Wind Cleanup Info

[OR Coast Range]

So what's the scoop for the weekend? Are we meeting before we fish so we can fish together or are we meeting after the fishings done for the cleanup? Has anyone decided to bring a BBQ?

I've never fished the Wind before. What's the common setup: standard drift gear, bait under a bobber, or jigs? What's the bait of choice: roe, sand shrimp, no bait? Will 30lb monofilamint line be OK, or will I be fighting a loosing cause against everyone with their tuff line?

[4Salt]

Over the Memorial day weekend, I took a side trip to the Wind river, while fishing for shad and sturgeon below Bonneville, to see what all of the fuss was about. I fished the canyon area (where I believe the cleanup is supposed to start?) at MP 7. The river up there is a series of boulder drops, and small falls, and the current was pretty swift. I started out drift fishing bait, but the fish were stacked so thick in the slot, you couldn't get your gear to drift through, without foul-hooking a fish. So I stopped setting the hook, and would slowly raise my rod tip if I felt anything. I started hooking alot more in the mouth, but I would have to say, this wasn't my kind of fishing. I much prefer an easy drift where the current is slower, and the fish aren't stacked so thick. I was using 20lb mono mainline and leader, and it was adequate if the fish were fair hooked. If they were snagged, anything too heavy might make them difficult to break off. Drifting seemed to be the most popular technique, although sadly, it was the easiest way for some of the guys to snag fish. I'm sure that if you found the right water, floats and bait would be the way to go, but in the canyon where I was, the current was just too swift [img]images/icons/frown.gif[/img]

[superfly]

Her's the deal, pray for rain now to bring water up and suck in some fish. Fished there recently and caught 3 fish in four cast with good eggs and then went a couple hours with nothing. The canyon was empty of people and very few fish in the good spots, but enough biters to make it worth while. If it is raining on saturday it will be very dangerous getting down into the main spots to clean up because the trails are so mudded up that it is almost impossible to walk down them with out using rope to hang on too!
So we will bring rope along with the garbage bags. There is a number of other spots that we can pick up if it is to hairy for everyone. [img]images/icons/shocked.gif[/img] also bring rubber gloves, I would not want anyone touching any of this stuff with your bare hands, who knows what kind of bacteria is growing on all this crap down there. [img]images/icons/shocked.gif[/img]
I think maybe what we should do is meet early, decide were to fish and clean up, go into designated places fish for a couple of hours, then pick up as muchtrash as we can carry, then hike out, take trash to hatchery and dump it there and then weather permitting have a barbecue in the early afternoon and call it a day [img]images/icons/tongue.gif[/img]
Peace Superfly

I, too, have not been there and quite frankly I haven't fished for chinooks for a couple three four years now and might admittedly be a bit of a greenhorn. Mind you, I've fished since I was 7 (about 4 years now... [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img]) so I'm not a fishing novice by any stretch of the imagination.

If anyone would like to take me under their proverbial wing that would be great. I'm currently strung up with 24lb Spiderwire Fusion and a fine complement of jigs but can switch to bait if necessary. Any shared info would be greatly appreciated.

[ 06-12-2001: Message edited by: fobbman ]

[parker]

Sorry everyone, but I have a wedding to attend to this weekend and can't make the clean up, but here's what I would use to fish the Wind.

A good *stout* rod. KidSauk had is GL3 1143 busted on a 30lb king. Those springers will just abuse your normal steelhead rod. Go heavy.

50-65 lb. PowerPro main Line. Or equivalent. Why? You need to keep the fish under control at all times. People get very angry when you allow your fish to take up the entire whole. Tight drags, and heavy lines are the norm.

2/0 or 3/0 <ahum> Vision Hooks </ahum> tied on 20-25lb mono leader. You will *not* need more then an 18" leader! Any longer then that and you'll end up flossing a lot of fish. Bring plenty of pre-tied leaders. Expect to lose a bunch.

Ditch the corkies and yarn. Bring bait. Lots of it. Lots of good shrimp and *good* eggs. Use golf-ball clumps of eggs. If the fish are truly biting, you'll only need bait. Anything else and you start approaching that whole snagging issue.

Use a sliding lead technique and drift fish. You'll end up using a good 3-4" on 1/4" pencil lead at a shot. Bring plenty.

If you can get enough guys in one spot, you could switch over to floats. The only real problem is with everyone casting, floats tend to get in the way.

Finally, when these fish are biting, they tend to really chew hard on the bait. It's really easy to tell when you actually have fish chewing away on your bait. You will constantly feel the small "tap tap" of a fish nudging your line. Setting the hook will hook the fish, but in the arse, not the mouth!

Hope that helps. Email meprivately if you want more details or answers. Wish I could be there.