Dropped pots Saturday morning and bobbed around with others waiting for the bar to open. Jigged herring a bit and picked up one here and there. We told stories about big halibut while we waited.
With the bar restricted to boats greater than 26 feet, we gave up on the halibut run and headed up river. We began trolling just above the boat wreck but found ourselves in way too much weed. So, we headed up to the oyster farm. Although we were in sunshine in the middle of the river, I had to turn on my GPS for a quick check. I was convinced I was at Buoy 10! Dang, there were a bunch of boats up there.
After three hours of not seeing a net fly, we reeled in and headed back to the bay and the fog and pulled our pots. We had lots of just under legal males and ten keepers. Very few were females. We used chicken legs for bait.
On Sunday, we dropped pots on the way out. Stoyjun Princess and I ran south to 200 foot water off of Seal Rock. I dropped my downrigger to 120 feet and she fished on a diver. We had flashers and purple herring on RSKs. Ten minutes into our troll, my rod went off but I lost him after a few minutes of tugging. Then, Princess brought a nice, fat native coho to the boat. She followed that with a small Chinook that went in the box. Then, she brought another coho to the boat…then another. I lost three more off the downrigger (dang barbless hooks!) but did get a hookup while frantically reeling my rod in to get it out of Princess’ way.
All in all, we probably hooked 15 fish but only one make its way to the box. We saw lots of fish caught although the fish checker would tell me later they were all small ones that day – 24 to 30 inches in length.
We heard someone haling Stoyjun Princess on 78 but the signal was weak. We thought it sounded like Pilar but it couldn’t have been. He was in bed with his foot elevated.
This was the first trip out with my boat since a rebuild on my main motor and a new kicker. I found a few new problems with the boat but the motors ran great.
With fooling with my kicker, manning the downrigger and inspecting the boat, I didn’t really pay much attention to trolling directions. I just tried to stay in water greater than 180 feet. When we decided to head in at noon, I checked my GPS and discovered we were just outside the jaws! There must have been quite a northerly push out there to get me all the way back from Seal Rock like that.
Phil Layer
Newport Nook Report - 9/27 & 28
Linear Mode
