustery conditions also kept Langara's sport-fishing
fleets close to home base. But Randy pumped us with hope.
"With a high pressure system moving in, things could change,"
he suggested.
And so it came to be.
Salmon fishing picked up on our second day, but not enough
to suit me. The Brothers Fedoruk decided to concentrate on
halibut. While we happily settled for three chickens between
10 to 22 pounds, the high-pressure system moved in.
Day 3 became hectic, I modestly kept a 12 pound chinook and
Mike caught his career-best, a 28-pounder. He also lost a
much larger one at the boat. We caught a brief glimpse of
the fish and I'm certain it would have been in the 40s.
Day 4 was another great day, at least to my way of thinking.
We went back to favored Cohoe Point, and Mike immediately
took a high-teen keeper. We had a couple of other touches,
but nothing serious happened.
Finally, four hours after we started and a few minutes after
the slack went to a flood tide, one of the boat's rods jerked
violently. Unfortunately for Mike and happily for Ernie, it
was my turn to play.
I took the 10 1/2-foot rod at 9:40. At 10:15, the brother
whom I must now adore netted my biggest...a lovely 51 pound
male.
There were many reasons for the nerves to jangle during the
battle. Firstly, one never knows if the single-action Daiwa
reel or the 25-pound line will stand up to the power of a
hungry chinook that has just moved in from the open Pacific.
Secondly, Mike had limited experience. To that point in his
life, he had never netted a fish weighing more than 12 pounds.
On this day, he did the job. Line and reel withstood their
tests, but the knees shook hardest after the magnificent specimen
was hauled into the boat--by both of us.
Family, I think, should do things like this more often.
Copyright ©
Ernie Fedoruk retired in 1996 after a 47-year journalism career as an outdoors and sports columnist, has just completed
14 years as director/officer of the Outdoor Writers of Canada,
also was director of the Northwest Outdoor Writers Association
for 11 years. His passion is fishing – to find and to
protect – and insists his greatest contribution as a
conservationist is incompetence.
Ernie Fedoruk Freelance Journalist
1867 Neil Street Victoria, BC, V8R 3C6, Canada
phone:(250)592-4438 fax:(250)592-7090
e-mail: efedoruk@islandnet.com
To purchase Ernie Fedoruk's column for publication, please
contact efedoruk@islandnet.com
For previous articles by Ernie Fedoruk, click on the links
below:
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