Worst fight EVER

[corn fed fins]

Well, you know your fly is getting down when you set the hook on a tick of the line and are fortunate enough to land a rock. The funniest thing about this was just moments earlier my buddy and I where discussing landing rocks. This is only the second time I've ever landed a rock. My first was a piece of pumice type rock, much larger than this one. Technically, I hooked a piece of something connected to the rock.

I have hooked my share of trash, Muskrats, a snapping turtle(worst), duck, many bats(2nd worst:icon_twis), and even a pelican once. (None intentionally, mind you). They all put up a better fight than this rock.lol

Just a bit of humor to start off March

 

[Ard]

Nice color in that one, I get a couple every year and catch them on standard salmon flies or tube flies with just a #6 Owner hook. Like you say they are proof positive that the fly was indeed on the bottom

I hooked an anchor chain about 6 or 7 years ago and managed to get hold of it with my hand. It was attached to one of those cone shaped lead drift boat anchors, still have it out in the shop.

 

[nevadanstig]

I have yet to land a rock. Ive perfectly hooked a lost spinner bait throught the swivel, hooked a cormorant, and I usually hook and land a few crayfish a year on a fly, but never a rock!

Sent from my SM-T237P using Tapatalk

 

[chechem]

Technically, looks like you caught a caddisfly tube.

 

[karstopo]

That's pretty funny. Catching a stream rounded rock is a feat. The snapping turtle does sound really bad. They aren't very good tempered and have a lightning fast bite. Do they get in trout streams? Makes me want to double check if the rock I'm about to step on is really a rock. The bat sounds even worse. I never even thought about that possibility. There goes any chance of me fly fishing in batty areas at dawn or dusk.

 

[Rip Tide]

I'm an expert stick-fish fisherman :thumbsup:

It's surprised at how often you catch mollusks in the salt. Clams, oysters and mussels.
They filter feed with their shells open and if anything solid (like your hook) makes contact, they "clam" right up.
Hook into a bed of oysters and you've got a fight on your hands

 

[stenacron]

Technically, looks like you caught a caddisfly tube.

Chechem is spot on. It's a real testament to the strength of caddisfly silk. It actually looks like you looped the body of the caddisfly larva, and the silk pulled in the remains of it's case and the rock it was lashed to. I snag a lot of these, but never with the rock still attached.

No when you get really good, you can land the free living caddisfly larva! Got this beauty on a #18 RS2 from the Taylor River.

 

[weiliwen]

In 1987, I lived in Oregon. My family had a place on the Nehalem River in tidewater. I fished that river for salmon every fall. One October, near the end of the season, a buddy and I went down there Friday night.

We got pretty drunk, but I was up at 6 to go fishing. It was blowing 40 MPH and raining sideways, so I knocked on my buddy's door and said "let's get up later."

Around 10AM, it looked like the rain and wind had eased up slightly, and since we were down there, I thought, "What the hell, let's go fishing." We trundled into the boat 10 feet out my front door, and warmed up the engine. We took off, and I had my buddy, not a salmon fisherman, pull off the requisite length of line to start trolling.

Once he was out, I started to do the same. I got my line about 15 feet out when I snagged a sunken log - a very common occurrence on that river. I had my buddy reel in and I made sure to keep my line slack while I moved above the snag in the hope I could pull it out. The snag started rolling in the current, so I thought, "Well, I might be able to lift this branch out of the water to remove my hook" when I started tugging, the branch started to move for the next county. So, about 2 minutes in, I realized this was a fish, not a snag!

Long story made slightly less long, it turned out to be a 60-lb Chinook, probably the biggest I'll ever catch. 48" long, and the rear fin was 13" across. It was only the 5th biggest fish caught on that river that year; they've got hogs in the Nehalem system.

 

[cab]

We were fishing from the boat, got a strike! Bent the rod pretty good, went sideways a bit, a Wiper (Walleye/Striper cross) judging from the fight. Pulled up a 3 foot stick. Tells ya how hard Wipers fight.

CAB

 

[clouserguyky]

I landed a live mussel once, and hooked a red-eared slider the other day as well. You know you're down deep when you're catching rocks! The best is when you hook sunken rods and reels!

 

[ottosmagic13]

There is a certain section of Irondequoit Creek that is downstream from a swimming hole and runs under an overpass.

There is a nice swift/slack transition right after the concrete of the overpass tunnel ends. Was swinging a nymph rig and saw my indicator tic and set the hook felt something take off into the faster current. Eyes light up and work it back into the slack water.

Turns out it was a shirt.

 

[sweetandsalt]

I used to love fishing the Madison River but don't much anymore. Still it flows through a beautiful valley and while traveling from one drainage to another occasionally go that way, stop at the butcher shop in Ennis and camp along the river for the night.

