Silver lining

Popular Jim Creek the place to be

August 1, 2006

By Amy Schenck/Frontiersman

Chuck Kusmider kept repeating the words as he set his red cooler on the gravel banks of the Knik River.

“This is a really unique place,” he said.

Kusmider pulled out the salmon he had just caught at Jim Creek “two silvers and a sockeye” and cleaned and gutted them in a freshwater tributary that spilled into the Knik near the Old Glenn Highway. Jim Creek is known as a Mecca for late-night partiers and off-roaders, but this time of year it has another attraction altogether - fish.

“It’s really, really good fishing right now,” Kusmider said. “Up at Jim Creek the silvers are so hot and heavy you can see them.”

Katie Puterbaugh, an Eagle River resident who caught her two silvers early in the day, echoed Kusmider.

“I've lived here 10 years and this is the best time I've ever seen,” she said.

Puterbaugh and her family arrived at Jim Creek at 5:30 a.m. She said most of the fish being caught are only 20 to 25 feet away from the anglers and there's plenty to go around. Puterbaugh summed up the day as “pandemonium in a good way.”

But not everyone considers this pandemonium so good. Some fishermen who used to be loyal to the area have found other places to go, and others, like Kusmider, will only stop by for the day.

“To camp here is crazy because the noise never stops,” Kusmider said.

“It's just such a recreation area, there's lots and lots of people out there,” said Gary Madison, who snacked on Doritos with friends and family after a day of dirt biking.

Like many days at Jim Creek, on Saturday, dust clouds trailed the roar of motors, hundreds of anglers lined the waters edge and the smell of fish seeped through the air.

However, as Kusmider pointed out, the lack of trash was notable and gone were most of the broken-down, rusted-out cars which were once synonymous with the area.

The effort to pull out all the junk cars began two or three years ago, Kusmider said.

Kusmider, who's been a regular at the Knik since the 1970s, remembers when he could go to the area on a weekend and not see anyone. As a teenager, he went rabbit hunting on the gravel flats next to the river.

A Wasilla resident who grew up in Anchorage, Kusmider estimates the majority of people at Jim Creek are from Anchorage.

“Pretty much this is the last, closest playground to Anchorage,” he said.

To Kusmider and the others who frequent the area, that's exactly what the Knik is, a playground.

And right now, It's a playground filled with fish.

Contact Amy Schenck at

352-2269 or amy.schenck@

frontiersman.com.