Puyallup

In this heat the Puke-It-All-Up and Carbon are flowing like chocolate milk; I drive over them every morning on my way to work.

Seems a tad early for the pinks to be all the way into the river; I'm anxious to hear if guys are getting them yet.
 
In this heat the Puke-It-All-Up and Carbon are flowing like chocolate milk; I drive over them every morning on my way to work.

Seems a tad early for the pinks to be all the way into the river; I'm anxious to hear if guys are getting them yet.
I am told they are definitely in the river, though I dont fish the river. Plenty of them out front staging.
 
I was in that line from 5am till 11ish. It was surprisingly well behaved and I didnt really see too much snagging going on in my section. Tons of pinks in the river, i couldnt keep them off, most in the mouth. Saw at least 10 kings caught as well. We caught 2 silvers and one king and I had another king on and jumping that probably was upper teens. The meat on the silvers was RED! I brought the fly rod but when we showed up in the dark the line pretty much looked like the pic above, so that stayed in the bushes the whole time. Overall an enjoyable time considering the circumstances.
 
So what happens if one of the plunkers hooks up and the fish makes a hard run downstream? Everybody ducks?
 
So what happens if one of the plunkers hooks up and the fish makes a hard run downstream? Everybody ducks?
Back in the day the folks around you would reel in, and it was your responsibility to have enough stick to keep it in front of you. Sounds from the comment above people were pretty good.
 
I was in that line from 5am till 11ish. It was surprisingly well behaved and I didnt really see too much snagging going on in my section. Tons of pinks in the river, i couldnt keep them off, most in the mouth. Saw at least 10 kings caught as well. We caught 2 silvers and one king and I had another king on and jumping that probably was upper teens. The meat on the silvers was RED! I brought the fly rod but when we showed up in the dark the line pretty much looked like the pic above, so that stayed in the bushes the whole time. Overall an enjoyable time considering the circumstances.

Good job getting out. That was my home river. Caught my first steelhead there 56 years ago.
You obviously have much more patience then I do. Just couldn't do it myself as no salmon is worth that much to me.
SF
 
Certain things, like opening day of lowland lakes, or standing in that line, are a fun option. I can recall having to watch from the sidelines before I was allowed to participate. Seemed like a right of passage for us kids. I wouldn't choose to do it now, but like opening day, if I was there I'd take the kids to the carnival.
 
I have no personal info but I have a work friend who has had great success on the carbon river and he seems to do well every year. He’s a gear guy. Salmon that high are just catches for the smokers he says. The Carbon river was gold panned by my dad and my uncle back in the 60’s. They never got much but from what I was told by them some gold was found in that river.
 
I have no personal info but I have a work friend who has had great success on the carbon river and he seems to do well every year. He’s a gear guy. Salmon that high are just catches for the smokers he says. The Carbon river was gold panned by my dad and my uncle back in the 60’s. They never got much but from what I was told by them some gold was found in that river.
I used to fish the Carbon a lot in the mid to late 90’s. Timing was everything of course but when they were in we caught a lot of little cookie cutter cohos drifting eggs on a light spin rod.

One day I saw a guy doing really well with a fly rod, he seemed to be swinging small comets. I was new-ish to flyfishing back then and after that I tried really hard to get them on flies instead of bait. But I just couldn’t unlock the technique and ended up moving on to other fisheries.

I’ve always meant to go back and try it again and maybe I will. But I guess you have to buy an City of Orting parking permit now to get near the river, so we’ll see.
 
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