Fencerows: Steelhead Airstrike

 “He’s rolling below that big rock in the current seam. Try to drop it higher up and a little more to the right.”  The words rang down from my son’s sniper perch in the birch tree deadfall like coordinates for an artillery strike.

 I cast the egg fly as directed, letting the current swing it down the limestone ledge into the pool below.  I gave the rod one slow twitch, pulling it across the current, letting it drift further, one more twitch.  A shout came from the observation post above and the line sang to life.  “You got him!”

There was an explosion of water as a steelhead trout came up from the pool and spanned half the creek in a single leap.  I thought the fish might go a good four pounds. It was pure adrenaline.  It was also short lived, lasting about a second.

The report came down.  “I’ll call that one ‘old scar’.  His back was scratched up.  He sure got off quick, maybe you should use a heavier rod and line,” the debriefing continued.

I defended my fly-rod expertise upon the steelhead battlefield to the commander.  “Holy crap,” I said.

We’d been along the campaign-trail of spring-run steelhead on Sauk Creek, an urban tributary winding through the city of Port Washington and emptying into Lake Michigan. There was the hum of passing cars in the distance, but the stream valley was deep and thick.  After the cars passed, it was possible to believe we were fishing in remote isolation.

The creek drops to a trickle in the summer.  Now, after heavy spring rains, it rushed over the rocks like water slide.  Floodplains along the banks were choked tight with brush and debris.  The water had been much higher only days earlier.  It was settling down but still running with the consistency of chocolate milk.

We’d timed the Sauk Creek run perfectly.  Steelhead trout are rainbows, living in the Great Lakes and running up the rivers to spawn in spring or fall.  Tributary levels vary with the unpredictable Wisconsin weather, and water flow is everything to the spawning runs.  On a given day, you’d swear there wasn’t a fish in the river.  The next, an armada of dorsal fins scrapes up the riffles.

The spawning runs are sight fishing at its finest.  Polarized glasses are optimal.  Unfortunately, along the flood-scarred runs of Sauk Creek, polarized chocolate milk was still chocolate milk.  Air-born tactics and fluorescent-orange yarn flies were necessary.

We found the spawning pool by accident, navigating around a brush pile through the water and startling two big fish from their lie and into the current. We found the birch tree in the same fashion, startling a bigger possum from the same brush pile.  I don’t like to think I’d run from a fight, but when the long black tail brushed across my feet and a furry brown face peered up at me with a snout-full of yellow teeth - then I can climb a tree pretty darn fast.

From the perch it was easier to see the shadows of fish moving into the run.  They advanced in swimming succession.  We took turns in the tree, alternating casting and spotting.  The orange fly and the hulking finds of the steelhead were visible from above.

In the course of an hour we hooked five fish, losing four and landing one that went a modest 15 inches.  The one we landed was a team effort, as my son jumped from the tree and slid down the muddy banks with the landing net.  We were outgunned on the other four.  They were heavy-sided silver torpedoes that danced on their tails.  I guess our only excuse is that they ambushed us.

A birch tree observation post.

Sauk Creek steelhead.