Richmond Beach report ... slow

My report from Richmond beach is the same as Bobarino's from Pt. Defiance.

SLOW.

Trolled a hoochie behind a flasher on a 5 oz banana weight, then a Coyote for a couple of hours last night (Wednesday) and nothing.  A few bait balls at various depths and various locations in the water column.  Trolling through them and .... nothing.  Lots of green, gooey schmutz in the water. 

Did get two keeper crabs when I checked the traps after a 90 minute soak.  Will probably troll again Friday evening and/or Saturday when I go out to check/rebait/collect the traps.

Thanks for the report DN.
A few tips. Use a spinning flasher (Kone Zone etc.) and a spoon (Sonic Edge, Coyote etc.) when using a banana sinker or diver. They put out a lot less drag so you can get deeper. Deep is the same of the salmon game.

Also, pull up and check your gear about every 10-15 min. There's lots of junk that can get on your gear and once it's stuck you won't be fishing anymore. Especially jellyfish. Do a thorough cleaning if you see any jelly snot on your gear.

Z

D,

how are you getting away with only 5 ounces?  i had a 10 ounce slip weight on last night with a konezone and hoochie and still couldn't get better than about a 60° angle on my line.  i had 130 feet of line out but was probably only 40 or 50 feet deep.  what am i doing wrong?  i picked up a diver to try next time out.  hope that helps.

Bobby

D,

how are you getting away with only 5 ounces?  i had a 10 ounce slip weight on last night with a konezone and hoochie and still couldn't get better than about a 60° angle on my line.  i had 130 feet of line out but was probably only 40 or 50 feet deep.  what am i doing wrong?  i picked up a diver to try next time out.  hope that helps.

Bobby

You most likely won't get better than that w/ a diver. The physics of trolling w/ divers on a kayak are totally against us. If you're gonna use a sinker I'd suggest mooching herring (no flasher) over trolling gear. The diver will work but the best guess on how deep you can get at 2 mph is probably 70 feet or so.

Read this for more on the subject: http://www.northwestkayakanglers.com/index.php/topic,795.0.html

Z

how are you getting away with only 5 ounces?  i had a 10 ounce slip weight on last night with a konezone and hoochie and still couldn't get better than about a 60° angle on my line.  i had 130 feet of line out but was probably only 40 or 50 feet deep.  what am i doing wrong?  i picked up a diver to try next time out.  hope that helps.

Remember your GPS speed is not water speed.  I've not been using a flasher with a spoon.  With a hoochie I'm trolling about 1-1.5 knots (finger in the water test) with a Kone Zone and trying to maintain a 45-60 degree intersection with the horizontal.  That gives me a 1.4 to 1.7 ratio for line out to trolling depth.  I rule-of-thumb it at 1.5x.  If I want 80 feet of depth I need 120 feet of line.  A 30 degree line angle gives a 2.0 ratio - a 60 foot depth needs 120 feet of line out.  I can drop my sinker vertically along side the transducer and see it on the FF to set my line out or I make 3 foot line strips.

Also, pull up and check your gear about every 10-15 min. There's lots of junk that can get on your gear and once it's stuck you won't be fishing anymore. Especially jellyfish. Do a thorough cleaning if you see any jelly snot on your gear.

Jellyfish snot is a pain.  Earlier in the year off Richmond Beach there appeared to be a massive bloom or migration of large jellyfish (globular with yellow centers), and I wonder if all the surface scum I am seeing is dead jellyfish collecting other junk and forming a floating green goop.  

I keep seeing postings about hootchies with Kone Zones.  That doesn't make sense to me.  You need to action of a rotating flasher (or swinging dodger) to get the most out of a hootchie.

Also, you can slow down to go deeper.  If you do, check the action on your lure.  Some don't work well at slower speeds.  But at 1 knot, I would think a dodger and a hootchie on a shorter leader would work fine.  Or troll a cut plug.  Many a fine salmon has fallen to trooching (trolling + mooching), or motor mooching as we used to do it.

-Allen 

I keep seeing postings about hootchies with Kone Zones.  That doesn't make sense to me.  You need to action of a rotating flasher (or swinging dodger) to get the most out of a hootchie.

