Ed Iman's Fish Camp 2013!

Aaron and I are in Merryhill, WA at the Columbia river for this year's Fish Camp 2013, put on by guide Ed Iman ((503) 658-3753). This is a yearly gathering put on by Ed Iman that brings together guide, outdoor writers, and fishing product manufacturers to introduce the latest new innovations in the fishing industry. It's a great event that Aaron and I have had the pleasure to attend now for the past few years. On to the fishing report:

This report is for Monday and Tuesday. We fished on Monday with "Dub", a local who fishing the Columbia river on a regular basis. we fished the mouth of the Deshuetes river. Dub knows the river, the fishery, and the techiques. Our target is chinook salmon, and our method is "hovering" fishing, which is a technique that has really caught fire and is deadly effective, as you'll see.

Hovering fishing is a method where the boat is backed slowly down river, using the kicker motor to slow the drift so that an angler's line is kept at an almost vertical presentation. We fished in water from 13 to 29 feet deep, using two ounce cannon ball weights and a 30-36" leader to a singler, 1/0 barbless hook. This is bair fishing, medium sized balls of bait, maybe a tad bigger than than a quarter sized. Ideally your line will be almost vertical. Make contact with bottom and reel up two revolutions so your bait is about 1-2 feet off bottom. This is critical because if your bait drags bottom you'll be catching sturgeon instead of salmon. Also, you will run into "peamouth" which are chubs - trash fish. Not what you want but one of those fishes you just have to deal with.

So, as you make contact, the "bite" is not really a bite, it's more like a "pull". These chinook are mouthing the eggs as they float by, and generally you'll hook them in the mouth, and not deep. So the level of concentration required for this fishing is pretty intense. If you have a "tap tap" it could be a peamouth, or it could be a thirty pound king. You just never know. So when in doubt, set the hook! Sometimes it will be an obvious king, sometimes not.

I'm sure you've heard this year is a superb chinnok return - over 800,000 chinook salmon and rising. I'm here to tel you, it's unreal! Our first day fishing with Dub we hit fish right away and never stopped until the boat limted, eight beautiful kings ranging from eight to eighteen pounds. The fish have a slight color to them but when filetb it's obvious they are still in prime eating condition. And BTW, there are bigger fish to be had. Last year at Fish Camp a lucky angler caught a 45 pound HOG.

Tuesday we fished with guide Bruce Warren of Fishing For Fun Guide Service (http://fishingforfunguideservice.com/).

Bruce is a first rate guide and a lot of fun to fish with. We were also tackle testing the latest Lamiglas product, a very nice 8 foot rod that worked great for hover fishing, the G-1330-T Magnum Hot Shot rod, 8 foot long, rated 10-20 pound. It's a great rod with plenty of backbone to handle the big fish, but it also has a nice, sensitive tip. I was totally satisfied using it and it handled my fish with no problems. Oh, yes, we limted the boat again! This time Aaron had the hot rod. He was on fire! Caughter his limit, and then some, The regs on the Columbia this year are very generous and allow the angler to continue to fish until the boat limits. Let's just say, Aaron was doing a LOT of handing off of his rod after multiple hook-ups. Of interest, we started slower today, but as the morning progressed the bite got better. Our boat limted by noon. Also of interest, the fish were bigger today, almost all of them in the 10+ range and half in the 15-20 pound range. Wow!

So, now is the time to head down to the Columbia for these strong, big chinook. It's a record making season so I hope you'll get a chance to join us in our quest for "Fish On!"