It is May 16th and the past 5 days the weather has been nice and sunny with clear blue skies. Although this means great weather in the city and on the patio, for the fisherman it often means we have to contend with some NW winds that come along with the high pressure system and sun.
Last weekend the wind co-operated and I counted 47 boats fishing the Thrasher Rock area. After the great fishing we had there earlier in the week, with a hot and sunny Saturday and flat calm seas, this was really no surprise. The action was a little slower on the weekend and our boats hit 3 to 4 chinook each, and each boat came back with a few nice ones in the box. There was also some good action off the Hump as well as some fish being caught right in the harbor around the freighters.
Two nice chinook taken from the middle of Vancouver Harbor on a sunny Satruday afternoon
The fish this week have mostly been red springs in the 10lb-15lb range and a fair number of hatchery fish. We were catching these fish in Vancouver Harbor, on the Hump, and all the way over to Thrasher. The white springs and marbled springs we were encountering the week before seemed to have moved on.
Fish have been caught anywhere from 40 to 180 feet in some spots, but the most productive depths seem to be in the 80-110 foot range. Glow/Green spoons have been working well, the spatter back hootchies continue to produce (OG142R and OG144R), white UV hootchies have been good (OAL12R), and of course bait is always a good bet, both herring and anchovies. If you need bait we have a good selection of anchovies and herring, even the larger anchovies which are often hard to get.
We aren’t heading out on the water today as it looks like it is going to gust up to 25 knots NW and that combined with the ebb tide is going to produce some nasty conditions this morning. It looks like the NW wind is going to die off on Friday as a low pressure system comes in and things switch to SE. We might get a few showers starting Sunday but I will take that chance as long as we get rid of these big NW winds so we can get out off the Hump or run over to Thrasher. That being said, some of our charters in the harbor this week out produced the boats at Thrasher and the Hump, including guide Eddie boating the two nice chinook pictured above on Saturday, and guide Craig hitting a tripple header to start the day off on Sunday! It just goes to show you that even if you can’t run across or fish offshore, it pays to get out there and get the lines wet.
We will be on the water Saturday, Sunday and Monday, so see you out there on in the shop!
Jason Tonelli