Springer Tactics????

[5-Cents]

To all you springer pros... what tactics to you use to take these fish? [img]graemlins/1zhelp.gif[/img]

I got my sled in June and absolutely cleaned up on fall spotty tails on the CR with a little help from you guys :grin: now I need to know what tactics work for the spring run.

No need to be giving up spots, just what has worked for you in the past, trolling, fishing off anchor etc... I think it would help some other ifishers along as well.

Thanks!

Fishin' again huh Shane? :tongue:

[5-Cents]

******,

Not quite the reply I was looking for from you oh great fisher of the mighty Columbia

[Drachir]

I personally prefer anchor fishing. I like to use a double set-up. I will usually use a prawn spinner on the bottom & a small spinner on the top. I use a 4' dropper & 4' leader on the bottom, and 2' up from the spreader is my top outfit. Last season, the top spinner got more fish than the prawn spinner. Just my 2 cents worth, Good Luck!!!

[ 07-14-2003, 01:32 PM: Message edited by: ****** ]

[Hogmaster]

First, get a new boat. That other one is old and not the right kind.

Second, hire a guide like DJ, unless you have a secret plan on how to get an invite from the mighty, like the Nanookster, FM, FWF1 or one of the other true salmon slayers of our time.

Third, fish only downstream of downtown but upstream of Swan Island if you are fishing the Willamette. Shhhh - this is where all the fish are but nobody knows it and that is why nobody fishes there...

Fourth, when you finally take out your new Willie, only go when you can take Mrs Nickle. She will spank you so often you will finally go back to sturgeon fishing. And she will outfish you too! :grin:

Fifth. Always. One with a name works well. Like Jim, Jack or Johnny.



[ 01-02-2003, 02:24 PM: Message edited by: Hogmaster ]

[ 07-14-2003, 01:32 PM: Message edited by: ****** ]

[fishing is life]

hi Shane, at the mouth of the mult channel in the columbia people like to troll spinners, prawn/spinner, and herring all on a spreader/3 way with lead dropper. same thing goes for the channel and the willamette itself. below bonnie i like sardine wrapped kwikies with a jumbo jet diver with the dropper. i like to backbounce when it is not too crowded. now go get those things that are splashing around.

[KingFisher85]

I do good plunking for them with a green spin go with eggs and shrimp. But what I really do good on is bobber and egg with some shrimp sent. Both set ups I use 6 foot leaders.

[Chris Nordling]

Plunkin spin glos :grin:



I think you'll find that the water will be different to fish. Run-offs from the mountain, spring rains, etc.... will all determine water clarity. It's sometimes a little tougher in the spring to get those fish to bite. High current flows are a factor too.

Basically I find it comes down to combining all of your other fishing knowledge from different seasons. What you learn now in high water ,will surely benefit you in the springtime. Paying attention to the tides, like fall chinook fishing will benefit you as well. And if it's a low clear spring, your experiences from last summer could come into play.

As far as techniques go, that will depend on the above. Different times of the year will produce fish on different techniques. It helps to know when to use bait , hardware, when to backbounce and where, when to use bobbers etc...... I think that water temperature might affect what they hit. But that's just my .02. They'll hit kwikies, wobblers, spinners, spinner prawns, etc..all from anchor or troll.

If you fish the Willamette, be prepared for crowds in small places. Lots of boats, and lots of guys going 65 mph when they don't have to. It's a zoo, but surely worth it.

Oh yeah, last year someone ( FM ) was saying something about herring and 14 pulls 4 oz or something. Not my style, but surely effective.

Springers are tough to come by for the most part, so don't get discouraged. If you can put in the hours to go, I'm sure you'll find fish.

Good Luck !

