I had just come off a week in Idaho and had experienced less than ideal conditions with run-off like you wouldn't believe on the lakes we tried to fish. I was relieved to come home to what I had hoped would be better fishing conditions. I wasn't even home a day when the phone started to ring about the big brown bite that went off up in the crater. By crater, I am referring to Newberry Crater where East and Paulina Lakes are nestled a couple of miles apart in a drop dead gorgeous volcanic setting. Three big browns in the teens had been caught while I was gone and it played with my head to the point of heading up there immediately.

My good buddy, John Werwie, and his Grandson, Mikey, had just arrived for a week outing to fish around Central Oregon. After a long and fairly unproductive day at Paulina the first day, John was coerced into heading to Crescent for Mike's sake. The brown bite was slow over there but John did put Mike into a couple of 5-7 LB. lakers and then into a nicer 16 LB.+ laker. It was Mikey's biggest mackinaw to date. In the mean time, I was paying my dues at Paulina and finally got out with John Hofferd for an evening at Paulina. We had been talking about fishing together for the last couple of years but the timing was never quite right. We pulled it off this time until John's back flared up. We caught a few smaller browns and called it a night. Next morning I hit East and visited with Ted Neal and Phil Brejle a couple of buddies from Sacramento that I first met at Pend Oreille several years back during our pursuit of the big gerrard rainbows that make that lake so famous.

Around noon, I had decided to have a little lunch and head out of the crater to get my phone messages. After finding out that one of our lakes had become accessible, several of us decided to head over to give it some licks. John and Mikey were right behind me as we pulled into the campground. Phil and Ted were coming in the next morning. The weather, by the way, was going down hill all that afternoon and I had heard that a front was pushing through on Thurs.-Fri. with snow and wind. They were right on this forecast! That first evening was great action but all 11 browns I caught were dinks to around 2.5 LB. Finally, right before dark, I got into a little better hen that went 4.5 LB. John and Mikey got a couple of identical 5 LB. browns to cap their evening. Not a bad start!

Next morning found us clearing ice and snow from our boats and hitting it hard with wind and snow almost non-stop for most of the day. I didn't even get bit until around 9 a.m. and then got into a couple of dinks and one 3 LB. brown. Ted and Phil showed up early that morning and I know they had a 6.5 LB. brown and I think at least a couple of nicer browns in the 3-5 Lb. range, though I don't know what their exact count was. John and Mikey scratched out a few but nothing memorable.

Around 6 p.m., I decided to work another part of the lake that I hadn't spent much time on this trip but have had decent success fishing in the past. I had just changed lures to one of my favorites that I lost to an anchor rope last year at East Lake and then lucked out and retrieved two weeks later. If you want that whole incredible story, go back to my fishing report from 8-13-07 to get all the details of that lucky event. Anyway, I dropped the custom painted rainbow pattern down on the rigger and worked the area. I had just made a turn to follow the depth I wanted and bang, the rod starts jumping. The hen turned out to be 6 LB. and had some really cool red spotting patterns to highlight her colorful body. No sooner had I set back up and the rod goes off again and I have a nice 3 LB. hen that I drop right back in. Looks like a good bite is developing. Five minutes later, a missed strike confirms that I am on it. After working this area over, I made a move and lined up to fish a shelf on the opposite end of the lake. I didn't have the lure down three minutes when the rod bounces once again and I am fast into a little heavier fish. My adrenaline takes over and I am no longer cold but nervously working the brown to get a look at it before I make my commitment to getting the net from the holder. A good look at the hookjaw convinces me that it is in the 6-8 Lb. range even in the low light and definitely worth some photos. After netting, I drop him into the live well for reviving. He and the 6 LB. hen take up a good portion of the live well.

Being by myself and the brutal conditions made it hard to even think about a self portrait. And besides, I had some friends on the lake that would gladly take a couple of photos for me. I ran over to Dink to do a "mini-burn" ( a term we use to show off your trout to your friend. A "hard burn "is showing off your brown exceeding 10 LB.) and get him to get some photos of the 6 and 7 Lb. browns swimming around in my live well. After some decent shots, they both released just fine in the 41 degree water of the lake. The aerator actually gets them back into better shape than just releasing them right after a drawn out fight. Let me advise you to be careful when doing this to make sure that you have and run the aerator and that the surface temps are friendly to the trout's liking 40-55 degrees. You may not want to do this is the middle of summer.

Wanting to get right back after them, I sped back to the area I had just caught the last brown from and dropped the rigger down. Bingo, I'm into another decent brown within minutes. This male brown turned out to be just slightly bigger than the last and probably within 100 feet of where I caught the previous one fifteen minutes ago. The last hour and a half made the trip for me. Nothing else happened the rest of the evening for John or I but having caught browns of 3,6,7 and 7.5 LB. in less than two hours put a grin on my face that didn't go away until I fell asleep that night.

Screamin' Drags,
Rick