ADX Goes South | Salmon Fishing Short Film

For generations, salmon have been one of the most respected fish in the Pacific Northwest. Not because they're easy, but because they're earned. They make you work for it. They make you learn. And if you want to be successful year after year, you don't just fish for salmon. You become a student of them. Salmon are built for a brutal life. They're born in fresh water. They disappear into the ocean for years. and then they return home through predators and everything stacked against them. That's why people fall in love with these fish, because nothing about them is handed to you. Every fish has a story. And for the last 30 plus years, we have lived that story. We have built our entire lives around salmon, not for attention, but because we just can't stop. Salmon fishing isn't something we do, it's truly who we are. but this time we're taking everything we know and we're stripping it down to the rawest version of the sport no home water no confidence spots no history just a brand new river tough conditions and four days to figure it out this is not a guided trip this is not a guarantee this is not a highlight reel this is a problem-solving mission with some of the best salmon minds in the Pacific Northwest this is about why we still chase salmon after three plus decades and why this sport deserves to be passed down to a new generation because somewhere out there right now a salmon is swimming up river and we have four days to find it so get ready this is salmon fishing at its purest where skill gets tested and passion gets proven welcome to no home water a four day salmon adventure We've done the steelhead thing down here a couple times. We've always wanted to come down here and chase these salmon, so here we are, southern Oregon, except this time it's salmon edition. So I was super amped for this trip. Like, I had been prepping a couple weeks now, just kind of, like, scheming in my brain, like, what's going to happen? Because I've read a lot of good things about these rivers, and I was just super stoked. First look at the old river, smells like fish. honestly the river was a little smaller than what i expected we're faced with low clear cold water and all my experience you know it can be really tough fishing and it's not usually the best fishing we are going to have to do one of two things we are going to have to cover a lot of water or get extremely lucky and run into fresh fish the challenges you face fishing on familiar water is just you never know what is going to work you're starting from scratch you don't know anything you don't know how deep you want to go what size bait you need to use what kind of bait you need to use when you're put outside your element and all of a sudden you have to figure something else out it really challenges you and it forces you to learn new things learn new techniques Here we go rowing down this mighty river. Mighty small. I've never been down in the southern Oregon area to fish so this trip was really special to me that you know I was gonna get to go out with my buddies and go see new water. Hey look at these fish coming up right here. Hey look at them all. Oh there they go again more of them right here under us look at the boils. We see some fish we actually did see a bright one and you know that the anxiety and motivation was high like we were we thought we were gonna smash them and then we went literally hole to hole to hole I think I had two bites all day one I know I that I felt pretty confident was a salmon I just missed the fish 100% I mean the other one who knows because it was on a bead we were really hoping that we you know catch a couple you know this first day is supposed to be a scouting mission but we all knew that we were really hoping to catch a few so we're getting a little nervous so this day goes by and it goes by faster than anticipated you know we launched late so we didn't have a lot of time so we had to kind of push fast through the river we chose to do a longer float because we wanted to lay eyes on the entire lower stretches of the river i don't think it was a bad idea i just don't think there was very many fish around she flew over yesterday she said those big high tides push the sand in the mouth of this thing so he doesn't think that there's fish probably coming up now with that sand you know the way it is a buddy of mine and dave's was down here and he tells us that he ran into the fish biologist who had done the survey on the river and is what they found out is the sandbars completely blocking the river off that means no new fish are coming through and so whatever was in there was probably what our opportunity was going to be and that was a little a little scary for us so it was time to come up with a plan B so every night when we kind of get into the house or get to wherever we're at we start planning like where we're going to go the place that we should probably start is just below the first shoot not just below but you got to row down a little ways i think day two is about to be a banger dude this is my sleep cozy it's bluetooth sleep cozy i can hear and then this is our blocker right here it's our blocker I wish this was bigger all right guys we'll see you tomorrow so we're on to day two and day two means we've got to catch some fish so we're fishing a new river never fished it before none of us have and we're launching in the dark you got to remember you know we haven't rode this river before we don't know what obstructions what shoots do you go right you go left on a braid are there rocks. We knew this river is not a real crazy river, but it is kind of nuts floating something in the dark that