Chris

[ 01-02-2003, 03:07 PM: Message edited by: FWF1 ]

[ 07-14-2003, 01:32 PM: Message edited by: ****** ]

Going Springer fishing with FWF1 would be an excellent choice as well. [img]graemlins/hearton.gif[/img]

[ 01-02-2003, 03:23 PM: Message edited by: ****** ]

[Chris Nordling]

Wind isn't blowing from the right direction :shocked: :shocked:

Chris

( thanks :blush: )

[ 01-02-2003, 03:16 PM: Message edited by: FWF1 ]

[Uglygreen]

Most important - water temprature.

Below 50 degrees - use bait, prawn spinners, sandshrimp and spinglo, etc....

Above 54 degees - use hardware, spinners, spoons, alvins, and quickfish.

I like to fish sandshrimp and spinglows cause I tend to hook a lot of late winter / early summer steelhead while springer fishing.

Favorites -

Multnoham Channel - trolling cut plug herring on the head of the tide. Baitwrap quickfish and prawn spinners on the anchor (outgoing).

Sellwood - early AM troll of cut plug herring

Oregon City - (cold water) backtroll bait on jet diver. (warmer water) backtroll quickfish on jet diver.

OC Hogline - (cold water) prawn spinner, (warm water) alvin.

Bonneville - (coldwater) sandshrimp / spinglow or prawn spinner - (warm water) bait wraped quickfish. If flows (and crowds) allow backbounce eggs.

Think shallower for springers than fall fish - I do real well in 15 - 18 feet of water, especially early in the season.

If your interested let me know and we can hookup aroud March.

UG

[fishdog]

Keep your spin glo or flat fish in 10 to 15 ft. of
water and you catch all spinger's you need.
From Astoria to the Willamette river.

Good fishen Arch

[ 01-02-2003, 03:36 PM: Message edited by: fishdog7 ]

[KingFisher85]

Now I got a good way to plunk a flat fish from the bank, its a really good way and it keeps it off the bottom and keeps it moving. Now I do most of all my plunking out on the lewis river and I see guys getting them spriggers with herring, so should I maybe tie a herring on to my flat fish or a Prawn or eggs?
Thanks for any info on this.

[ 07-14-2003, 01:34 PM: Message edited by: ****** ]

[hack2ee]

RAINBOW SPINNERS! dropper spreader with about 4 feet of leader to spinner. weight varies. also, anchoring with quickfish and wiggle warts. wiggle warts in orange and hot pinlk or red seem to work best most of the time.

[5-Cents]

Ok this is sounding goooood now :grin: :grin:

UG and ****** I have seen waaaaay too many pictures of you guys hefting huge pigs to turn you down on those offers so count me in when the time is right

Excellent information from all of you guys except for that Hogmaster character who must be peekin in my window at night seeing my wife spanking me, oh you mean fishing :shocked: :shocked:

BTW Hogmaster please call the wife 7-Cents (thats 5-Cents plus her 2 Cents )

Keep the info rolling I am sure that a lot of people are benefiting from this!

[norms gone fishing too]

well kingfisher85 just how do you do that??
if you don't mind you can email with the info if you please

norm

[norms gone fishing too]

double double post post

[ 01-02-2003, 09:56 PM: Message edited by: crabbait ]

[k9jeff]

Willamette,, troll prawns my brother,,,,,they have to be soaked in K9Jeff's secret sauce.... I Know I kept that egg juice run off for a reason......They also need to spin a special way,

Watch the temp,, 50 is the switch temp from bait to hardware for me...anything close to 50 and I will rig double just to make sure sometimes.

I cant wait,,,I get the shakes thinking about it. Steelhead is fun,, but there is nothing like the smell of 2 stroke exhaust, warm coffee and the cool breeze to make ya feel like a hee man!!!!! :grin:

[Hogmaster]

OK, buffalo, I'll call her 7 cents.

Huh? I thought my tips were great! Especially the fifth one! :grin:

I'd tell you some real tips but heck, I never catch springers. Nope, not me. :grin: :grin: :grin:

OK, here's one: Get a hook file and learn to use it!

