2013-09-15 Even More Silver Fishing

Lisa and I still needed just a few more fish to reach what we feel we need for the winter.
Last year we had a place in Klawock can the large majority of our fish and we are hoping to be able to do that again this year. 

It was just Lisa and the puppy Bambina ('Bina) and myself onboard today.

We headed for our usual trolling grounds North of town and got our lines in the water.

The weather was foggy and cool to start and I was wearing a sweatshirt on deck.  An hour later I was down to a T-shirt as the fog had cleared and the sun had come through.

We ended up trolling only about 3 hours and boated 5 nice fat Silvers, and called it good at that.  No Pinks landed, but we did end up with a few shaker Kings which of course we pitched back.

We stopped at the fuel dock on the way back in and fueled up.  These short little salmon fishing trips don't burn much fuel but eventually you have to pay the piper.

This may be the end of salt water fishing for us this year. We'll see how the weather holds up for the rest of the month.  I traditionally take my salt water fishing gear off the boat around the end of September. The weather starts deteriorating, the fish disappear, and the daylight hours take a dive, so it's time to shift gears.

2013-09-08 More Silver Fishing

Today I took out Ryan's relatives who were in town for about a week.
Let's see if I can get their names and relationships right.

     Hal - Grandfather
     Don - Uncle
     Terry - Uncle

We started trolling in my usual spot just North of town in sunny and calm conditions.
We had left my raft at the stall so we had more room to work the fish from the swim step.
That also allows us to run a third line from the middle rod holder if we want, which we really can't do if the raft is there.

This time of year the hope is that the fishing will be so hot that you couldn't keep a third line in the water if you wanted to.

Ryan and his family were a great crew, working the gear all day.  All I had to do was steer.

After a pretty good haul of Silvers, (and a few Pinks which we pitched), we stopped out by Guard Island and anchored for some bottom fishing.  I couldn't believe it when Don hooked a small halibut within less than a minute of dropping down.  I told him I've spent hours trying to get a halibut so that was definitely not fair.  Unfortunately that was the only halibut we got.  The sharks and the turbot we in abundant supply though.

We came in with a mediocre haul, not as much as I had hoped for.

2013-09-02 Silver fishing

This post will be short and sweet as well.

Labor Day weekend is traditionally a time when we try to get out away from town for a few days, but this year I had to work Saturday and Sunday.  Fortunately we wrapped up our work Sunday afternoon so I was able to get out for some salmon fishing on Monday.

The crew for this trip consisted of wife Lisa, and the two grandsons Tyler (9) and Bryan (7).  And Cristina's boyfriend Ryan.  Today was Tyler's 9th birthday!

And we also had our puppy Bambina ('Bina) on board today as well.

We had one goal for the day and that was to get as many Silvers in the boat as possible.  It's that time of year when we try to fill our freezer with salmon to last over the long winter.

We did not go far from town, and just trolled two lines from the downriggers.  Ryan rigged all the gear and worked the downriggers all day long and did a good job at it.  When a fish hit we would all scramble with different people taking turns on the rod or on the net.  We did lose a few but for the most part got all of them in that hit.  We also got a few shakers (under sized Kings) which of course we shake off.

We didn't do as well as I did on the previous salmon fishing outing, but came home with a respectable catch.

Bryan (left) Tyler (right)

Gee, I wonder who we could get to clean all these fish!

This catch got us a lot closer to our goal, but we still need some more.  Typically I try to fish right up to the end of September, and then I take the salt water gear off the boat for the season.  So we have a couple of weekends left to get a few more fish.