hkriflenut and I got together to do some fishing today, and we had a blast. I took my son, and he got a bit burnt, but still had fun. Caught some bass, and hk landed about a 3' sturgeon. Under the legal limit, so he went back. Later he hooked into a big, big, big (we assume) sturgeon, somewhere probably in the 8-10' range. Not something that was going to come off the bottom, at least with 6lb test line on a lightweight pole, and he would have been larger than legal size anyway. He moved around a few feet down in the hole he was laying in, but wasn't going to come up to play.

I'm sure hk will be along with pics of his small sturgeon. All in all a great day.

Sounds like you guys had a great time. I can only imagine what is like to hook a sturgeon. We have some decent catfish here but nothing like that.

Sturgeon get to 8-10'?

i am VERY jealous!

i'm glad to hear ya'll had a good time. i bet your son will remember that for a long time.

Pepper over-estimated a little the length of my first fish - it was closer to 2 feet in length than 3, but it did put up a heck of a fight on my lil trout rod - 7 foot ultra light using just 6lb test line, a #6 hook, and a night crawler.

Here's the fish:



I couldn't get a better shot for 2 reasons: 1.) I forgot to take the good camera w/ me on the trip. 2.) it is illegal to remove a sturgeon not of legal-keeper length from the water. They must be released unharmed without removal from the water.

It was a blast though. Not sure how well my rod is going to hold up anymore though - I hooked the big mofo on the same outfit, and for the half-hour we had the damn fish hooked, the rod spent most of it's time bent into a solid "C" shape. Wind was whistling through the line playing us an old Hank Williams song I'm afraid the poor lil trout rod might've developed stress fractures from over-exerting itself, so I'm gonna hafta purchase a backup of the same type/size/rating... the cool thing - it's an Okuma. Very well built, and very inexpensive compared to other brands. The drag on my reel got a workout too. Every time we'd start pulling the big fish up off the bottom a little, he'd shake his head as if to say "No." and head right back the fuzz for the bottom, then swim in a circle around his little hole.

The good news through all this hilarity - we know exactly where we're going to start fishing on Saturday - Pepper, myself, and another former coworker of ours are going back out, same river, only this time all armed with sturgeon-class gear. I'd like to hook the big fuzzer again and actually have a shot at landing him.

And Noneya - sturgeon in these parts have been known to grow to over 16 feet in length...Prehistoric, long lived motherfuzzers. There's fish in the rivers around here older than the oldest humans walking around.

At Bonneville Dam on the Columbia, they had one in a pond that was 12' long, before some idiots stole it. I've heard they have another one stashed somewhere, that's much, much larger, somewhere in the 18-20' range. One of those would be a record fish, and illegal to harvest.

yeah, especially considering the slot-limit is 42-60 inches in most water, and something like 48-60 on the Columbia...18 foot long fish would definately be a no-no to keep...

not to take this off topic... but... i've been watching the bonneville fish cam and have seen some HUGE salmon and steelhead going through. the silver's seem to be higher in number than usual too.

congrats on the fishing... drano and underwood on the WA side are on fire...

I did not know they got that large.

What the heck are you going to do with a 12' long fish.

That's a couple hundred pounds of fish steaks, smoked sturgeon, oh yeah. Thinking about it, that 12' fish is probably well over 50 years old.

You have to love Sturgeon. I have only caught 2 in my lifetime, but then again I am not an avid fisherman.

Anytime spent on the water with kids is good time. It sounds like you guys had a blast!

I had no idea that the fossil looking fish got so big and so old. very educational, thanks!

Good luck this weekend with the big boys, send pictures!!!

I've got a feeling that 12+ feet of sturgeon is more than a couple hundred pounds - think about it - cows/bulls make it over a thousand pounds easily, and they're nowhere near the same size as a 12 foot long sturgeon...I'mma say a 12 footer is probably easily a thousand, and probably more.