Salmon mooching questions

Hey Gang,

Looking for a couple of basic pointers on salmon mooching (I'm sure these will seem like dumb questions, but hey, when it comes to salmon I am pretty dumb...)

a) Does one typically keep your rig down on the bottom, or if seeing bait higher in the water column (like 20 feet) do you drift your bait at that depth?

b) Does one actively raise/lower their bait by either reeling or raising the rod? If so, how much up and down action do you want and what is the cadence?

c) Any general tips on trooching?

Thanks in advance for any opinions/insights.

john

Keep in mind mooching generally takes place over concentrated bait.

A.  The general rule of thumb is to mooch at the depth of the suspended bait. Dead or weakend baitfish that hang out on the edge of the bait school are natural targets, try working the edges. 

Going to the bottom and coming up from there also works, if nothing is going in the middle of the water column I will drop and slowly reel up.  It also opens the door to picking up some of the bottom dwellers that will hang beneath the bait. 

B.  Yes to both.  Just enough to keep the bait moving, not so much that the anchovy is getting warped or ripped off the hook. 

C. Put rod in holder, slow paddle, pause....repeat.  There's some debate as to whether its trolling and justifies using a barbless j hook, I would stick to barbless circles but thats jmo.   
 

Thanks for the tips, agarcia.

How do you like to hook your bait? I had been threading them (hook coming out the eye socket), but then I dropped my bait threader overboard... Now I'm just nose hooking...

Still haven't mooched up a salmon, only caught them trolling.

I hok em the same way I do when trolling, but here we can use j hooks when mooching.  I hook them the same with circle hooks too.  When its bright and sunny or the warm water is in closer, I mooch just off the bottom and you don't necessarily see something on the fishfinder.