96 



THE OREGON SPORTSMAN 



AFTER STEELHEADS IN THE ROGUE 



Once He Feels the Sting of Your Hook, the Steelhead is a 



Wild, Reckless Fighter; Seven Pounds of Quivering, 



Angry, Stubborn Fish is Contesting With 



You His Right to Live 



By 

 BLAINE HALLOCK 



RECALL having read in one of Hemw Van 

 Dyke's exquisite little fishing stories a line 

 which he modestly credits to our long-deceased 

 and much-respected brother, Ike Walton, but 

 which I truly suspect originated in his own 

 fertile brain. Musing on the excellence of a 

 luscious wild strawberry which he finds ripening- 

 on a sunny bank, he volunteers that "doubtless 

 God could have made a better berry — but doubtless God never 

 did." 



And now, on this particular spring morning, when the call 

 to go "a-fishing" is strong, the thought comes to me that doubt- 

 less God could have made a finer trout than the steelhead, but 

 doubtless He never did. 



I think it will be admitted by all who have taken steelhead 

 (salmo gairdneri) trout on light tackle that they are easily mas- 

 ters of their kind. The rainbow, especially of a pound and a half 

 or two pounds weight, is a worthy adversary. He can rush and 

 leap and sulk with a style all. his own, and he is game, every 

 inch, from the tip of his stub nose to the end of his square tail. 

 A big cut-throat in small water is worthy of your best efforts. 

 Even the cannibalistic Dolly Varden, with his slower though more 

 ponderous surges, will come in for his share of credit as a game 

 fish. 



But to the steelhead, the powerful, lithe, quivering steelhead 

 of the Rogue river, belongs the title of king. 



I refer to the Rogue river steelheads because to me they 

 typify the perfect trout. Perhaps this is purely imaginary. It is 

 possible, and for that matter quite probable, that the fish of the 



