Salty Dogs,
Wow, what a weekend. Fished out of Newport on sat for halibut. Started the day fishing Harrison's Ridge with about 100 other boats!!! Caught 1 34" keeper in 2 hours. We were about to run out to the Ranch when Fishdispatcher called out a big fish (63") and some numbers. We headed up with several other ifishers. On our first drift we got nothing...checked the numbers again and repositioned. Got a double on that drift (went right over his numbers), then two more on the next drift...including a 56 incher that was truely a monster! It was my buddy Nico's first halibut and biggest fish of his life...he joked that the bait that we were using was bigger than the trout we caught the day before
It was an epic battle, totally working him and taking several long runs. As the fish came up to the boat I quickly put away the net and grabbed the gaff (wishing I had the flying variety). As we shouted about the size of this monster, my dad grabbed the second gaff. I reached out and sunk the gaff deep into the head of the 80+ pound fish. As I tried to pull it in, it took off and dragged me to the corner of the boat, nearly pulling me in. It then began to twist and shout, nearly dislodging the gaff. Just as the my gaff began to fall out, my pop came out of nowhere and stuck the gaff into its cheek and, in one motion, dragged it onto the boat on top of him. Quite a feat for a 69 year old dude!!! The fish went bezerk on the boat, we pulled my pop out from underneath him and beat the snot out of it until it stopped moving. We screamed and yelled, high fives all around. Amazing fish. A true monster of the ocean. Thanks again Fishdispatcher for calling us in. That is what the salty dogs are all about. I gave out those numbers several more times that day (I hope that was ok fishdispatcher) and those ifishers caught nice fish there too. Tried for salmon for a few hours, for only a small shaker. Ohwell, it was still an epic day!
Fished Sunday for TUNA! out of Depoe Bay. Camped out in the parking lot and got good fish reports from Pilar and Sea Lion. Headed out the next morning at 5 a.m. on a 275. Hit 59 degree water at 10 miles, but continued on to 20 miles, where the water was 63! Had our first hook up at 25 miles, but were wondering why it was fighting so weird. Turned out to be a blue shark hooked in the tail. Good luck or bad luck I figured...turned out to be good.
Continued trolling West and had a jig strick at 32 miles, did a crazy Ivan and caught our first fish. We continued trolling West, hooking fish every 20-30 minutes. At 40 we turned S (heading to where we thought mountainview was[fix your gps]) and conituned to pick up fish here and there. At 1 o'clock, with the breeze beginning to blow, we began to head back to Depoe. We continued to catch fish here and there, with our last fish coming at 23 miles from Depoe Bay (we trolled in to 15).
It was a strange day on the water. I have never fished such warm water for albacore. I usually fish the 59 degree water and go no further. The water all day ranged from 63-63.6. We caught our fish around no temp breaks, no current seems, and saw no jumpers. All of our fish were blind jig strikes! We caught 11 fish for the day, from 15 to 30 pounds. We had no fish on the handlines and only one on the short lines (unfortunately I didn't start putting the corner rods farther back until later, we almost immediately had a hook up). 4 fish came on a cedar plug fished way back, 5 on a swimbait, and 2 on a clone fished long. My first albacore on swimbaits. Thanks again MarkMC for the tutorial last year.
My buddy Nico caught the biggest fish of the day again (he also caught a 20 pound chinook last week). It totally kicked his butt and his forearms were burning, despite my encouragement to keep his arms straight and "Pull on that thing, Nico!!!!" However, the fish of the day was one that I saw strike..or should I saw, sip a fish trap. My pa was fighting a nice albie and I was about to gaff it. We leave the lures on the outriggers in the water to save time on resetting the lures. The fishtrap was hanging in the water about 5 feet deep, moving up and down with the motion of the boat bobbing in the ocean. As I was about to gaff the fish, I look over and see something swimming towards the swimbait. At first I thought it was a blue shark (we saw several that day), but then I saw it was a TUNA! and it cruised right up and sipped up that swimbait in a very casual manner. It looked like a trout! It then sped off, I yelled at Nico to grab the rod (I get kinda excited out there sometimes) and set the hook. He didn't need to, as the drag was peeling off the reel. Epic! I gaffed my pa's fish, after untangling the lines, and, about 5 minutes later, Nico landed his fish. Very cool.
Called out to Salty Dogs all day, only talked to Mountain View (where are you), El Shaddai, and someone else. El Shaddai killed them (45?). Met Les at the launching ramp and we congratulated each other on our catch. Good to meet you. Also met Marty at the cleaning station. Thanks again for the extra bags and ice Marty. It was a pleasure meeting you too.
I'll only say one word about this, but a 18 foot open bow river boat has no business going 60+ miles out, no matter how good the fishing. Just because you are a Satly Dog, don't expect us to save your ass!
Great weekend on the big pond. I'm heading back home (Grover Beach), but hope to fish with many of you again in the future. The Salty Dogs are a special group and the fishing off of the Oregon Coast is something special.
best fishes,
steve
Big Halibut Sat/ Tuna Sunday
Phil Layer
After we joined you, we had a double on as soon as we got to the bottom. Ended tagging out the four of us in about 30 minutes. 
Linear Mode
