This one got by me this summer. Darn it.

[Sharphooks]

I heard mid to upper 80's---caught on a fly rod---either she's real small or that spring is REAL big....it got turned loose.

 

[poet1971]

W would see fish like that in the Skeena river in North BC. My biggest out of there was 50. But 80's and 90's get caught there every year.

 

[wishiniwasfishin1]

Do you know where / when it was caught?

 

[boogieman]

wow, what a fish!

 

[Rum Buddies]

wow - imagine the fight if it was fresh in the ocean.

 

[Saxe Point]

Maybe a Kenai fish.

 

[SophiaB]

Quite the slab! Nice to know fish like that are around. Keeps me going back and spending money I don't have that is forsure.

 

[Sharphooks]

It was a Skeena fish---probably heading up the Kalum.

It does look like a Kenai fish. I fished the Kenai for 5 summers, every weekend during June and July. I saw fish like that, but they were always caught by the housewife from Des Moines, Iowa who got talked into a day on the Kenai by her husband.

I love it when the gals show up on the river with zero expectations and get fish like that.

 

[Bootsy]

Nice to hear it was released. Big fish spawn more big fish. I am with Sharphooks-how did that get by me in the ocean and the river?

 

[el.Pereh]

Wild fish! That tail looks as wider than her waistline!

 

[Time]

My kind of woman!
Looks like she waded in, grabbed on, and is wrestling the fish to shore.

 

[jeffywestcoast]

Nice Fish! that sucker is a hog...woulda been quite the show on a flyrod.. Good for her! a fish she will not soon forget.

 

[Revenge]

I’m thinking it was most likely fought to the point of exhaustion seeing as it was on a fly rod and Springs in a river don’t do well in that situation the chance it survived can’t be good in my opinion, but still an incredible fish ether way !!

 

[Fishin'Zinn]

Wow, that looks almost unnatural! I'd be glad to hear if more of these big suckers were released like this one was... The problem is people all want to gloat with their 'trophy'. I can see mid to higher 30's but when people keep a 40+ it is beyond me.

Good for those people keeping the ones with the good genes in the water!

 

[Rum Buddies]

I’m thinking it was most likely fought to the point of exhaustion seeing as it was on a fly rod and Springs in a river don’t do well in that situation the chance it survived can’t be good in my opinion, but still an incredible fish ether way !!

maybe but the chance of survival if you bonk it is zero.

 

[Revenge]

maybe but the chance of survival if you bonk it is zero.

LOL "True that"

 

[aheny]

Im sure which is more impressive, the fish, or the woman who caught it

 

[jeffywestcoast]

I’m thinking it was most likely fought to the point of exhaustion seeing as it was on a fly rod and Springs in a river don’t do well in that situation the chance it survived can’t be good in my opinion, but still an incredible fish ether way !!

It was already in the river lets hope it wasn't to far from it's spawning grounds...

 

[Gunsmith]

That would be a Kalum fish, within fifty miles or so from spawning. Seems to be less every year, quite noticeable in the last twenty years.