ten feet off the bottom

[KarenLee]

I've got a question for anyone to repond to. When fishing in the sfternoons, on the low slack in the columbia, from St Helens to Gobel, I find holes that are 60 to 80 feet deep with fish hanging ten to twenty feet off the bottom. I don't know if all these are sturgeon, or walleye or ????
I've been told salmon won't go that deep??
They appear to be schools. tons of fish on the finder. Happened again today at near gobel and has occured along Columbia City.

Any Ideas, thought of trying a walleye rig with worm just to see if I get a hit.

Just call me interested.

[Capin' Dan]

Kathy, pull a spinner through there and you'll find out. They are giant Kings in the 9 to 13 inch range. Just kidding about the spinner we have to respect these little guys and when they start showing up try and find a lure that they will not bite. We killed one by accident last week spinner hooked in the gills, fairly sure he didn't make it, really made me feel bad. They could also be panfish but there are tons of smolt around right now. [img]images/icons/frown.gif[/img] [img]images/icons/frown.gif[/img]

[ZaQ]

As far as salmon going that deep, I was up in the Sound a couple of years go jigging crippled herring off my friends boat. I hooked and landed a chinook at about 120 feet. I think they do go that deep. In Sitka we were fishing for them around 200 feet. BUT!, the Columbia might be a different song all together.
The pic of that fish I caught in the Sound is on my web page. http://zaq.4mg.com

[Pete]

Last year I was fishing for sturgeon in 60 feet on the Columbia side of Warrior point when we thought another shaker was on our smelt. We handed the rod to the 10 year old. 3 minutes later the river exploded with 32 pounds of silver fury and soon landed the fine buck. Pictorial evidence is in the photo gallery.

[Fish4Fun]

Do Salmon go deep? Here is what we found a couple weeks ago in Elliot Bay in Seattle. 195 feet of water, 220 feet of downrigger cable out and a 12 pound Blackmouth to show for it. [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

[Pilar]

This happens at the Rockpile off of Newport too. 180 foot of water and spotty tail fish from 120 to 150 feet. I think the nookies go wherever the hell they want to.

The bend is your friend!

[Big Nook]

For years I fished springers at the mouth of the M Channel and the Columbia (when open) at 12-14 pulls, no matter how deep the water was. On the last day the Columbia was open several years ago I was trolling out in the channel just east of Sand Island. One of the fellas with me hooked and lost a springer. He said he'd "just hit the bottom and came up three cranks." I said impossible because we're in 42 feet of water. Dick said he was just running up and down the column (being an old blackmouth fisherman, he knew no better) Anyhow I believed him and we put on 6 oz and all three of us soaked our herring on the bottom of the shipping channel. We picked up 3 more in an hour and a half doing that. When the tide slacked, they turned off and we had to move into shallow water to get the other 3. It was a fantastic day. I've never hit them on the bottom since but always give it a try if nothing else is happening. Maybe we just hit a bunch of fish moving through. But I suspect the upriver-bound fish do occassionally hunker down on the bottom when the Columbia is running out hard. Give it a try sometime. Good luck!

[V. Green]

I have no idea of how deep salmon will go, but I can tell you what I witnessed off the ORegon Coast.

During the 80's while commercial fishing, my Dad and I went 20 plus miles off of Tillamook and sent two of our deep lines down to 80 fathoms (480'), and were catching 10lbs brown bass and large chinook off of the bottom spreads 60-80 fathoms. We were using a silver canadian spoon off the canonball and plugs and/or bait on the other lines.

I only know the depth because this was so much different than the 30 fathom (180')depth we normally fished. We would normally catch chinook at the 20-30 fathom mark and silvers from the top to 20 fathom line.

Note for those not familiar with commercial fishing:
Fathom=6'
Spreads=the number of lines hooked to a commercial fishing cable. Normally we would fish one line every 12' on the main cable.

Just my experience,
V. Green
nwfish@angelfire.com

[KarenLee]

Hey guys, thanks for the responses. When I was told salmon don't go deep, They were refering to the columbia. Do you think these might be salmon down in the bottom ten feet of an 80 ft. hole. Some are marked as large on the ol fish lier. Could this be schools of smults. If they are keeper size salmon, what lures or bait presentaion should I try.

I'm going back to troll a earthworm on some walleye riggs to rule in/out walleye. I would like to catch some of whatever they are. I did pull two shaker sturgeon out of the hole on smelt. Could this be a school of sturgeon babies. Remember, I'm finding this phenomenom at low slack, rocky bottoms in deep holes.

Cheers [img]images/icons/confused.gif[/img]