I love fishing for Chum salmon, pound for pound, a fresh chum can outfight anything on the river. I’ve always been amazed by their strong spirit and while some people call them chum or dogs, I often refer to them as spirit fish and they are special for me. One day in November, I took Sonny James fishing on the Skagit and he had quite the battle with an especially large spirit fish.
We put in at Sedro-Woolley and ran up to the Harvey Hole, just above Gilligan Creek. After dropping the anchor, we baited up with pink wingbobbers and sand shrimp. Pretty soon, Sonny’s pole slowly bent down, down, down and I knew it was a heavy fish. Sonny wrestled the pole out of the rod holder and reared back setting the hook. Line sizzled off the reel and the big chum nearly pulled Sonny out of the boat.
It was quite the fight, Sonny leaning way back on that fish and then flying forward, almost falling out of the boat. Back and forth they went and I wasn’t sure who was catching who? As Sonny got that big chum close to the boat, I picked up the net, but I wasn’t sure if I would be netting the fish or saving Sonny.
Finally, the fish was tiring and near the boat. Sonny was giving it everything he had tugging on that big salmon. The line was singing with tension and I was reaching out with the net, “Crack!” The line parted and Sonny flew back a couple steps. I can’t help but think that had that line not parted, Sonny would still be water skiing behind that big ol’ spirit fish on the Skagit River.
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