Albacore Mother Ship?

I think he was hoping for a short term rider just for the trip or the week.  If it's $1000 for the year, one would hope he might be able to get a short term rider for a couple hundred.

As for a California trip, I could be convinced.   How reliable is the tuna down in CA?  Seems like even when I was in CA I heard more about OR albacore.

Looking into an option out of Eureka.  That would put it about half way between you and me.  The past few years have been an OR show.  The past few years before that, it was the other way around.  We'll see what develops.

-Allen

The key was to be mobile and scout for and chase jumpers then cast live bait or iron to them. The action can be fast and can be over quick.  You then scout around for more fish and repeat.  I could see pulling up on some fish and by the time yaks are deployed and everyone in ready the school sounds and its game over. Deep water halibut would be interesting too.

Sounds like a that calls for seal style launch. That sounds exciting.

 There were a few private boaters on the ifish saltydogs board that had ocean going boats and were interested kayak fishing for albacore (I saw one with a pic of a kayak mounted on his boat). These are not charter boats and could probably only accommodate one or two kayaks at a time, but they were willing and able and only looking to split expenses. Might be worth a troll onto their board. PP you were a salty dog weren't (aren't) you?  That is north of San Jose though.

I'm sure we could wrangle up some sort of mothership opportunity here from Coos Bay.

I'll have to talk to my people........Ok, I'm gonna ask Royg...

The butt season in WA is too short at 2-3 days for us to be able to plan a trip.

True for Neah Bay but not for Ilwaco, or I think, Westport. Plus there's always part of the quota that is reserved for the inshore/weekend exemption. I've taken advantage of that inshore quota in OR, before.

Unfortunately, I'm probably going to have to wait till we're a DINK family to do a big mothership trip.

I'd definitely be interested in a tuna trip. Eureka may also work. It all depends on the details...

The butt season in WA is too short at 2-3 days for us to be able to plan a trip.

True for Neah Bay but not for Ilwaco, or I think, Westport. Plus there's always part of the quota that is reserved for the inshore/weekend exemption. I've taken advantage of that inshore quota in OR, before.

Unfortunately, I'm probably going to have to wait till we're a DINK family to do a big mothership trip.

I think it is true for Westport as well, but there is some incidental catch there, or something like that, right?

-Allen

Allen-

Here's what the regs for MA2 say for the past season say-

Special HALIBUT Fishery: Those waters from 47°25.00'
N. latitude (Queets River) south to 46°58.00'N. latitude
and east of 124°30.00'W. longitude are open to HALIBUT
fishing 4 days a week (Fri.-Sun. and Tues.) during open
season

The regular season was May 1- quota or Sept. 1, whichever came first. The south coast areas are usually slow to hit quota.

I believe this extends S into OR; but I think I remember inshore being defined as 2 miles from the beach.

Of course there is also the Canadian butt fishery out of Neah Bay.  PITA to gets licenses though.

-Allen

I've done the license PITA. Might as well stay and go to Sombrio!

Pole, have you caught albacore out of a yak?  If so, how did you do it? When I trolled for them either with hand lines or rods with clones, feathers or swim baits it was a FAST troll, like 4-7 knots.  I'm sure Zee can peddle that fast but my fish and dive is not a speedy platform.  I think it could be very very cool or very very frustrating.  Butts would be more of a sure thing, set up the drift deploy yaks and get picked up at the end of the drift with your catch.

Pole, have you caught albacore out of a yak?  If so, how did you do it? When I trolled for them either with hand lines or rods with clones, feathers or swim baits it was a FAST troll, like 4-7 knots.  I'm sure Zee can peddle that fast but my fish and dive is not a speedy platform.  I think it could be very very cool or very very frustrating.  Butts would be more of a sure thing, set up the drift deploy yaks and get picked up at the end of the drift with your catch.

I have not caught albacore off a yak.  I have caught them on swimbaits on the slow troll.  I've also caught them chumming dead bait until a school came up.  Also mooching bait on deep marks and jigging irons on deep marks too.  Lots of "slow" presentations work once you find marks.  Otherwise, like you say, it can be slow and far between.  In the late 90's and early 2000's I'd get out after tuna maybe 8-10 times a year until it went dead in the Bay Area.  Of course I moved back to Seattle about that time so I didn't miss much.

Of course, every now and then you get lucky, like finding a school under working birds and keeping them chummed up for a 4 hour bait stop.  Late season is better for this situation as the tuna seem to switch over to baitfish and a chumslick can really keep 'em close.  Can you imagine that off a kayak?

-Allen

That sounds like it would work, especially if the mothership put you right on the fish.  It is amazing what the options are when you look at things with a different lens.  Wish I had caught the yak bug while I had my boat. 
I could have carried four yaks with no problems. It would have made tuna fishing more interesting but not any cheaper, I sold the boat as fuel climbed toward the four dollar mark which made a full tank of gas almost 600 bucks and was good for two trips

Yeah, the way I envision this is that the mothership would have to go into search mode with troll lines until a decent concentration was found.  Don't count on getting the yaks in the water fast on a hookup though.  3 minutes per yak would be quick.  So we'd need to be sure that the albies are around otherwise we'd just be wasting time.

A mothership with a big bait tank loaded up would help in chumming them up and keeping them around.  Hopefully the mothership also has a large deck too as it will get crowded with all the yaks at the ready while troll searching.

-Allen

So I talk to the local fishing charter place in the town I live in today about the hole mother ship idea and they loved it. They think it would work out well for us. In there experience they have trouble getting close to what they call jumper schools of tuna because of the size and noise of there big boat. They said they would cruise around until they find the schools of tuna and drop us off in the area and they would shadow us for the day. If the fish move out of the area they could pick us up and move us in front of them of them again. If you fill your boat up with fish they would come and pick them up and you could keep fishing. It sounds like it would be about $150to $200 per person for a full day trip. They usually go out about 12 miles or up to 50 miles to find them. The only down side is they do not set certain dates for trips. It all depends on the oceans currents to bring in the warm water. They said it would be a one or two week notice. They have three boat they use. There main boat is pretty big. We looked at it and decided it could hold up to 10 kayaks. It has a big door in the back of the deck for us to drop the yaks into the water. The town this is in is Bandon Oregon. The charter company is called Prowler charter. I'm good Friends with them and they would make me a good group deal. Anyone interested???

Definitely interested.  I'm looking for the right opportunity to set up an albacore charter somewhere in the NW.   Can you shoot me their contact info so I can check them out?

-Allen