Supposedly they are surplus springers from the Santiam system. I saw my first real nice one in the 80's, about 8 or 9 lbs. Fish and Wildlife came down to photograph it, if looked like it was fresh from the ocean with all those loose silver scales. I know a guy who used to target them a few years ago. All I know was that he would motor around quite fast until he started marking them on the graph. He would start out in the 90'-100'depth range and when he would found them he would go back and troll for them with downriggers if they were too deep to troll with weight. Not sure if he used for bait at all, but I know that he used some salmon style spoons and plugs like they use in the great lakes. Hope this helps. Mike