you've never seen before. There's a tree down, there's a tree down. Everyone stop, everyone stop. Okay, stop. Get out, get out, get out, get out, get out. Bail, bail, bail. Yeah, it looked, it looked loggy down there, but it looks, it does look open. Like, I don't think we're pulling it back up, so let's go. Catch a salmon on any one of these. Shrimp. There we go. Works back home. See if it works here. So we get down to the river and we kind of come across our first hole that looks pretty good. Nick and I stayed there. Marlin, Cam, and Jason headed down to another hole. So when we rolled up into this spot, it just screamed Chinook salmon to me. Within about five minutes of kind of like checking out there, I looked down in front of the boat and I see like three salmon swim right by the front of the boat. And I'm like, okay, we needed to find fish to catch fish. And I think we've got some sitting in front. Oh yeah. Cam's on baby. Finally. Oh gosh. Oh, he is just going now. He is going, he's going. And I got a little too much meat on that light leader. Good job, dude. That's a quality fish. Yeah. Oh my God. There he just went. Pulled right out. Hooked him. We pull in, they say they're 0 for 3. You know, I think Marlin had hooked two and Cameron had hooked a really nice one and lost it. I was like, oh hell yeah, this is what I'm looking for. There's somebody. Smoked that time. You gonna land this one? He's got one on, boys. He might land this one. No! What the hell? 0 for 4? And then Cameron casts back in about five minutes later and hooks another one. That's fish. That's fish. Got him. Damn it. I mean, he is flat up kicking our ass, but... Yep, yep, I got him. Oh! Are you kidding me? he has landed zero we can't get him the boat i think we hooked like four or five fish so at this point he's zero for five and i don't know about this legend business anymore but we'll see be a legend baby i want this fish for you guys so bad oh my god it's a nice one man third time's a charm baby there it is guys beautiful fish cameron was roping i mean for for what we have seen on this trip Cameron was what I would consider roping him and he was handing it to all of us That's a bigger fish. I mean I am putting everything I want on him with a little thumb. Midday break and we're just trying to wait for the hole to rest but look this is this is guide mode right here guys We want to catch you guys a fish. Jason's got four different concoctions going here We're going to give them four different flavors because we think they might be triggering to one of them literally four different baits and four different chemicals so hopefully one of them makes makes their ticker go boom when i went to go real i mean it was like i hooked ran into him i miss one and i'm like okay i was figuring out you know i'm like i'm gonna catch one i uh throw it out there and i let it swing down this the inside a little bit of everybody and it comes through there and just buries and i stuck that thing fish on baby there he is yep yeah brother come on ready oh he swam in the net he just swam right you like that nice nice nice fish there it is buddy i'm on the board on the board bro with sea lice i got sea lice on my sea lice guys he just showed up sweet thank you sweetie Boy! Way down there. That was way down there. Across the hole. There's my first Southern Oregon. That's your first one! Wow! Never been down here. Wow! That's what you want right there from an addicted hook. That was not coming off ever. First Southern Oregon Chinook Salmon. Just an absolute specimen at that. Okay, so the consensus was we should try a bigger jig. So I'm going to try this big jig. I'm going to give it little twiddle and see what happens hey that's a fish what was the right one hey you're wrapped on your tip bro give me your tip give me your tip i'm not i'm derapped i'm deep wrapped i'm derapped literally almost lost it stay down there now get on down here stay down there okay you ready bud one night for southern oregon salmon ever guys you know what's so awesome about this guys is this is why i wanted to come down here and bring these guys down here because it's It's like, you know, some of the best salmon fishermen I know, and you guys have never fished any of these rivers, and it's crazy to me. That's our problem. I mean, I never probably leave my home river. I'm fishing every day, and I just don't get the time to ever. When we were coming down before any of it today, we were coming down, and we were like, it is kind of weird to row a different river in the dark. I go, I kind of understand why all these guys that come onto our river have spotlights and stuff, you know. That is a beauty. Oh, look at that. A sea lice just popped off of him. I saw that. Good job, dude. Terrible idea. Oh, almost terrible idea. Oh, if you can touch it, you can catch it, man. We knew we had a long, long journey out of here. I think they said it was something like eight or nine miles overall, and I think we had maybe floated a mile or so, I would guess, overall. And then I remember at one point, they're like 50 yards below us, maybe 100 yards. they're like hey back there by that rock there's a bunch of chromers what is going on dude i told you the whole water lit up you could tell it was a lot more than a couple fish you know it was like actually creating like a curling wave from these fish swimming in shallow water we ended up sitting there for probably 20 minutes in that spot and meanwhile Marlon Jason and Cameron just kept rowing. We have been forward stroking for at least six miles. That's just what you gotta do sometimes to catch these slimy salmon. And pretty soon I'm like dude we should