Published Dec 10. 2014 - 9 years ago
Updated or edited Aug 19. 2017

The man with the silver waders

This is about a steelhead - a sea run rainbow trout. We don't have wild rainbow trout here, so all rainbows we catch are escaped hatchery or sea farm fish. And most are butt ugly. But not this one.

A magnificent rainbow - Rainbow trout in the Danish ocean are usually fat and ugly, escaped from fish farms. This one was beautiful.
Chrome from the sea
Martin Joergensen

This is about a steelhead - a sea run rainbow trout. We don't have wild rainbow trout here, so all rainbows we catch are escaped hatchery or sea farm fish. And most are butt ugly. But not this one.

This fish was in all ways beautiful and the day was in all ways memorable.

We were three guys who met up to fish, my good friends Asger and Jens and myself. Each arriving in his own car, which is pretty crazy since we all lived close to each other and have a long drive. Well, we burned some gas that day.
It was an April day, but unlike many of our spring fishing days, I remember this one as bitterly cold and windy. I was late to the party and the other guys had already fished for a while with no results. We gave it another shot at the meetup spot, but decided to move.
A bit further north was one of our absolute favorite locations, and we gave that a chance too. No go. Asger was expecting guests and had to leave around noon, and I was miserable, grumpy and on the verge of following him, but decided to spend some time at just one more location. So I parted way with the others and headed for that day's third spot.

And I had chosen wisely.

Wind was picking up, but coming from behind, and since it hadn't had a chance to raise any waves yet, the water looked very fishable in spite of being extremely low due to the hard off shore wind. The sun had also come out, and things did look OK.
I waded out, far longer than we could usually go, and laid out the fly over a large weed patch. As it passed onto the sand I felt some nibbling, and on the following cast a small fish took the fly.
Woot!
It was released and the fly laid out again.
Boom! Another one. And better size too.
Release, cast, take, long distance release...

There were fish around, no doubt, and from the first fish took around half past one till I stopped and returned home late that afternoon, I would catch 15 fish and loose a few too, which is beyond what anybody can wish for on a Danish coastal trip.
In the beginning of this amazing stint of fishing I had kept a couple of fish for the pan, and the released the rest. Jens joined me for a while and had a couple of fish too, but had to leave before the party was over. I fished on.

One more would die that day. After fish number 11 or 12 or whatever, I had a heavier take, and the fish leaped several times and vigorously pulled line off my reel. Definitely a more decent fish than what I had seen that day.
After a very good fight I landed it. A chrome bright sea run rainbow as perfect as they come. I decided to keep it too. These are hatchery fish, remember, so killing them will not do much harm to the population. They won't spawn anyway.
Weighing in at 2 kilos or some 4 lbs and measuring 55 centimeter or just 23 inches it was a very healthy fish. Bright as polished aluminum, and one of those I really remember - not least due to the extreme circumstance under which it was caught. I fished on for another half hour and landed and released another couple of sea trout in the same size range.

The wind had picked further up and the sun was gone, and that was it for me.
But not only had I had the day in my life where I caught the highest number of fish ever, but I also caught one of the most memorable and beautiful ones.
What a day!
What a fish!

Jens also caught - The fish were plenty. Enough for all
Another one - One of 16 fish on that fantastic day
Relaxing - The weather wasn\'t great and fishing was worse
Polished aluminum - The sea run rainbow was extremely beautiful
The fly - My trusty Magnus/Frede hybrid
A fantastic day
Jens Groenlund - Martin Joergensen

Comments

Martin, this is the ...

Martin, this is the way how ALL hatchery fish should look like, but I personally never caught one of those pig look-alike escapers. Nice article.

Rgds,
Ole

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