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WP July 8-9, Coho, Chinook, Pacific Jack Mackerel and Albacore. I caught 4 species of fish!
I had forgotten most of my tuna tackle at home. One of those things where the gear is in the tote but the tote didn't get loaded into the vehicle before leaving the home 20. Oh well, power forward! So, before heading out from the ramp I had decided just to make it a quick salmon day. The plan was just to run out to 150-170', bang out a couple salmon and get back into port and see what I needed from Englunds to make a tuna run worth while.
As things go, my newest salmon tackle was with the tuna gear AND the salmon density had moved further out. I drug some of the older gear I had around in the areas that had been reported as having salmon just a day or two earlier. Nada! I hailed on the radio, asking for where the fleet was and some smart ass came back with "that's the million dollar question." Luckily I kept my ears peeled to the radio as I fished and dug through what I did have on the boat and I finally heard some useful information and found some gear that looked more presentable.
I found the fleet on the 46*55' line in about 200' of water and started draggin gear rigged Canadian style, long ass leaders eh. In the middle of the fleet there was nothin and that took some time to make a pass through. I found myself out of the pack when I started nailing one unclipped ho after another very near the surface. Seemed like it was 9 before I finally nailed a clipped. Who's in charge of clipping these SOBs? LOL So thinking there might be a nook with my name on it at a much deeper depth, I dropped on down to see. I'll be damned if I didn't hook into another clipped ho just like that and then another unclipped at this much deeper depth. Time to move!
So, now late in the afternoon, I popped on out to about 300' of water and witnessed porpoises and whales. I ran out beyond them to keep my distance from a big boy charter, that I like, fishing east of the whales. I dropped my big ass spoon with a long ass leader down to about 120', 10 minutes later, fish on, 10 more minutes, limited and time for some cleanup before running in. I hit the ramp a bit late to make a shopping run into Englands but I figured I had enough old Mickey Mouse gear on board to make a tuna run the next day.
After another restless night's sleep I was unwilling to get up when the alarm went off. So another 2 hours later I launched, picked up a scoop of chovies and ran to the previous days salmon grounds. Within a reasonable amount of time, repeating what I had done the day before, I had my salmon limit, plugged in 46*40'x124*40' and off I went at about 9 am.
While heading south I saw some commercial boat way off to the west and I couldn't help to wonder if he was trolling for tuna or using one of them trawl nets, too far off course to take a gander. I hit my spot, looked around, didn't feel it so I headed SW. Ran into a rip, tossed some live baits in there and popped a couple pacific jack mackerel. I wasn't sure what the hell they were when I pulled em up since I don't recall seeing one before. It was fun but then I got sharked out. I couldn't help but notice these tiny fish jumping, seemed like less than an inch long, in among the velella and still greenish water. In hindsight, I shoulda rigged the troll gear up right there and made a couple passes but it just didn't quite feel right so I moved on looking for more obvious signs.
Finally saw other boats, rigged for the troll with this old costume gear, didn't get any hits and these x-wrap knock offs were individually wrapped with a ton of line from jumping so much, so stopped and dropped some live baits on some marked fish. I thought I'd have enough time to rig some additional clones while just doing a drift. Not so, sharks came in and cleaned me out again. Moved further south and west, set up a troll with what I had and while trolling I set up a few more clones, with get this, 50 lbs big game! Ouch! It's what I had on board. Finally got my spread of 7 and worked due west, still east of the 124*40' but the temperatures and color looked good and there were the occasional .5 degree temp breaks. I picked up two tuna in a rough half mile square, tried a bait stop each time but quickly got sharked out both times. The largest tuna dwarfed my approx 15 lbs nook so it wouldn't surprise me if it was 30 or just slightly under. That was on a clone with 50 lbs test, it broke when the fish hit the fish box. The other tuna was much smaller.
I was pretty wore out and a headache was coming on so after working that half mile and then expanded mile area for quite some time later, I headed north quite a ways with nothing more to show for it but I did see more whales. I don't recall even making it to the 124*50', 48' yes. I was super tempted to take a nap, weather and water was good. I "recalled" buoy 8 and made the run NE instead. I was pretty punchy when I hit the ramp but it was a very good day so well worth it.
I looked up those mackerel when I got home this morning and got really excited when I saw the state record, I knew mine would be close. Called WDFW and figured out what I needed to do. I hit Tim's Seafood in Kirkland to get my fish weighed since a closer QFC said no, they wouldn't do it. I was 0.47 lbs short of tying the record of 4.99 pounds. Can a 5 pound fish lose 8 oz in a little less than 24 hours while on ice? I may have even tore a gill out when bleeding it...... Excitement over, time to write this and get it to ya. Happy fishing and a big thank you to Greg for inviting me to join him on Wed, even though I declined and to Rick who took the time to help ID these funny looking fish. My condolences go out to Duramax, those guys just wouldn't leave you alone on the radio, did you have time enough to fish! LOL I know I wouldn't have with that much radio traffic since I fish solo. wink emoticon
The sorta "funny now" experience was when I shifted my extra fire extinguisher while looking for other fishing gear, well, I dropped the lid on the box then sat on it.... The fire extinguisher quickly let me know what I had done. I think I'll open that box up in a couple days after I recover from this last trip! LOL It's a mess, white powder is in everything in that box.
Final count for two days, two for each of the following: coho, chinook, albacore and jack mackerel.
After posting this report it came to my attention that an unpublished rule exists that forbids having salmon on board while fishing for tuna with more than one rod per person. So if you are going to fish for tuna with more than one rod per person on board you'll need to catch your salmon AFTER your tuna fishing is over.
"It was a grey area a couple years ago about using more than one rod for tuna and WDFW finally stated that one could but not if salmon onboard."
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