So it was we camped and had a little dinner after which we strolled the banks of a side channel as dusk deepened, casually casting at fish feeding on popping caddis flies. Light was about gone when I snagged a hunk of junk which, having just come from the Missouri, I was used to as plentiful floating weed and algae had prompted our departure. As I slid my hand down the tippet to free my fly two things occurred to me simultaneously; 1. the Madison does not have much in the way of weed beds and 2. weeds don't flutter and warmly wiggle when you torch them. That is the only bat I have ever actually hooked and I was very fortunate that it did not bite me. I put my boot on the tippet and cut it, freeing the bat...I hope it did not mind my elk hair caddis being affixed to it too much.

I have hooked a good number of gulls and terns as they wheel and dive over spraying bait as bass and albies attack from below; a towel is required to restrain them while being disentangled, a two person job. My fly has found a few northern banded and garter snakes swimming and once I hooked a quit large beaver but didn't land it.

White pelicans have proliferated to far too great an extent in the West and a couple of years ago on the Rail Road Ranch, my pard, Dillon, hooked a very nice rainbow, a good 21" I'm thinking. The fine trout ran and leaped excitingly but also excited the attention of a pelican which circled and unsuccefuly dove for the fish which continued its great battle against the bent rod. The bird tried again two or there more times and then, its extended bill flap gyrating violently, flew off with the rainbow. Dillon's reel protested and so did he but the bird was victorious and with a twisting in flight giant gulp, swallowed the fish. The tippet couldn't hold the pelican and Dillon wound up with a lot of line to reel back in.

Bonefishing and inadvertently hooking big sharks is just so common I'm not even going to get into it.

 

[chechem]

...
White pelicans have proliferated to far too great an extent in the West and a couple of years ago on the Rail Road Ranch, my pard, Dillon, hooked a very nice rainbow, a good 21" I'm thinking. The fine trout ran and leaped excitingly but also excited the attention of a pelican which circled and unsuccefuly dove for the fish which continued its great battle against the bent rod. The bird tried again two or there more times and then, its extended bill flap gyrating violently, flew off with the rainbow. ...

The white pelicans at Hebgen lake are aggressive too (maybe same ones). Last year I started carrying a bag of rocks in my pontoon boat to keep them at bay. NO I DIDN'T TRY TO HIT THEM! But when you hook a fish you'd better throw a rock in their direction or they'll get your fish, no matter how big!

Here's one at daybreak waiting on the fish!

 

[Rip Tide]

The white pelicans at Hebgen lake are aggressive too (maybe same ones). Last year I started carrying a bag of rocks in my pontoon boat to keep them at bay. NO I DIDN'T TRY TO HIT THEM! But when you hook a fish you'd better throw a rock in their direction or they'll get your fish, no matter how big!

We have that problem with seals
You hook-up with one of them and your reel is smokin' !

 

[runningfish]

I once fought and landed a Rapala it wobbled and darted like a real fish.

 

[corn fed fins]

The snapping turtle does sound really bad. They aren't very good tempered and have a lightning fast bite. Do they get in trout streams?

I was throwing a streamer parallel to the bank for bass. Fly was in the mouthunk: but I wasn't sure if it was hooked or if the turtle wasn't about to let the dinner go. After I poked at it and it "snapped", the fly just fell to the bank. Small one. Maybe 12" across the shell. By the fight, a 15" turtle would outmatch my 5wt.


Hooking seals? LOL The salt version of a beaver. I'll pass on both accounts.

 

[rfb700]

We were fishing from the boat, got a strike! Bent the rod pretty good, went sideways a bit, a Wiper (Walleye/Striper cross) judging from the fight. Pulled up a 3 foot stick. Tells ya how hard Wipers fight.

CAB

White Bass/Striper cross??

 

[philly]

I've caught a few strange things. Three YOY seagulls, two on spinning tackle and one on the fly rod. All were reeled in and released. Some rocks, a rod and reel, a water snake. The worst fight i had from a fish was probably the largest trout I've caught on a fly rod. In the fall the PFBC stocks brood fish on their last legs in the streams. This one was a big male rainbow close to 30 inches with a hook jaw and in full spawning colors just sitting sitting there. It had its mouth open, like it was gasping for breath. Still not sure whether it actually took my woolly bugger or the fly drifted into its mouth and I set the hook. The seagulls, rocks and the fishing rod and reel but up a better fight than it did. I literally dragged it in. Released it. A couple of days later went back to the same spot and it was lying on the bottom quite dead. Now that I think about it. The fish might have been dead when I caught it.

 

[bigjim5589]

I hooked and released on old tennis shoe one time that put up a pretty good fight, until I got it close to the surface. Then it fought like an old tennis shoe.

BTW, it was released into a trash bag, not back into the water.

 

[chechem]

... Now that I think about it. The fish might have been dead when I caught it.

Funny.

Well, if we're including spinning tackle, I've caught an alligator (in Louisiana) and almost caught an owl (also in Louisiana).

The owl was in a cypress tree; didn't see it at first. I was popping a Tiny Chugger below it. It made a dive, and I snatched away the lure.

The alligator was small, maybe 3' (big enough). It took a minnow, and I had to reel it in. It was a bigger fight than above-mentioned shoe! I put a wooden paddle in its mouth, put my foot on its head, and pulled the hook free with pliers. Then I threw it and the paddle overboard.