Willamette River Sturgeon

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Weather: Rain, Rain, and more Rain, 50's

Water Temp: 48 degrees

Who Went: Hunt, Me

Cari and I had the pleasure of going on a 4 day vacation to Portland, Oregon to stay with our friends, Justin and Stephanie Hunt. We had an unbelievable time while we were there, as it seemed like the good times never stopped. We were going non stop from early morning til midnight everyday trying to fit in as much as we could! One of the days the girls decided to pamper themselves with facials and shopping. This was Hunt and my chance to get in a day of fishing! We woke up and headed towards the Willamette River! The Willamette River is huge, and it runs right through Portland and then meets up with the Columbia River. We launched Hunt's boat literally from downtown. It rained on us all day and this did not help our chances as we planned to bass fish! We tried all morning without a bite. Wondering what we could do to pull something out of this river we saw some guys fishing from the docks. We headed over to see what they were fishing for. They surprised us when they told us Sturgeon! The funny part of the story is that the guy talked with a lisp and continued to tell us that Sturgeon were a dinathor fith over and over! It took some restraint not to laugh and it soon became one of the jokes of the trip! Along with the Mandingo from Tillamook (inside joke)! The guy went on to tell us that he gets bites on average every 20 minutes. That's all it took for us! We were in! Now all we needed was some bait, as they use dead fish or squid to entice these ancient things. We tried to buy some from the guys at the dock, but they were not interested. We then went to some high class seafood restaurant right on the river to see if they would sell us any raw fish! This did not go over to well and we were basically told "this is a restaurant, not a bait shop!" As a last resort we pulled up next to a guided boat just as they were pulling anchor to leave and asked them if they had any bait left they would sell to us. He started throwing coolers full of bait at us! He told us we didn't owe him a thing, but we gave him a 10 spot anyway. It was probably around 30 dollars in bait! Now it was on! We found 75 feet of water just as the guide had informed us to do and then anchored up! We put on a 2 ounce sinker and an octopus hook and loaded it with squid and sardines! Within 3 minutes Hunt had a Sturgeon on! It was quite the fight and I was starting to wonder if our poles were going to hold up against the bend it was giving! After a long fight we had landed our first Sturgeon of our lives! It must have been over 3 feet long and it weighed 10 pounds!
We were pretty pumped to say the least, and couldn't wait to get back in the water to catch another one. No more than 10 minutes later Hunt was on again with another one. This one ended up being the smallest of the trip weighing in at only 5 pounds. Now I was starting to get jealous, as I really wanted to catch one of these prehistoric dinathor fiths! Just as I was starting to get impatient I finally had a Sturgeon on! It fought me just like a 20 pound catfish would fight, and I just hoped that my under powered 10 pound test would be able to haul this beast in from 85 feet down up to the boat! It ran on me several times before it tired out and I was able to get it to the boat. It had to be close to 4 feet long and weighed 11 lbs!
Soon after I was reeling in to do a bait check and told Hunt, I think I might have something on. I pulled in this little catfish that looked just like the bullheads I catch back home in Utah Lake!

We could have stayed and fished for them all night, but the girls probably would have killed us! We headed for the docks and picked the girls up from downtown. We cruised in the boat and did some sight seeing. It is an unbelievable river and an unreal experience I will never forget!