[KingFisher85]

norms gone fishing
you got mail

[reeldick]

Watchout while on the Wilamette, Hogmaster has that telescpoe in his back room so he can keep track of what everyone is doing around Clackamette Park and the garbage hole.

[Jettin' Fool]

We did well on the Multnohma Channel last year around Gilbert launch. The key to catching fish here is trolling DOWN STREAM. Make your pass and fly back to the top and do it again. 90% of the fish we caught and saw caught were on the downstream.

Ive said to much.........

[garyk]

Indeed you have Jett'in Fool....

And had you mentioned that when it warmed they would also hit shallow running, whole-rigged sardines, you would have said way, tooooo much.

BTW Jett'in what boat were you in?

[Jettin' Fool]

Dark Green North River with 15hp Yamaha kicker. Please dont throw things at me :grin:

And You??

[garyk]

Usually we were using our 179 Hewescraft Searunner w/ black trim, a couple Hondas on the back and a German Shepherd or Wirehair on the front for some bow ballast.

No problemo with the downhill run tip. It seemed the traffic pattern went very smoothly.

And you know, while downhill worked for most folks, I still remember a day we went hitless and back at the ramp eyeballing three beauties that the guy in the big 22' black Alumaweld sled caught - I believe all taken going upstream. Go figure.

[ 07-14-2003, 01:34 PM: Message edited by: ****** ]

[Scott B]

The only thing I can give here is that ever springer that I have hooked and landed which is approx. 7 of them have all come on prawns, with a spinner blade. I also troll upstream, with a set of sea anchors. You barely move and more often than not you are going backwards. This happens near Sellwood. Good luck.

[garyk]

Thanks for the link ******, that was fun!

Jet'n Fool, I seem to remember a boat like you described, with several people aboard, that liked to anchor-up below Coon Island. Was that you?

[Jettin' Fool]

I did achor up once in that slot where it shallows up. Thought we would give that shelf a go while we ate some grub. But maybe that wasnt me as there were only 2 of us in the boat and that was the only time we did that. My buddy has a Trophy named 401k that has that area dialed in along with several other locations. Cant wait for Spring!!

Fool

[Jettin' Fool]

******, Have you seen the video the author is talking about? Sounds interesting.

Fool

[kodiakfisher]

In order to catch salmon with frequency you have to understand why you are doing what you are doing, and why the salmon might strike your offering. [img]graemlins/idea.gif[/img]

Just putting out some bait with a spin and glow will catch fish, but...if fish haven't entered their native water they're probably still feeding on small bait fish like smelt so something that imitates this food like alvins, diver and bait, kwikfish would do fine. Size may be dependant on water clarity. It's more often the virbration put out by a particular bait that is the attraction. I have heard over and over that I fished such and such color next to this slight variation and I killed them and they didn't. Fish don't see color very far, they feel vibrations farther than they see here is the proof you can catch salmon in pitch dark with the correct action in this case color didn't matter. I will also say that on Kodiak a particular color spinner will work a few times and then stop and in some cases all that is needed is for these fish to see a different color. I know I know contradictons contradictons this is why we love fishing so much!! :grin:

Once fish enter their "native" waters they will pick up eggs with higher frequency why this is open to much debate. A few schools of thought is they are returning the eggs to the beds out of habit thus mouthing them, another thought is they are killing the eggs to ensure their genes are passed on, and yet another they just like them and will pick them up so who cares. Also hot shots and invader/irritant lures are also great options. I have seen salmon move to take eggs and have seen the move out of the way of irritant lures and vice versa I have yet to figure this one out. Maybe some more tide, moon, water temp research is in order Nah as long as I can enjoy fishing and put fish in the freezer this is all that matters to me.

Some may say this was helpful and others may find this not helpful at all. Bottom line make sure you know why you're doing what you're doing and you will catch fish if not more fish.

Yeah I'm feeling great about fishing today because I caught an oversize 8.5ft sturgeon with fish_on today!