Piute and Sevier River 2-28

[mjschijf]

I am not very fond of my limited experiences with ice fishing. Therefore, ever since I heard of open water at Piute, it wasn't a tough decision as to where my next trip would take me. I've also been wanting to hit up the nearby Sevier River to try for some nice browns, so I thought this would be a good trip to kill two birds with one stone.

I had originally planned on a solo trip, but my dad informed me earlier in the week that he wanted to come along. We got off to a fairly early start on Saturday morning (by my standards), and decided our first stop would be the Sevier River through Marysvale Canyon.

We quickly found a stretch of the river that looked very good. We parked the car by the road and I walked down the hill towards the river. I didn't grab my camera, as my dad assured me he'd be "coming right behind me and bring the camera." Well, I reached the river and started fishing. On my third cast, I caught a decent brown of 15 or 16 inches. Of course, my dad was nowhere to be seen (with the camera) so I released the fish with no picture. Apparently my dad was sitting in the car, reading his bird book. Since it was my first fish of 2009, I would have liked a picture, but it was no big deal. It was caught on a Gitzit "trout fry" swim bait.

That was it for that stretch of the river. We tried a few more spots that looked promising in the next couple of hours, only to get shafted. In fact, I didn't see any more fish in the river. Oh well, it was on to Piute.

Piute is almost completely ice-free. There is a small patch of ice just south of the boat ramp but other than that, open water is a-plenty.



We worked our way towards the north dam, and within 20 minutes I had the first fish of the day:



One of the ugly, chewed up browns that seems to be fairly common in Piute. It was actually my first ever brown from a lake. Caught on a small, white jig.

We continued trying with spinners, Jakes, Kastmasters, Rapalas, and Gitzit swim baits with no luck for the next hour, before my dad and I both decided to go back to the jigs (which is apparently the only thing I can consistantly catch trout with).

After tying on another jig, I had another hookup. It was another brown, slightly bigger and more colorful than the last:





And then, my dad shed off his skunk with the fish of the day. A healthy rainbow measured at just over 18 inches:





It was nice to finally see a nice sized fish with a good looking tail and fins that weren't all sawed off. It was one of my dad's biggest fish to date.

Just a few casts later, my dad landed another bow. Smaller than the first, but it was healthy looking and had good color:



I was getting a little frustrated because I had at least 4 fish hooked that got loose while reeling them in. :? This included one that had my drag clicking and looked like a beauty underwater. I'm not sure if this was something I was doing wrong (drag tightness maybe?) or just something unavoidable. I had numerous other bites in which I wasn't able to get the hook set.

Anyway, for some reason that I can't understand, my dad decided to stop fishing after catching that second bow. I kept getting bites and losing fish for the next hour but wasn't able to land anything else. Oh well, I was happy that my dad caught a nice fish. I guess it makes up for all the days that I've outfished him. :)

It was a long, tiring day of fishing and we hit the road to go home at about 5 P.M. All in all, not a bad day. My highlight was my decent brown out of the river. My dad's bow was definitely the nicest of the day though.

It was my first time getting my hands on some fish for almost 3 months! It felt good to get out again and hit some open water. I might even go back to Piute next weekend to see if I can get revenge on some of those sneaky fish that got loose. However, springtime is near, and bass fishing is no more than 3 weeks away! Can't wait. 8)

[chickenlicken]

Sounds like a good starter trip. We've got a few more weeks up here til spring fishing will hit. I can feel it coming and can't wait. Nice to see some fresh fish getting caught. Whats up with those browns with stubs? Planters?

[Jaxx]

very cool. That trout is huge! I guess once you catch a hog like that it takes the fun out of any other fish you would catch. Nice pics and TR.

[accadacca]

Sweet! You guys did well.

[LOAH]

Nicely done, Schijf.

Welcome to Bogley.

(I suppose you've been a member since 2007, but welcome anyway!)

[mjschijf]

Sounds like a good starter trip. We've got a few more weeks up here til spring fishing will hit. I can feel it coming and can't wait. Nice to see some fresh fish getting caught. Whats up with those browns with stubs? Planters?

Yep, last year they planted a bunch of those ugly, brood stock browns. I've seen some good-sized browns caught out of Piute (I believe LOAH caught one) but they all seem to have those stubby, chewed up tails.

I bet there are some nice browns in there that come up from the Sevier River that are healthier looking fish. However, they seem to be few and far between.

[mjschijf]

Nicely done, Schijf.

Welcome to Bogley.

(I suppose you've been a member since 2007, but welcome anyway!)

Thanks for the welcome, Justin. I registered on here a while ago (this forum used to go by a different name, if I remember correctly?) but haven't visited much since. I completely forgot I even registered here until I stumbled upon it a couple of weeks ago and remembered. I think I'm going to start sharing the love though and at least post my reports over here. There appears to be a lack of fishing reports so I'm more than happy to contribute to this outdoor community.

By the way, this forum has some cool emoticons!