Fish that have taken you the most work to land...

[MichaelAngelo]

Inspired by tangledline's recent adventure, share the stories behind the fish that took you the most work to land!

I'll start:




Just this May, I had my first experience fishing for steelhead. I was armed with my leaky garage sale rubber boots and jeans!

Of course I hook into a colourful male that decided to ride the current downstream, so I shouted to my friend that I was going with the fish. 15 minutes later, I come back looking like the above picture...

The fish had wrapped itself around the line and wedged itself between 2 rocks in 3 feet of water. He wasn't showing any signs of wanting to come out on his own. So I went in after 'em , grabbed him by the tail, and yanked him out. He was quite snugly stuck between those two rocks!

Best part is, I didn't even USE the net... I had to carry it in my mouth the whole way! I don't do this anymore, because a net in the mouth during a fall would break all teeth!

After all this abuse of the myself and the fish (and grabbing him by the gills), I decided to try tasting steelhead for dinner.