Live baiting PC lings

Had plenty of rockfish in the freezer, but the ocean looked so nice and calm and I had time so I hit Pacific City on Monday, so I pinched the barbs on my light jigs and hit it. The surf launch was like stepping out into a lake and the ocean was equally benign. I began smashing rockfish on my lightweight trout rod and 3/8 jig before I even made it out near the rock and the action stayed red hot every time I marked fish and dropped the Gulp! minnow within 10 feet of bottom. After scrapping with the salt-n-peppers for awhile (couple dozen)  I moved to another spot with no fish on the screen and was stoked when I pulled up a 14" greenling. Now my plan for the day could really come to fruition!
I have never live baited in the ocean before but I had looked at a couple things on the Google so I quickly rigged up my jigging rod with a circle hook with a treble trailing 12" back. This was on a 3ft leader onto a 3-way spreader and a couple feet of dropper to a 3oz lead. The circle went through the top of the greenling's head and the treble trailed freely. Dropping this down to the bottom and reeling up a few turns left me to just sit and wait with a sandwich as the greenling did all the work for me. It was so cool to watch the rod as the greenling got nervous and then see it slam southward impressively when the ling got hold of the poor little bugger. What a cool way to fish! The first ling was hooked on the treble and the second one actually got hooked by the circle when it tried to take the greenling head-first. The second one was the biggest for me yet in my limited experience and measured 35."
On Tuesday I tried a repeat with a 15" sole but found the flatfish really hard to keep from tangling up my leader and it was difficult as well getting it down to the bottom and keeping it there. I fished it for an hour or so with no luck and eventually brought it up and I had it for my own dinner last night. Yummy! The black rockfish were no less feisty on Tuesday and some of them felt like they were going to break the trout rod in half. I got my lings too, but they were in the barely legal class.
Anyway, I am still pretty new to going out in the ocean in my kayak and definitely am not a scholar on live-baiting, so if anyone has some experience to share about rigging and fishing live baits from a kayak, I would love to learn because I found it productive and fun.
Also, would I be breaking any ODFW regs by fishing my lightweight rod while my jigging rod is out too?
Thanks everybody and honestly, I don't think I could have ever done the fishing I'm doing  and with such success without the resource of this forum.

Wow! Great read, and that's a helluva ling you got there. Keep those reports coming!

Sounds like a couple great days of fishing.

Also, would I be breaking any ODFW regs by fishing my lightweight rod while my jigging rod is out too?

Well if it's just a lightweight rod, I don't see what it would hurt..

Acutaly yes, you would be violating the regs. You can only fish for rockfish and lingcod with a single rod at a time.
The only times you can use two rods at a time in Oregon is with a two rod endorsement in certain lakes or when you're fishing more than 3 miles offshore for pelagics (and you don't have any non-pelagics already onboard)

Awesome story and congrats on taking advantage of the good conditions.

The circle went through the top of the greenling's head and the treble trailed freely.

Maybe I'm doing it wrong, but I do it the other way around: I stick one hook of the treble in the head and put the trailing hook all the way through just ahead of the tail fin.

Livebaiting, goood! Congrats.

The circle went through the top of the greenling's head and the treble trailed freely.

Maybe I'm doing it wrong, but I do it the other way around: I stick one hook of the treble in the head and put the trailing hook all the way through just ahead of the tail fin.

Cool, that way sounds good. I'll try that next time. I think I might have gotten lucky with the hooksets.

Sounds like a couple great days of fishing.

Also, would I be breaking any ODFW regs by fishing my lightweight rod while my jigging rod is out too?

Well if it's just a lightweight rod, I don't see what it would hurt..

Acutaly yes, you would be violating the regs. You can only fish for rockfish and lingcod with a single rod at a time.
The only times you can use two rods at a time in Oregon is with a two rod endorsement in certain lakes or when you're fishing more than 3 miles offshore for pelagics (and you don't have any non-pelagics already onboard)

Thanks a lot for that info. It would probably be too much of a goatrope anyway.

Nice report! Thanks for sharing.

Fred "True" Trujillo

The circle went through the top of the greenling's head and the treble trailed freely.

Maybe I'm doing it wrong, but I do it the other way around: I stick one hook of the treble in the head and put the trailing hook all the way through just ahead of the tail fin.

Cool, that way sounds good. I'll try that next time. I think I might have gotten lucky with the hooksets.

Now that I think about it, I don't know if Lings would prefer the bait head or tail first... but you could leave the head trailing backward with a treble in the head and the single or another treble  wrapped or half hitched and then poked in the tail.... Hmmm... requires further experimenting...

Now that I think about it, I don't know if Lings would prefer the bait head or tail first...

From my experience there's not much of a trend either way.

I have a dream of getting some baitfish with a stabiki rig, then nailing a few salmon with them all in the same day.  It's a recurring dream I've had, both at sleep and awake.

I have done that with herring in MA 13. It was awesome to go from a herring to a big king. I know it will be a fishing experience I never will forget about.

The circle went through the top of the greenling's head and the treble trailed freely.

Maybe I'm doing it wrong, but I do it the other way around: I stick one hook of the treble in the head and put the trailing hook all the way through just ahead of the tail fin.

Cool, that way sounds good. I'll try that next time. I think I might have gotten lucky with the hooksets.

Now that I think about it, I don't know if Lings would prefer the bait head or tail first... but you could leave the head trailing backward with a treble in the head and the single or another treble  wrapped or half hitched and then poked in the tail.... Hmmm... requires further experimenting...

I don't know how lings tend to swallow fish, but pike and lake trout always swallow fish head-first.  I fish for both of them with dead fish on a quick-strike rig consisting of two treble hooks a couple inches apart.  I suspend the bait fish by putting the upper treble hook in its back at the balance point.  Then I sink the lower treble hook in the bait fish's head or cheek with the tips of the hook pointing towards the bait fish's tail.  Sometimes I set the hook as soon as the pike or the lake trout grabs the bait fish, often across its middle.  But usually I let it carry the fish off a ways, stop, flip it around so it's going down the hatch head first, and start swallowing it.  Then I set the hook.  Having the tips of the hook in the bait fish's head pointing towards its tail ensures a solid hook set.

Good job out there. I've tried live baiting greenling for lingcod for hours and hours and I've never gotten a hit. I must be doing something wrong.