probably get going it's 3:30. I'm like I'm gonna try to pull up Google Maps and I pull up Google Maps I'm like oh my god. We're probably a solid three miles still to go and it's almost dark. So we decide to all right, we're no more fishing. And I even rowed a little bit. Believe it or not, guys, there is footage of it. I actually got on there and rowed, so. I can officially say I rowed this river. We ended up coming around the corner right before dark, and there they were. They made it, we made it, and had a hell of a day. All right, guys, well, we weren't recording the first part. We missed a little bit of it, but this is our first trip with Jason, and you got to have thick skin to hang out with him. and so we called him and left Dave's phone on and started telling stories about the stuff that he's done so we were gonna call and leave the phone on again and just start talking about his body nobody can fill out the back of a pair of waders like Jason can go go right now i don't think you ever noticed but jason's got a real apple bottom it's what you call it that ass it's like it's unbelievable dude it looks like a hot chick with a pair of gas jeans on does big dave know that his phone is on again in his pocket oh it is what i don't know where this whole apple bottom thing is coming from but i mean big dave's big dave so i don't know I think it's hilarious dude called Jason apple bottom dude so watching in the dark on day three We had a mission and we knew exactly what we wanted to do. It's kind of a workout. It's kind of a workout early in the morning if you just resist it and get that shoulder pump so you don't have to beat your friends up in the boat. Or if you do, you're already warmed up, knock them out. Well, I was excited for today because I got to fish with you guys and I haven't gotten to do that in a long time. It just never works out to where we can get the same boat together, so. So I was excited about that today and I was excited because we found a stacker hole and hopefully the morning's gonna be good. All right, good morning. It's day three, and we're set up and ready to fish. Cam and Jason are gonna sit in the upper hole that we saw yesterday that looked really good, and then me, Marlin, and Dave are gonna be down here where we caught the fish yesterday. We're gonna just try to catch a few more fish. We're gonna try to get Marlin on the board early. Well, we're going into day three, guys, and I'm fishless. I'm really just fingers crossed that I'm gonna get one today, fingers crossed. So right when we anchored up, we saw a lot of fish milling about, you know, it was still only about a half an hour of light, kind of cloud cover. And when you're trying to like approach those conditions, you know, you're using your eyes. You're like, you're like sight fishing these Chinook up. Shit. Oh, that was. I was looking back at you, dude. I can see a salmon right in front of me here. Oh yeah. You're going still towards them right there. There's fish underneath you. Come on. Look at them all. I need to just deepen up just a little bit. There's still fish underneath, yeah. There's still fish there, we need to get down and stay straight underneath the bobber because we noticed a lot of our baits were getting kicked out in front of our bobbers so we're like okay what can we do to to keep that bait more vertical and i threw a bait weight on and it didn't take long oh that was a fish that was fish 100% dude that was a fish you saw that right Sean oh got him you keep that head down pretty much you got him right in the nose i don't feel like i have him hooked that well though i can see it's in the nose of his mouth Scuzzbucket oh god it's her hand to it looks like a buck oh dude that fish wasn't going anywhere look at that hook pretty there she is good looking fish cool spotting on its forehead look at that bunch in there again oh there's a bunch in there we almost just doubled whoa oh yeah loser another while there he goes oh my god dude that's a chroma buddy that's a dying dude you've got you've got him buddy oh my god twitcher he likes all the fish was like miles and miles and miles from the ocean yeah and it was yeah see-through fins it was a freshie it was very apparent when we pulled into this hole and fished it for like two hours that it wasn't the same hole and it was not the same day no we do have a weather change that happened today too so some little different stuff going on we had a little weather change we got some clouds in the sky and it was i'm talking when i say it was windy guys it was windy it was probably blowing 35 to 40 miles an hour on the headlands this morning you know in our local rivers that happens a lot like well is what happens to us on our local rivers is the fish will just shut off pre-storm a lot of times they either bite really good or they bite terrible was it recording no you're dead we got none of that on camera well we've been fishing this hole for like two and a half hours hey we were literally leaving i was literally we were leaving and then of course and that happens all the time to us you got to leave and you hook one you just make the monster a little longer i'm walking down to the boat my bobber goes down i set the hook and it was huge it never failed you never lose them on jigs that's the thing we just said that dude i don't know he Pulled across he was right here in the soft water and it was a huge fish guys He hooked it and it instantly went up river didn't even know it Yeah you thought you were snagged for a second I thought I was snagged. Honestly big one. It was huge 10 more casts guys 10 more All right 10 more casts 10 more and we're gone fish fish fish Good job