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Mark Freeman Commentary Big, wild steelhead hit Rogue Photo by Mark Freeman Steve Billmyer of Friday Harbor, Wash., holds a 36-inch summer steelhead that he released. Bait fishing nets scores of 10-pounders By MARK FREEMAN Steve Billmyer took a two-hour ferry ride and a 10-hour drive from the San Juan Islands for one day of summer steelhead fishing on Southern Oregon's upper Rogue River. His journey yielded an eight-hour drift boat trip that started in sub-freezing temperatures and ended with just two caught steelhead to show for his efforts. Yet Billmyer was hardly disappointed. The Friday Harbor, Wash., man caught and released a spectacular 36-inch wild summer steelhead, a fish more than twice the size of the upper Rogue's average summer steelhead. "That one fish is worth the trip," Billmyer says. "A fish like that comes around once in a lifetime. It was an honor to catch him." Billmyer's steelhead was just one of several large summer steelhead that created a nonconventional flavor to the traditional Nov. 1 return to bait fishing on the upper Rogue. On a fishing day where quantities of steelhead are the norm, it was the quality of steelhead caught by bait fishermen that defined Monday's events. The two-month season for fly-fishing ends each Halloween night, with fishing with lures and bait allowed upstream of Gold Ray Dam the following morning. For 61 days through September and October, the summer steelhead in upper Rogue riffles have had their fill of eating the eggs of spawning chinook salmon and dodging the artificial flies offered by anglers. But on Day 62, the eggs start having hooks in them again. Steelhead are eager bait-biters and the return of fishing with roe creates such bountiful catches that the event has earned the nickname, "The November First Massacre." But with cold water and a low run of summer steelhead, this year's massacre looked more like a border skirmish. While many fishing guides are used to getting their Nov. 1 clients easily into double-digit steelhead catches, most anglers caught fewer fish this year, according to Jack Jermain from the Fishin' Hole shop in Shady Cove, the center of upper Rogue fall fishing. But Jermain saw more fish over 30 inches long and over 10 pounds Monday than most days on the upper Rogue, where summer steelhead average about 4 pounds and few stretch past 30 inches. "There seemed to be a lot of those 30-34 inch, big, old, fat, wild steelhead," Jermain says. "That was a big surprise, especially after seeing mostly smaller fish during the fly-fishing season." Summer steelhead more than 30 inches long are a true rarity on the Rogue, which is known for producing large quantities of relatively small steelhead that return each summer and fall. Mike Evenson, the Rogue District fish biologist for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, says the summer steelhead's unique halfpounder run is a big reason for smaller summer steelhead here than rivers like the Umpqua. As halfpounders measuring about 12 inches, the summer steelhead make a false spawning run up the Rogue during the fall before they return to spawn. During their six months in the river eating insects, the steelhead do not add the poundage that standard summer steelhead do while feeding in the ocean, Evenson says. Earlier research shows that about 90 percent of the Rogue summer steelhead are less than 24 inches long. That makes fish over 30 inches -- including Billmyer's 36-incher -- real Rogue anomalies, he says. "That's a whopper for a summer steelhead on the Rogue, for sure," Evenson says. "That must have been exciting." Exciting doesn't come close to what Billmyer found on the end of his line Monday afternoon. After catching just one 17-inch summer steelhead in the morning, Billmyer continued fishing from a friend's drift boat until mid-afternoon. In the Frenchman's riffle downstream of Shady Cove, Billmyer cast a small cluster of roe into the swift water, where he hooked the steelhead and fought it for 20 minutes. After netting the large wild fish, it was revived and released unharmed. Rogue rules require that all wild steelhead be released unharmed during the summer steelhead run. Comparatively, Billmyer caught 10 summer steelhead -- but none over 5 pounds -- during a similar Nov. 1 trip on the Rogue last year. "This year is still better than last year," Billmyer says. But this year's overall summer steelhead run hasn't lived up to similar billing: It is down to one of the lowest of the decade. This year, 2,629 steelhead were counted at Gold Ray Dam through Oct. 27. That's about as low as the 2,779 steelhead counted by Halloween in 1991 -- the worst summer steelhead run of the decade. This decade, the upper Rogue has averaged about 8,900 summer steelhead by Nov. 1. Since the dam's fish-counting station was built in 1942, the upper Rogue has averaged about 6,000 steelhead through October. The low returns are likely the result of poor ocean conditions from previous El Nino years, Evenson says. Despite the low counts, wild fish numbers appear strong in the run. Last year's wild steelhead accounted for 53 percent of the fish over Gold Ray Dam -- the most since 1991. Though no studies exist to support this, scientists believe the Rogue's hatchery fish do not fare as well during poor ocean cycles as the wild fish do, Evenson says. (Staff writer Mark Freeman covers the outdoors for the Mail Tribune. Call him at 776-4470, or e-mail him at: [email protected] ) Outdoor Journal main page Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA