We arrived at the Stewart around 7 AM and the lot already had a couple of cars. We headed down to the river and talked to one fisherman who said he had spotted a couple of fish. We were a little more enthused knowing that there were some fish in the river. The river was very low and a lot of the good pools Jerry has fished two weeks earlier were now 2-3 feet deep. We decided we would head upriver until we came across a promising looking stretch. We hiked upriver further then we had ever gone before and did not find any fish. Just about ready to give up and head further up the shore in search of a river with some water, I spotted a fish in the bottom of a pool. I wasn't sure if it was a fish at first, but I finally saw its tail move from side to side. I took a couple of drifts and the fish spooked downriver. I headed downriver to see what out to be a beat up steelhead that had seen better days. It was a large male close to 29 inches. I took a quick picture and let him go. I headed upriver to see if Belisle had spotted any fish. He hadn't seen any, but we decided to keep heading upriver to see if we could find the barrier falls. We came across another fisherman who said he had spotted a couple of steelhead, but they had spooked after a couple of casts. We finally made it up near the falls where I spotted a fish. It was holding it the tailend of a small pool, but spooked as we approached it.. I decided to head downriver one more pool where I finally spotted it, settled down on the very bottom of the pool. I drifted my fly through the pool for a while before it finally took my fly. It bolted downriver through a rapids before I was finally able to get it up to shore. I released the fish can came back up river near the falls. There was another fish holding in a riffle and it spooked as soon as I pointed it out. It stopped in the bottom of the next pool and Belisle decided to try to fish for it. I continued upriver and was surprised to find 3-4 fish holding in the next pool. They would move every time you drifted near them, so I began changing flies to see if I could find something that they would take. After unsuccessfully hooking up with any of the fishing and again spooking them off, we decided to switch spots. I headed back down to the lower pool where I spotted another fish and managed to hook up with it after a couple of casts. The fish bolted upriver and I chased after it. I managed to turn the fish around and it took a couple of jumps as it went back downriver. Right before the faster riffle below, the fish ran out of energy and I got it into the shallower water. It was another male steelhead close to 20 inches. For such a small fish it put up a big fight. We took a quick picture and let him go back into the pool.

We continued working the pool and managed to hook into some more fish, but only managed to have the flies pull out or the line break. There was one large fish we were after and he seemed to be the smartest one in the pool. We finally managed to spook him and he took off up to the pool right below the falls. The water was flowing pretty good through the pool, so we loaded up on the split shot and began drifting the pool. It wasn't long before I hooked the monster, but he came up foul hooked. It shot downriver and I broke him off. I continued working the pool figuring there had to be a couple more fish. A while later my rod jerked down and I was hooked up again. This fish fought like crazy and I could tell it was a good fish. After taking me downriver through three pools I finally landed it. It was another male steelhead close to 28 inches.

We let him go and continued to work the top couple of pools. Eventually the fish all seemed to dissapear and we didn't manage any more hookups. We decided to head back downriver and to see if we could find any more fish in the deeper pools. We came to one pool that you could just barely make out the bottom. There were a couple of fish holding right in the head of the pool and one monster that was swimming back and forth. We drifted our flies through the pool without any hookups. We would occasionally see fish, but they didn't seem interested in taking our flies. The monster finally worked its way into the tail of the pool and I managed to hook up. The fish was huge, definitely the largest steelhead I have hooked on the North Shore. It took off downriver and I was right behind it. I managed to turn its head a couple of times and quickly tired it out. We didn't have the net with us, so I tried to beach up in the shallower water. Right when Belisle got downstream to try to tail it, it started thrashing and the line broke. he made a grab for it, but it took off downstream. We followed it downstream, but it disappeared in a deeper pool under a log jam. We decided to head back to the car for some food and on the way back I spotted a fish holding up against a ledge. I throught it was a sucker at first, but I hooked it and when it took off downstream I realized it was a looper. After a short fight I landed the fish, a 25 inch hen.

We headed back up river to a pool we had spotted some fish in earlier and were pleasantly surprised to find it was holding fish. The pool was full of suckers with a couple of steelhead mixed in. After we eached hooked a bunch of suckers I finally hooked into a larger fish. It swam up and down the pool before finally heading upriver. It went up through the rapids and I could see that is was a pretty good fish. I got it turned downriver and managed to coax it into the net. It was another pretty male close to 24 inches.

It was just a couple of casts later when Belisle hooked into a good fish. It took off downstream and I ran over with the net. He managed to get it into the shallow water and I got the net under it. It was another nice steelhead close to 24 inches.

We continued working the pool, but only managed one more foul-hooked fish and a lot more suckers. We decided to call it a day after working our way back downriver and not finding any more fish. It was nice to find so many wild fish in the river, we probably spotted between 20-25 wild steelhead. There were a lot of 1 year old fish, in the 14-16 inch range, which should hopefully lead to better runs in future years. We didn't find any fish on the gravel and only spotted one pair together. The water temperature was around 48 degrees, with the water level extremely low. Many of the usual holes weren't deep enough to hold fish. Any hole that was deep enough that you couldn't see the bottom seemed to hold a fish or two. The best flies were dark wooly buggers and San Juan worms. The brighter colored flies seemed to spook the fish with the low water conditions.