KJ's Take on Clay's Rules
- Joe's Salmon Lodge
- Jun 29
- 2 min read
A few nights ago, I was chatting with a gentleman by the name of KJ. He’s been coming to the lodge for a long time.
He even helps us with set up and take down - thank you KJ!
As we were talking, he said to me, “wait a minute”, and ran to his room to grab his laptop.
On his screen, he pulled up an Excel spreadsheet titled “Notes from 2009 Gap Massacre”. The page contained 11 brief points.
These points were a collection of comments Clay Nygard, one of our previous owners, had made during a few hours of fishing with KJ. When KJ heard them, he took a mental note and wrote them down as soon as he got back to the lodge.
Here's that very list:
Hopefully, you don’t mind us sharing them Clay.
When the bite is on like this, really give 'er when you set the hook.
When you set the hook you might want to hang onto the spool.
Keep your rod tip up, it lets the rod help fight the fish.
Keep your line tight, take up the slack.
If your rod starts to straighten out that means she's running back towards you
Bow to the fish when he jumps.
It's hard to tell sometimes when you short guys are bowing.
If he wants to run, let him run. The drag on the reel will take care of it.
“Let go of the bag when netting the fish (if you don't, none of that other s*** matters)”.
If the bite goes soft giving a little nod to Chuck & Uncle Jack
KJ insert: “They were friends of Clay whose ashes were spread at the Gap”.
That’s beautiful.
The fishing was so good today they were jumping in the boat!
Another KJ insert: “Haha, we (Clay, Joe T. and I) had our limits of Coho and were heading back to the lodge for a bowl of soup and a hot dog. A Pink Salmon jumped and landed in our boat. It turns out that we only had 11 in the fish box instead of 12, so that Pink Salmon filled our limits for us”.
Hey, I mean sometimes Mother Nature just knows.
Tightlines,
JSL
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