Jon Borcherding
04-03-2007, 02:03 PM
Launched from Luhr beach at about 6:30 A.M. stood at the launch and threw a few casts out because I saw one nice jumper right at the launch. No takers. Headed for my favorite beach on Anderson Isl. but as soon as I got there I realized that it was too windy to get a decent cast and I figured that it might get worse so I headed back across Nisqually Reach and started exploring some new beaches. It was easiest to fish the beaches that were at the foot of cliffs because they helped to block the wind.
After reading Dmoocher's post about silvers being full of shrimp I had tied up a couple of shrimp patterns. My tying skills are still marginal so these things weren't particularly pretty. I didn't have any orange material and the closest thing I could find was pink marabou, so I hacked some of it up and used it for dubbing. I stretched a piece of plastic wrap over the back and picked out some of the dubbing for legs. Used bead chain for eyes. Guess what? Ugly little booger worked!
About 45 minutes into the ebb I got my first fish, a fiesty little silver at about 15 inches. I was using a new rod and also a new line, a Rio outbound type III sink. It was a little awkward because it's hard to get the memory out of the running line and I spent a lot of time stretching line and untangling messes. I was sure glad to have the heavier line to throw in the wind. I had brought my old rod with the WF6F and it was not nearly as effective at cutting the wind.
A half hour later I picked up another silver and after that the action slowed. No more hits, no rises, no nuthin'. I watched a sea otter for a while and got to sea him run up the beach with his catch. Looked like he was fishing the res. silvers too. I ran around in the boat, making mental notes of good looking beaches and rocks, logs, and other structure for future use. I talked to a guy in another boat at Johnson Pt. He had landed a decent blackmouth, fishing a hootchie/flasher off the downrigger. I saw some fish on the sonar, holding at about 130 ft. near Johnson Pt. Too deep for me. The tide was almost low and I was just killing time so I ran up Henderson Inlet, exploring and noting more beaches that might produce when the current is right. I managed to fritter away most of the afternoon running from one beach to another, looking for fish, throwing a few casts and generally just goofing off.
As we got into the second half of the flood I started to get serious about fishing again. I hooked up with a couple more silvers. One of which was about 18" and he was a lot of fun to play with. He hit my fly twice before I got him hooked up. The first time he made a hell of a swirl, so I was really stoked when I finally got him to the net. I don't usually try to get photos of silvers because my experience is that they are pretty fragile. It's hard to get pics without hurting the fish when you're alone.
I also caught one small cutthroat. He was 12 or 13 inches with no slashes but otherwise typical coloring and spotting. Kinda wierd though.... he was missing his adipose fin. I thought that hatchery cutthroat were a thing of the past? Maybe he lost the fin some other way? He also had some kind of parasite just behind the dorsal fin. It looked like a tiny stingray with a rounded front. Don't know what it was but, I think I recall something similar being described in another thread.
All in all a very enjoyable day on the water. Enough daydreaming material to get me through another week!
JonB
After reading Dmoocher's post about silvers being full of shrimp I had tied up a couple of shrimp patterns. My tying skills are still marginal so these things weren't particularly pretty. I didn't have any orange material and the closest thing I could find was pink marabou, so I hacked some of it up and used it for dubbing. I stretched a piece of plastic wrap over the back and picked out some of the dubbing for legs. Used bead chain for eyes. Guess what? Ugly little booger worked!
About 45 minutes into the ebb I got my first fish, a fiesty little silver at about 15 inches. I was using a new rod and also a new line, a Rio outbound type III sink. It was a little awkward because it's hard to get the memory out of the running line and I spent a lot of time stretching line and untangling messes. I was sure glad to have the heavier line to throw in the wind. I had brought my old rod with the WF6F and it was not nearly as effective at cutting the wind.
A half hour later I picked up another silver and after that the action slowed. No more hits, no rises, no nuthin'. I watched a sea otter for a while and got to sea him run up the beach with his catch. Looked like he was fishing the res. silvers too. I ran around in the boat, making mental notes of good looking beaches and rocks, logs, and other structure for future use. I talked to a guy in another boat at Johnson Pt. He had landed a decent blackmouth, fishing a hootchie/flasher off the downrigger. I saw some fish on the sonar, holding at about 130 ft. near Johnson Pt. Too deep for me. The tide was almost low and I was just killing time so I ran up Henderson Inlet, exploring and noting more beaches that might produce when the current is right. I managed to fritter away most of the afternoon running from one beach to another, looking for fish, throwing a few casts and generally just goofing off.
As we got into the second half of the flood I started to get serious about fishing again. I hooked up with a couple more silvers. One of which was about 18" and he was a lot of fun to play with. He hit my fly twice before I got him hooked up. The first time he made a hell of a swirl, so I was really stoked when I finally got him to the net. I don't usually try to get photos of silvers because my experience is that they are pretty fragile. It's hard to get pics without hurting the fish when you're alone.
I also caught one small cutthroat. He was 12 or 13 inches with no slashes but otherwise typical coloring and spotting. Kinda wierd though.... he was missing his adipose fin. I thought that hatchery cutthroat were a thing of the past? Maybe he lost the fin some other way? He also had some kind of parasite just behind the dorsal fin. It looked like a tiny stingray with a rounded front. Don't know what it was but, I think I recall something similar being described in another thread.
All in all a very enjoyable day on the water. Enough daydreaming material to get me through another week!
JonB