With the Redmond Show behind me and after getting caught up on some business items, I took my old buddy Steve Kelly to LBC for our first outing on the year up the Metolius Arm. I had caught a few reports from friends that smaller bulls were the majority of the catches but I did get a good report from Dave Lemke the prior week.

Dave got into a total of 10 bulls off the riggers working 50 feet of water with herring and Lyman's. The area up from the island to around Perry South was the magic stretch of water.

The best bull of the early season that I personally heard about was Eric Cole's 12.6 LB. hawg that came on the factory version of his famous Dad's ( Alan Cole) original 7" A/C plug in the slvr/blk pattern. As he laid it out to me, he was just around the corner up the arm just minutes after getting on the lake. He noticed a small bunch of kokes spraying the surface and turned out to make a pass through them. Right as he went through, the rod is over hard and he is fast into a trophy bull. Congrats man!! He is a little lucky....just like his Dad.

Steve and I worked the island area first with no luck and then moved over to work "Slim Shady," one of Kelly's nicknames for a cove he caught his best bull at 12.5 LB., a few years back. It also just happens to be the area the I took my personal best bull of 15.5 LB. off the end point about 3 years back with "Big Fish" Billy Amerongen.

Unfortunately for us, the spot did not hold any big bulls, just a 3 LB. hen from the end of the run. Near the end of the day, Steve did scratch up a respectable 4 LB. beautiful, iridescent young hen but both photos were blurred as the anxious fish wouldn't stay still. The final highlight of our day was this smaller 17-18 in. brown that Steve banged off a small inner point just around from "Slim Shady." The little bugger hit a 5" Lyman in about 12 feet of water and is the first brown trout I have ever put in the boat up in the Metolius Arm.

It wasn't a day to brag about but we ended up with 4 bulls to 4 LB. and the smaller brown. I also took 1 koke jigging at 85 feet while working for bulls near Perry South. Back at the ramp, the creel census gal from ODFW told me that just the day before, she did measure a 13 LB.+ bull that was over 30 in. and an 11 LB. fish back at the opening. So far, I have not heard about very many of the bigger bulls showing up yet. The data on the spawning redds and overall creel census for last year were both down considerably. Seems like we might be in a rebuilding phase for the larger adults over the next few years....time will tell!

Tight lines,
Rick