Trinidad - Late August Salmon Season Got Hot - Got All My Vids Up

Saw you otw. After unsuccessful mooching went past the head and got me a decent ling for Korean spicy fish soup for tonight.

The pattern lately has been all about an early bite.  After yesterday's paddle and dive marathon I was still pretty torched this morning, so getting there at 615 and launching 20 minutes later wasn't good enough.  I got outside the harbor and saw a salmon jump right off the bat, but the fleet was calling me from a mile to the Southeast.  I trolled my way there and was joined by Jason Self in his SIK, towing a Little Cleo on his handline.  He had a buddy with him on a SOT - Todd.  We could see Rob a couple hundred yards away just inside the fleet, and it looked like he had a fish on.  Just then I got a good bite, so I peeled off a couple handfuls of line and hoped it would return.  It didn't happen, but Rob soon announced one in the box, so hopes were high again for this early bite happening.  All the yaks (maybe 8 or 10) joined the powerboat fleet where there was lots of bait and some birds.  Some of the boats were jigging, some were mooching, and some were trolling.  No nets were flying around me, but you could hear fish being announced here and there.  A guy in a SIK caught one, and hopes were still high, but then a couple hours went by with nothing going on.  I veered away from the fleet trying to find my own baitball, and while I had a couple of stripped baits, I never did get a fish on today.  I joined up with Wizz for a while - he'd gotten there a little later and managed to bag one between the fleet and the CG buoy, and Jason Self had announced that he had one on at the CG buoy when he left for work, so, damnit, I should've stayed where I got that first bite!   

I bailed at noon with those three I mentioned being the only yak salmon I know of for the day, but Rob and Matt/Wizz were still out there trying for a limit fish.

My advice:  get there REALLY early and launch when there's enough light to see.

It's still one of the best bites we've seen this year, and the fact that it's only a mile or so from launch and fishing in 40 FOW makes it that much sweeter.

I plan to be back out Sunday.  Tomorrow is couch coma day.   

Had 2 more that wouldn't stick after you left, but the bait ball we were on produced, 5 strikes, 1 shaker, 1 coho, and 1 26"king in the 2 hours I was on it midday, by I didn't get a scratch at the fleet.  Ate lunch, lost the bait ball so headed in and nabbed a few blacks on the inside. Fun week and always a joy fishing with you buddy, but I could see the burn. I'm burnt after half if what you've done, so kudos for the marathon man!

Good fishing with you too, Wizz.   

A few yak-caught kings and several coho again today from the reports I received.

See you tomorrow. 

Saturday I took the day off, but Lost Anchovy and crew hit town and got on a decent bite.  Hopefully we'll hear from them.

Sunday at Trinidad - Quite a few of us launched well before dawn hoping to tap into a hot early salmon bite. Not many salmon caught, but the threshers were on the chew. Several were hooked, a few played for 15 to 20 minutes or more, and one was landed. BBQ'd some thresher and other hot lunch afterward with good friends. Trinidad Bay has been very good to us for the past 11 days or so.

This post is having a page 6 error, so maybe I can hit 7 pages to get past it!   

There were lots of folks up early for the crack of dawn launch including a crew lead by Keith Lost Anchovy.  They all beat me on the water as I was struggling with battery connections and still waking up.  I got launched around 630 and saw bait right away in the harbor so I got my sabiki rod out and began picking off some nice chovies.  I trolled around awhile and saw that Kiet had a thresher on and notice Eric and Dominic following another yakker with a thresher too. I trolled around and stayed close to the other thresher hookup just to watch until it broke off.  I went in shallower and found some more bait and began jigging more chovies up.  I setup my rod for mooching and picked up a nice 10-12lb 28.5" salmon on a live chovy.  That would be my only salmon for the day though I did get another takedown in the late afternoon.  I only saw one other salmon caught by kayakers which was a trout sized 22"er when I went back to shore to ice down my salmon.  I relaunched and had some gear for thresher though my wire leader I got from Matt had somehow fell out of my kayak when I came to shore.  I decided to troll a big chovy in a Krippled anchovy which produced a screaming takedown by a thresher which immediately took off like a rocket and launched out of the water which I determined to be well over 8ft.  It did not hang on the bottom like other threshers that day, but instead raced at the surface and did laps around me and kept changing directions.  After 10 minutes or so of battle it sheer ed off the line at the hooks.  There were more thresher hookups than salmon hookups for kayakers yesterday.  Dominic battled one for a good while till it broke off and Ross had one on for awhile.  I decider to stay on the water and take a look outside of the head, but it was pretty bumpy with a large mixed swell.  I got on a hot rockfish bite and had fun catching big blacks on the mooch first on anchovies that needed to be used cause they weren't good enough for trollinhg.  After keeping a black I scored a couple lil shrimp from it belly when I gutted it and used it to catch another big black which had partially digested squid which I used to catch another good black until I got snagged and broke off.  I then put my 2oz Lazer minnow to work and hooked up a few more blacks then decided it was time to get out of this sketchy water and head in to see if I could get the devilfish or another thresher sleigh ride.  I got one good takedown that didn't stick and found a good bait ball that I trolled back and forth through as the wind began picking up.  I looked at the clock and didn't realize how fast time flew and that I was approaching another 12hr day so I went in to shore.  When I was at the beach I saw another thresher was landed and caught by pilot rock.  The guys who caught it said they had severe hookups with threshers that broke off.  It didn't look like a 100lber, but I'm sure it was fun and tasted great.  I did miss the cookout on the beach by Eric and Keith who grilled some thresher for folks at the beach.  It was a fun day though I wish I came in early.  I gifted to blacks to a guy that I hoped would go back in because he was out in shorts and considering going around the head in real sloppy conditions.  There wasn't anyone outside and I didn't want to babysit.  He also didn't have a radio either.  Luckily as he was starting to go outside I think the local charter Jumping Jack talked some sense into the late 40s guy and he went back in.  On the way home I gifted the other 3 blacks to a friend cause I was not looking forward to cleaning so many fish.

bump

bump

another bump

bumping

bumping me

selfless bump

page 7!

page 7!

page 7!!!

one more!