Sunset Bay fish

Fished north of Sunset Bay Wednesday after work this morning. Found a spot out of the wind and started killing the the blacks right off with a PB next to me. He was really intrigued with me flyfishing out in the ocean.I showed him some of the flies that I was catch the blacks on.Then he notice the the lingcod fly and could not believe it. tied it on and started casting got a good cast out and starting counting down till it hit bottom gave the fly about 2 pulls and "WAM" pole double over and then some.Mister PB said that this was not a black and I agreed he thought it might be a hali. for the first couple of minutes then it surface and the worlds most pissed off ling went nuts, jumping out the water ramming the kayak and diving back down and repeating the process a couple more times. Finally got the ling in the kayak. It had swallowed the fly completely so I just cut the leader as I was going to release her. The PB agreed whole hardly with a nod. Got my limit of blacks and was getting ready to head back when the PB motion for me to come over. All I could here was something banging into his boat. When I got over there,here was this monster ling banging into the side of his boat going totally nuts, help the guy net the fish. The guy was going to let it go because it big but it was bleeding real bad so after being bonk it measured out at hair over 41 inches. and weight in at 22 1/2 lbs. I said good-bye and was about to leave when he said wait a minute and handed my fly back to me. The same fly that I had caught the same fish with 30 minutes ago. So I guess now my personal best ling is 41 inches and22 1/2lbs. on a fly what a day!

Thats a great story! Awesome!

that is a monster.  Too bad the fish didn't make it.  I'm sure it will make a few good meals though.

Nice memory for you and good story for us.

Great Story,  that must have been 1 hell of a fight on a fly. 

That's awesome! I'm curious what a lingcod fly looks like. Really cool experience.

Nice report but I have a question now. Why the concern over releasing a large ling? Is that some ethical reason or do they not taste good? Usually bigger is better. I wouldn't know though since all the ling cod I've ever caught have been undersized or small keepers.

Standard clouser minnows in large sizes in Greenling-ish colors work well...I like spun deer heads as well.  They tend to hover above bottom and snag less.

Had some good action last year in the PS with this guy:
edit...damn that pic was huge.  Small version attached.

Nice report but I have a question now. Why the concern over releasing a large ling? Is that some ethical reason or do they not taste good? Usually bigger is better. I wouldn't know though since all the ling cod I've ever caught have been undersized or small keepers.

According to the biologists the big ones are the egg-laying females. So by selectively harvesting mostly smaller fish you don't tend to impact the reproductive population as badly.

I'm all for selective harvest, but no one should feel bad about keeping an occasional lunker either. Lingcod is a very sustainable fishery.

Standard clouser minnows in large sizes in Greenling-ish colors work well...I like spun deer heads as well.  They tend to hover above bottom and snag less.

Had some good action last year in the PS with this guy:

That's sweet! I don't have any experience fly fishing in the salt - that's pretty cool.

Nice report. I want to try some fly fishing eventually. I might ask you for help on picking out some gear. What time were you out there yesterday? I was out from about 8am till noonish and didnt see anyone. I was down south though. There was a green PB that came in at the same time as me. He was fishing north. Must be a lot of big Lings out there right now. I ended up with a personal best 24 pounder

Nice report but I have a question now. Why the concern over releasing a large ling? Is that some ethical reason or do they not taste good? Usually bigger is better. I wouldn't know though since all the ling cod I've ever caught have been undersized or small keepers.

According to the biologists the big ones are the egg-laying females. So by selectively harvesting mostly smaller fish you don't tend to impact the reproductive population as badly.

I'm all for selective harvest, but no one should feel bad about keeping an occasional lunker either. Lingcod is a very sustainable fishery.

Got it, thanks. I never heard that before. Guess it's a moot point in my case unless I start catching lunkers.

Evan, anytime you want to pick my brain feel free and that goes for anybody else too. If you look under waving the bug wand( Bottom Fish flies) there a lot of info there plus pictures of flies for both bottom fish and lingcod. Must have been right behind you got there about 8:30 headed North got behind lighthouse to get out the wind and didn't get off the water till about 3:30 or so.

This is a great looking fly.  How deep was the reef you were fishing?  I would love to get out there with my 8 weight, but not sure I have enough line to get it to the bottom.

I'm also wondering if you have ever tied a similar fly on a jig head, instead of an octopus hook, and  bounced it off the bottom in a similar fashion?

Thank you very much for sharing.  Sounds like a blast.

This is a great report Scott. Thanks for posting.