PULASKI -The Salmon River, which flows through this Oswego County town on its way to Lake Ontario, has undergone a transformation the likes of which hasn't been seen since Charles Colson found God.

Five years ago it was a place you didn't take the kids unless you wanted them to think that fishing was an aquatic form of roller derby and professional wrestling. Today, if you wanted to make an instructional film on stream etiquette, you couldn't find a better location. The atmospheric change derives, for the most part, from the state Department of Environmental Conservation having put an end to the snagging of Pacific salmonids during their spawning time in the river.

I fished the Salmon last month with Dr. Tony LaSorte and his son Adrian. Adrian is a professional guide who divides his time between the Delaware River and the Salmon.

On this particular day, the river was at a near-ideal level and full of steelheads just in from the lake. The guides call these newly arrived fish "chromers," because of their silvery gray color. Only after they are in the stream for a few days do the horizontal, lavender stripes that affirm their rainbow heritage become pronounced.

We began our fishing at first light, in the flies lures only, catch-and-release section of the river between the Altmar Bridge and the state hatchery. Anglers were present in considerable numbers, both above and below the bridge.

Tangled lines were inevitable, given the narrowness of the stream at that point and the number of anglers, but not once did I hear an angry exchange, not even a recrimination.

The moment one of the anglers shouted the words, "fish on," and it was shouted frequently during the early hours, every other angler dutifully reeled in, giving the hooked-up angler room to play his fish.

And room is what you need with steelheads. Their first instinct, when hooked, is to head back to the lake. They jump, too, these magnificent fish, and they are unpredictable. They will halt in a downstream run, just when you think they're about to run you out of backing, and then take off upstream faster than they went down.

A Salmon River regular fishing a few feet away from us said he averages about 70 days on the river from November to May. If you have ever been on the Salmon in winter, you have some idea of what that entails. The best day he had last season, the man said, was one in mid-February, when the air temperature never rose above minus 10 degrees.

Tony asked the man what his success rate was, and the answer was not encouraging. About 30 percent, he said, after some thought; which meant he lost three fish for every one he netted.

That was not encouraging, especially for someone who had never caught one. The best I could hope for, I told myself, was to get a couple of misses out of the way and maybe catch one the next time. But wonder of wonders, my first strike was a winner. The fish took a large pink and silver fly and took off downstream toward Pulaski the moment I set the hook.

I have never felt such raw power at the end of a fly rod. Luckily for me, the fish was well-hooked and Adrian netted it after a five-minute fight and released it. He estimated the fish at about six pounds; a leviathan in my book but, as it turned out, the smallest steelhead we were to catch that day.

A few minutes after my fish was released, Tony caught one that Adrian put at between eight and nine pounds. Then I hooked and lost one that felt much heavier than the one I'd landed, and after that we drifted.

During our downstream run to Pine Valley, I was impressed by the consideration the guides showed for one another and each other's clients. Adrian never took our boat past another guide's party without first asking permission and waiting until their lines were out of the water. They, in turn, showed us the same courtesy.

It was a display of sportsmanship nearly as pleasing as the fishing itself. Adrian, as usual, was top rod. In a riffle about halfway to our destination, he hooked, and netted a steelhead that made mine look like a smelt. He guessed its weight at 12 pounds. He also missed one that he estimated would have gone about 15 pounds.

I caught the last fish, however, an Atlantic salmon about nine inches long. The state has stocked some of these fish in hopes that they might grow and establish a population, but most of the fisheries biologists I've talked to say it is a long shot.

Dave Rossie is associate editor of the Press & Sun-Bulletin.
His Wildlife Watch appears on Sundays.

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