Jon Borcherding
03-19-2007, 04:49 PM
I launched my boat at Luhrs Beach at 7:35 A.M. headed towards Anderson Island and spent all day cruising along the beach from Oro Bay to Devils Head. My first fish was a nice cutthroat at about 14 inches. I didn't see the take so I thought it might actually be a beach cruising blackmouth because the little booger was stripping line off my Medalist!
Things were pretty uneventful for a while after that and then I got into some silvers and picked up a couple fish before the slack low. Both of them were about 12 - 14 inches. I cruised around for a while durring the slack tide, hoping to find some chum fry but never did spot any. I made a run across the water to Devil's Head and tried to fish there for a while but the wind made it kind of difficult. I got frustrated by a whole school of silvers that passed right under my boat in about 12 ft. of water. I was casting in their direction as they moved on but they didn't want to play with me at all.
The wind sent me back to the lee side of Anderson island where I managed to pick up 2 more silvers, about the same size, 12 - 14 inches. I also ran into a large school of herring that were cruising the shallows. I stayed with them hoping to pick up a Blackmouth but, no such luck. I kept changing flies every time I got bored. Often I could see schools of silvers feeding but they seemed uninterested in my fly.
I tried the ChumBaby, Clousers, and a couple of nameless concoctions of my own. The same fly took all 4 fish. It was a clouser tied on a #6 streamer hook and beadchain eyes instead of dumbells. The body was glow-in-the-dark and the wing was pearl flashabou, tied fairly sparse. It's a wierdo pattern that I threw together on a whim after reading the post about night fishing for res. silvers. Funny, it's the only fly I got action on all day.
I got back to the ramp late that afternoon and I had an interesting conversation with "Pete", who is a fish biologist with WDFW. He has been monitoring fry / smolt in the area and told me that the high water that we've had recently has washed a bunch of chumfry out of the gravel before they were really mature enough to swim. Instead of holding in the shallows near the beaches they "got hosed across the bay to Anderson Island" which probably reduced their chance of survival. He says that they had more than a little difficulty swimming because their yoke sacks were still attached and larger than you would expect to see on fish that were ready for the salt. According to him the majority of the fry are still in the gravel and we won't see them in the salt until about the last week of march (unless we get more high water and scouring in the river).
All in all it was a great day. That one SRC made the whole trip worthwhile. Beautiful little fish! My arm hurts a little and it reminds me of the hundred frantic casts made into the herring ball in hopes of hooking a marauding blackmouth. I'll get 'em next time.:thumb:
JonB
Things were pretty uneventful for a while after that and then I got into some silvers and picked up a couple fish before the slack low. Both of them were about 12 - 14 inches. I cruised around for a while durring the slack tide, hoping to find some chum fry but never did spot any. I made a run across the water to Devil's Head and tried to fish there for a while but the wind made it kind of difficult. I got frustrated by a whole school of silvers that passed right under my boat in about 12 ft. of water. I was casting in their direction as they moved on but they didn't want to play with me at all.
The wind sent me back to the lee side of Anderson island where I managed to pick up 2 more silvers, about the same size, 12 - 14 inches. I also ran into a large school of herring that were cruising the shallows. I stayed with them hoping to pick up a Blackmouth but, no such luck. I kept changing flies every time I got bored. Often I could see schools of silvers feeding but they seemed uninterested in my fly.
I tried the ChumBaby, Clousers, and a couple of nameless concoctions of my own. The same fly took all 4 fish. It was a clouser tied on a #6 streamer hook and beadchain eyes instead of dumbells. The body was glow-in-the-dark and the wing was pearl flashabou, tied fairly sparse. It's a wierdo pattern that I threw together on a whim after reading the post about night fishing for res. silvers. Funny, it's the only fly I got action on all day.
I got back to the ramp late that afternoon and I had an interesting conversation with "Pete", who is a fish biologist with WDFW. He has been monitoring fry / smolt in the area and told me that the high water that we've had recently has washed a bunch of chumfry out of the gravel before they were really mature enough to swim. Instead of holding in the shallows near the beaches they "got hosed across the bay to Anderson Island" which probably reduced their chance of survival. He says that they had more than a little difficulty swimming because their yoke sacks were still attached and larger than you would expect to see on fish that were ready for the salt. According to him the majority of the fry are still in the gravel and we won't see them in the salt until about the last week of march (unless we get more high water and scouring in the river).
All in all it was a great day. That one SRC made the whole trip worthwhile. Beautiful little fish! My arm hurts a little and it reminds me of the hundred frantic casts made into the herring ball in hopes of hooking a marauding blackmouth. I'll get 'em next time.:thumb:
JonB