Anglers Are Ones Who Get Away at Creek : Big Tujunga Canyon: Fish stories focus on the beauty of a trout-stocked creek minutes from the city.

Their fish stories are not about The Big One That Got Away.

They are about lazy mornings along a mumbling creek in Big Tujunga Canyon, casting lines in shallow pools and waiting patiently for the rainbow trout to nibble. About the grand feeling of standing in a clear, cool stream as it winds through a sheer canyon beneath a canopy of blue sky.

And, eventually, about The Little Ones That Get Away, the clever fish that wriggle along the bottom in plain view, brazenly grab the bait and swim away unhooked.

“Look at him,” said Johnny Gibbs of North Hollywood, pointing to a six-inch fish nibbling at the hook loaded with a popular “secret formula” bait, sold in fishing tackle stores, that looks like fluorescent pink clay.

After two hours, Gibbs was still two trout shy of his five-fish limit. No big deal, though. He tossed out his line again. “Wonder if I can feed him some more.”

Fish and Game officials on Monday stocked the creek for the first time this season with several hundred rainbow trout. Since then, fishermen from around the San Fernando Valley have parked themselves on handy rocks or among the weeds that line the shallows. They will be there off and on until the middle of June, when the stream stops flowing and mosquitoes swarm around the stagnant pools of slimy water that remain.

Until then, the Department of Fish and Game will restock the stream every two weeks with a new shipment of hundreds of six- and seven-inch rainbow trout. All told, the department will dump about 8,000 fish in the lower portions of the creek between early May and mid-June.

They are small enough to catch with little trouble and quite tasty when prepared properly, said Dorothy Ricketts, who works in the inland fishery department.

Anglers who frequent the stream expect this spring to be better than the last several seasons. Drought in recent years shriveled the creek to almost nothing, and restocking of fish was sporadic at best. “Last year, the fish just died because the water was really bad,” said Bill Mondun, 68, as he tugged his line to lure a couple of fish from their hiding places in the rocks.

Although the canyon is just minutes from the congestion and brown skies of the Valley, it is largely unscarred by man’s intrusions and feels like a mountain retreat tucked hundreds of miles from civilization.

“I like to eat fish, and it gets you out where you feel the air is clear,” Gibbs, 56, said. He takes his days off during the week so he does not have to fight for a space on a weekend, when, “as soon as you pull one out, four people drop their lines in right next to you.”

But during the week, this stretch of stream is quiet. The dirt parking lot is nearly empty and the wind rushing through the canyon smothers the sound of jets screaming into Burbank Airport on the other side of the hill.

Sure, there are good spots and bad spots along the creek, but it is, more than anything, a game of luck. Mondun has dropped his line in the creek every day since Monday. On Wednesday, he had his five fish in a little more than 90 minutes. Tuesday, though, he spent the better part of the morning at a makeshift rock dam before he reeled in his fifth.

“It’s all luck,” said Mondun, a retired electronics repairman from Sunland-Tujunga. “You can’t give up.”

Seconds later, the tip of Mondun’s pole dipped slightly.

A bite.

He reeled it in against the gentle current of the stream--”come on, come on”--and landed the fish on a patch of rocks. Writhing in the air and slapping hard against the earth, Mondun’s catch struggled to flop its way back to the water.

Mondun chased it several feet, breathing hard as he stooped down to grab hold of the trout and pull the hook from its mouth.

“Fishing is supposed to be relaxing, but it just takes so much out of me,” he said between breaths, holding his catch up to see.