-Allen 

If you clip your leader in on the outter most hole, you'll get a rotating action on your lure (you need to use a little shorter leader so action isn't dampened by leader length). 
You get a much more exagerated rotation if you clip the Konezone in backward (wide end forward).  This will give you a little more resistance but not as much as a similarly sized dodger.

D,

how are you getting away with only 5 ounces?  i had a 10 ounce slip weight on last night with a konezone and hoochie and still couldn't get better than about a 60° angle on my line.  i had 130 feet of line out but was probably only 40 or 50 feet deep.  what am i doing wrong?  i picked up a diver to try next time out.  hope that helps.

Bobby

How fast are you trolling?  Pinks and Chinook like a slow troll (< 2MPH)

I keep seeing postings about hootchies with Kone Zones.  That doesn't make sense to me.  You need to action of a rotating flasher (or swinging dodger) to get the most out of a hootchie.

-Allen 

If you clip your leader in on the outter most hole, you'll get a rotating action on your lure (you need to use a little shorter leader so action isn't dampened by leader length). 
You get a much more exagerated rotation if you clip the Konezone in backward (wide end forward).  This will give you a little more resistance but not as much as a similarly sized dodger.

Ahhh ... now that makes sense.  I've only ever used Kone Zones with cutplugs.

-Allen

How fast are you trolling?  Pinks and Chinook like a slow troll (< 2MPH)

i was doing between 1.5 and 2 mph ground speed but i couldn't get a real good judgment on the water speed.  too fast apparently. i guess i should focus more on keeping the line at the angle i want more so than ground speed.  i think that's a better way to judge how fast i should be going.

Bobby

How fast are you trolling?  Pinks and Chinook like a slow troll (< 2MPH)

i was doing between 1.5 and 2 mph ground speed but i couldn't get a real good judgment on the water speed.  too fast apparently. i guess i should focus more on keeping the line at the angle i want more so than ground speed.  i think that's a better way to judge how fast i should be going.

Bobby

I find it hard to troll slower than 2 mph.  I need to consciously slow my strokes down.

For pinks ... as slow as you can stand and still keep your dodger wobbling.

-Allen

i had to do the same thing. my normal cadence produced a line that was damn near parallel to the water.  had to do a stroke, pause, stroke, pause kind of thing.  that got the line back to about 60° i probably could have slowed down to less than 1mph GS and still been ok with water speed.  i'm still learnin'.  still lots to figure out.  i'm going to do some more jigging around the bait balls at the point next time too. 

Bobby

Judging how fast you're going takes a really long time on the water to figure out. Although speed can be important I think it takes the backseat to depth. You can be trolling a bit slow or fast and fish will still bite. But if you're gear is 40' above where the salmon are it doesn't matter how fast you're going.

Z

Judging how fast you're going takes a really long time on the water to figure out. Although speed can be important I think it takes the backseat to depth. You can be trolling a bit slow or fast and fish will still bite. But if you're gear is 40' above where the salmon are it doesn't matter how fast you're going. 

Good advice.  Zee, how do you guess at what depth the salmon are?  Bait balls, fish reports, fish arches, move bait up/down the water column, ...?

1 kt is a a very, very slow walk, about 6000 ft/hour, 100 ft/min, less than 2 ft/sec.  You can crawl faster than that.  A gentle wind on still water could move you at that trolling speed.  Water speed can be judged by how fast you pass floating stuff, on the surface, and as far down as you can see.  A finger in the water can also help.  If your finger pushes a white capped "bow wave" - slow down. 

Good advice.  Zee, how do you guess at what depth the salmon are?  Bait balls, fish reports, fish arches, move bait up/down the water column, ...?

You should see them as arcs. Problem is getting your gear to the depth they're at. Using a diver etc. is nice and simple but always a guessing game. You'll never know for sure. That's why I rock the downrigger.

Z

Trolled Richmond Beach again yesterday afternoon/evening for a couple of hours - no luck.  A few PBs were also out, but I didn't see anything caught.  Fished in 60-200 feet of water at various depths with a 4" pink UV hoochie with 6" Kone Zone then a Coyote sans the flasher.  Not much bait, some fish arches in the bottom half of the water water column, and a lot of snot and goop in the water. 

Skunked on crabs, not even starfish.  Bait almost untouched.  Traps came up with a lot of clinging kelp and snot on the wires.  Crabs may be moving deeper as water warms and debris builds up.