THE OREGON SPORTSMAN 109 
The rod for steelhead fishing must be very powerful, of course. 
The fish can be killed on the ordinary five or six ounce trout rod; but 
one of eight or ten ounces, built short, stocky and powerful, is better. 
It must be able to handle a long line, which means a heavy line, one 
practically of light salmon size. As the angler fishes close to the sur- 
face of the water there will be much line submerged in his casting, and 
his rod must be powerful in order to lift it—as must his wrist be also. 
Once the fish is hooked and free in that boiling torrent, the rod has 
asked of it all that any rod can give. It must, in effect, to be most 
efficient, be of just as much weight as one can handle single-handed, 
with the heavy line. 
The steelhead will follow the fancy of fresh-water trout in its own 
selection of flies. In habits somewhat like the tresh-run salmon, it still 
rather favors the fresh-water trout; and it is not customary to angle 
for it with the gaudy flies that alone serve in salmon angling. In 
summer evenings the local anglers favor gray hackles, brown hackles, 
or some modest fly of that description. Number One hook is a favored 
size for that river. 
It is to be understood that the strain on the tackle is extreme, and 
the hook must be large enough not to tear out of the fish’s mouth. At 
times in the evening the coachman is found effective. Most anglers 
during the day will change flies as they do on any trout stream. The 
usual uncertainty as to what the steelhead actually is going to want is 
before you all the time. At the time of the writer’s visit, in July, the 
gray hackle was perhaps the best fly in use. 
In water like this it is naturally some time before a fish can be 
subdued after it is hooked. The angler will have a fight on his hands 
every minute of the time—he may rest assured of that. He will have 
rushing tactics—boring and sulking sometimes, if the water permits; 
but his fish, being smaller than a genuine salmon, will rush more, leap 
more and be more active. Again, it will make extremely long runs— 
I have never seen any trout take off so much line at one run as the 
steelhead does, , 
It was my fortune to see this steelhead angling at its best in the 
company of some friends of Ashland and Medford on one midsummer 
day. Our party, more or less unsuccessful during the heated hours, 
was augmented in the evening by an auto-load of experts from Med 
ford, led by the prosecuting attorney of that town, a powerful man, 
weighing more than two hundred pounds. His chosen fishing companion 
was the editor of one of the daily papers, a man of medium height and 
weight. These two quite often fished together. They would lock 
hands and wade out along the edge of some ridge of rapids, in the effort 
to get out line enough to reach over the lying ground of the steelheads, 
which experience had taught them was in the deep white water far 
out in the middle of the stream, where the broken rocks afforded the 
fish a chance to hold their own against the current. 
Time and again, as these two hardy souls slipped and slid on their 
way out to the middle of the river, we expected to see them go down; 
but they proved their ability to fish in those conditions. Such angling 
would be a physical impossibility for any salmon angler accustomed 
only to boatwork, or for any trout angler used only to gentler streams. 
It was the most exciting angling I have ever seen during a life more 
or less passed in wandering. 
Of course in this sort of fishing the shoes are hobnailed heavily. 
Beyond that, the angler does not wear very much of a costume. 
Waders would be out of the question—to be carried down in breast- 
high waders would mean death for any swimmer in that stream. 