Dave Good job, buddy. It's a bright one, too Right one. Good job, dude Oh, oh your leader just broke off oh thank god that swivel broke that's pretty crazy though it's gone why is your weight tied on the bottom yeah why do you have your weight I don't have been a miscalculation brother, I love about Dave, all right we're getting to we call this the land of pain, pain for the fish but it might have been pain for the boys but i don't see them, we were supposed to meet them here so one of two things happened, they either cracked them and are like looking for something different because they got bored or they're i don't know what do you think Chase i don't know it could go either way they could have they could have gotten him in here they could not have gotten him in here it's hard telling not knowing about right where we were yesterday yep so we catch up to the boys and honestly neither boat was kind of finding success after we after at least we left our first spot because i mean we we found we found a couple fish you know so we finally get down to a hole that has some fish and my cluster goes through that I'm fishing a little B cluster and it just goes like this and I'm like what was it so then I go back through same thing same spot except this time it goes under for just a sec and then pops right back up and I'm like what in the heck well then Jason's right behind me with a jig rod and his bobber goes right into the same slot drains oh he did it come on Jay on the pin Jay take your time Jason and I'm like dude this has just been my luck this freaking trip oh that's a brand new I haven't caught a fish on the panel one too and i put a jig on at this point i'm like you know what screw that i'm putting a jig on too now it goes dink dink drains i'm like finally dude i set the hook got him got him got him got him and it's like 14 inches this represents marlin's trip to southern oregon you guys does it look big if I do this? That is Marlin's Southern Oregon in a nutshell. See you buddy. Got him. That's a fish. Oh yeah. He's on the inside right here. Oh it feels like a good one. Look at that. Look at the arc. Look at the arc. Dude he's heavy. He's huge. 265 pounds. Oh it is a nice one. It is a really nice one. Right there, right there. Yeah it's a really nice one. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Alright buddy, be good now you hear? Baby let's go! This is what it's all about guys. Some days you just come out here and you grind and you grind and you grind and one or two fish make your entire day. It's not always about killing fish or catching 50. It's about it coming out here and having fun with your buddies. getting to spend time as a group we we rarely get to do that so it's real special for us I mean every fish every trip it's just amazing so we end up you know looking at the clock and realizing okay we still have you know a mile and a half almost two miles to row out so we're like all right if we're gonna fish this other spot we got to go like right now Look at that! There it is bud! That was a freaking curveball! There we go. I'm usually not a big fan of white chocolate, but white chocolates are pretty good. That's pretty real. Pretty good. Oh boy, we're going the distance. No way! So really guys, day three is a wrap and, you know, when we rode down the river we saw some fish kind of moving in, but I feel like we ran into more fish today that just didn't want to bite. But we have a significant weather change tonight and we don't really know what we're going to do tomorrow. We're going to talk about it tonight. So I don't know if we're going to fish same waters and just fish it differently or maybe make a move but we got like an inch of rain coming tonight so it's either gonna be boom or bust. I think tomorrow's gonna be sick. You think it's gonna do it? I think it's gonna do it. Well guys it's the last day and we're planning on getting up at about 4 30 this morning. Well at about 3 30 this morning I woke up to the craziest rainstorm wind. It was pounding on the window. At that point I was kind of like Are we even going to be able to fish this fourth day of the rain i never liked the rain till i walked through it with you that's a great song uh that was Blind Melon and only melons for those of you that know i'm just not really good at singing put the boats in you know weather actually let up a little bit and Jason and I were like hey let's run up to the top of this hole real quick and see see if there's any fish there's one finning right there old one come on baby hi little birdie are you gonna find me some fish you're gonna be a good little birdie show me some fishies on here okay ready oh my god there's one thank you little bird it's not real deep in there though no no it's only it's not real six seven feet yeah okay yeah there's one there's one there's one yeah yeah Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh look at that one on the bottom right? Yeah, and behind him and behind him. Oh, look at that guy Look at those guys. There's a few fish in here. Thanks a little birdie. We'll see in a little bit. Hey boys My little homie birdie said there's some fish up there little birdie told me there's fish No, we didn't even fish it just cuz didn't know what you wanted to do You get down into the holes and I'm pretty excited like there's a lot of fish There's a lot more than I thought was gonna be down here. So I'm thinking okay, we're definitely I'm gonna catch him today. What is the layout in here, the hole look like? Deeper down there, I definitely saw him on this inside, but I don't know if they're gonna be there anymore. I saw some on that seam too, in front of the, where it's turning around, and there's that boil. Well, that's it. That's it. Where are my lines going in the water, right in front of you, Marlon. Oh my God, he's literally- He's under your boat almost. He swam under my line, where my line is going right towards you. Like, dude, this line right here is where my bobber is. That line down is where they're all. In one roll, the second I go, right where you cast it. So they're, I mean, they're all there. Hey, that's a fish. Nah. Nah. Oh, I don't know, though. Look at that. Had tuna and everything on there. Yeah, that was probably. I had eggs, tuna, everything. Shrimp. And these fish just won't go. Like, we don't know if they're stale or if the water's too clear or what, but we go at them for about an hour and a half, and these fish are just not cooperating. This place, this rain that's coming here in a few days, we're probably gonna have some pretty decent fish in here. They're moving, they came up in here, but they're not playing. You get down to what's the last hole, and we all just basically start fishing. Dave, Dave, Dave, oh, that's a fish, that's a fish. Got him, got him, got him. There's a little glimmer of hope, because Big Dave hooks one. Rolled out, guys, it rolled out, like we'd seen a lot on this trip. He didn't blow the hole up, at least. They're just starting to bite. Hey, well, what happened there, guys? We weren't sure, but now I know that was a bite up there for sure. We fished the crap out of that thing with everything. And I put a piece of tuna on. Got a bite. These fish are really being affected by the pressure system that's coming in. And I think that's kind of why we're seeing what we saw, you know, with Dave's fish. Good, solid bobber down, hooked up, and then popped off. I just don't think that fish, you know, ate it very good, you know. And that's kind of the thing with this with these pressure systems is sometimes salmon don't bite the best But we wanted to come out here and and give it one last shot So we fish pretty hard like the rest of the way down like kind of hitting every piece of water that we can and It doesn't happen. We had some some amazing moments and some really positive moments in this river And I can really see where this thing could be absolutely amazing I'm already chomping at the bit to get back up here and and maybe time it a little bit better, maybe with the run and time it a little bit better with the weather. So just getting up here and getting to come up here with the guys is super important, man. It's something I look forward to. Being able to come and make these videos with these guys that I just learned so much from every single day, I wouldn't change it for the world. It's just where I want to be. It's where I want to be in life. And I just can't wait to do the next one. I can't wait to plan the next adventure and do the next adventure. I hope you guys enjoyed this video and I hope you enjoyed me challenging these guys. I really wanted to do something that just took all these guys out of their element and we didn't just come and smash them. We had to try to experiment, figure it out and learn the fishery to be able to be successful. And I can tell you, we're coming back, baby. I promise you that. All right. We're leaving, dude. It's raining way too much. I know. Hey, we were lucky we got this long. That's true. That was great. Thanks, Marlin. Yeah, that was fun, dude. Yeah. Appreciate you. Good job, Applebottom. Love you, brother. we out bro dude we had beautiful weather until today i wish this rain would have come a little bit earlier you guys drive safe dude make sure you guys the legend was legendary we're coming down here and fishing a brand new river and having a brand new experience never been here before never seen it it just shows that anybody can do this and that is what we try to do with our videos is just try to inspire people and let them understand that you don't have to have a boat you can come out here and you can walk the bank and do some research and find bank spots and and become engaged in this sport we all love when i look back on addicted and the legacy and everything that we've done like that's what i want to say we can hang our hat on is because we inspired a lot of anglers and a lot of kids and a lot of new people to get into the sport that we all love and become advocates for the sport you know we need these other anglers we need these new anglers coming in filling in the ranks if you don't use the resource you're going you're gonna lose the resource, guys. There's not a lot of us doing it, you know? There is, but there isn't in the grand scheme of things. I know sometimes it may not feel that way when you get on your local river, you go somewhere and there's a bunch of anglers, but I promise you guys, we're a dying breed. And so, it's our responsibility as anglers to keep people excited, inspire a new generation, and just continue to keep this sport alive. Oh Salmon fishing isn't just about today's bite It's about the rivers that raised us and the kids who will fish them after us Every cast we make is borrowed from the next generation So it's on us to protect the water Respect the fish and pass on what truly matters To everyone here supporting the outdoors and helping keep the sport of salmon fishing alive Thank you, and we'll see you on the river. You know me and him are best buds. We like to do things together Another idiotic rowing session. This is great. You like it Shawn? Yeah, it's pretty cool We're good though dude. We're in a clack man. Let's go this way. Let's go backwards Nice work You ever row a river like this? You ever done that guys? So for all of you that say I can't row, suck it.