Humpy or Pinks in Puget Sound

SENSEI · Posted: Sat Aug 20, 2011 12:28 am Post subject: Humpy or Pinks in Puget Sound

well, we had a wonderful day of pink fishing just south of the Mukilteo Ferry landing aka humpy hollow. we fished all day and what great weather to be on the water today.
we dropped gear and started trolling and had the first fish in the cooler 13 minutes later.
the bite was a little slow for the morning but picked up arround 11:00 am and then we had a fast and furious time for about an hour. 5 in the boat by 12:00 when the WDFW boat came along side and asked us to reel up and prepare to be boarded. we came thru with flying colors and they went on their merry way. we dropped gear and procedes to go about an hour without a hit. then about 2:00 pm the bite was on again and we fished till about 6:00 pm. 9 nice humpys and a sunburned face from all the glare.....lol......
whew, I am one tired fisherman tonite.
all in all, it was a glorius day on the water and the fish were a bonus.

rob bauerle · Posted: Sat Aug 20, 2011 10:57 am Post subject:

Boy that sounds great as I'm reading this while at work on a saturday. I can't wait till I get comfortable with my boat and get some more equipment so I can go over there next year

starcrafttom · Posted: Sat Aug 20, 2011 12:18 pm Post subject:

talked to john of johns sporting goods and he said the hummpy hollow is on fire. stay out in the middle if you go and dont bunch up at the end of the tide with the other 400 boats. I fished the river from the bank yesterday but struck out. saw some fish caught. the river is just getting started.

chromer · Posted: Sat Aug 20, 2011 8:40 pm Post subject:

Will there still be ample pinks in humpy hallow next weekend?

Salmon Fisher · Posted: Sun Aug 21, 2011 2:23 pm Post subject:

We also fished Humpy Hollow Friday and saw the crew of the Sensei. Put 6 in the box, lost a few too. Fished from 6-11 am. Got them on the old reliable mini pink squid with 2 red hooks, 12-18 leader behind a chrome or white #0 dodger trolled at 40-55 feet dead slow.
Humpies showed up Friday off Mukilteo from what the fish checker said.

Should be solid for 2+ weeks. Don't be surprised to catch a coho or two while targeting humpies!

Make sure and bleed them immediately and put on ice. Clean ASAP and you have a tasty fish for BBQ or smoke them.

I'll be out again this week!

Doryman · Posted: Sun Aug 21, 2011 3:28 pm Post subject:

Roger, et al. -- what kind of gear did you rig with?

Tom, Lori wants to try bank fishing -- what is the hot setup?

Warren

SENSEI · Posted: Sun Aug 21, 2011 5:11 pm Post subject:

Hey Warren
we were using a pink squid(hootchie) behind a white dodger.
we use a strip of hearring on the front hook and some Krill oil slathered on the dodger and hearring. we started in the 60 ft depth but went to 90 ft when the sun got hot.
we were going as slow as we could with the current and then faster into the current. it didn't seem to matter which direction we were going. we had 12 lb lead balls on the downrigger.

c-ness · Posted: Mon Aug 22, 2011 2:00 pm Post subject:

I'm a long time fly fisher who would like to take a shot at catching some humpies. I think I can figure out the gear but I'd like to know where to fish that is reasonably close to Bellingham. I don't have a tow rig for the tomcat so I'll be forced to cruise to wherever the fish are. Any suggestions?

SENSEI · Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2011 3:24 am Post subject:

today was very hot out on the water . that is not usually the problem in the PNW. we really wished for a breaze or something. I have never seen it so still out there.

we didn't get out to fish till about 10:20 this morning. 5 minutes after dropping gear we got our first hit. played for a few minutes and it threw the hook. Humpies have the softest mouths. we fished for about four hours today and came home with 8 nice bright humpies. 8 for 17, not great odds but a lot of action. we had two poles on two downriggers and there were several doubles . it is real hard to try to net one fish on one side of the boat and then hurry to get the fish out of the net to net the other. out of the four doubles today we landed four fish. a lot of fun tho.

it was interesting watching the seiners out there in the North end of the area we were fishing. I counted 13 large seine boats and they were very active running their nets out to corral the fish.

starcrafttom · Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2011 12:16 pm Post subject:

Warren try a pink jig or a pink buzz boom. I also like dick night spoons. To rig the dick night you need to have 4 to 6 ft of leader from the spoon to a swivel. off the swivel you want 12 to 18 inch's of line for a dropper to your weight. this keeps the spoon off the bottom a little and allows the spoon to flutter behind it. you can use what ever weight you like but you want the weight to just hit bottom as it swings SLOWLY in the current. SLOWLY is the key . these fish are just off the bottom.

we will be up north fishing Saturday around the deception pass area and then overnight and crabbing in eagle harbor. sucks having my boat up north this year with all the pinks south.

rogerbum · Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2011 12:28 pm Post subject:

Roger, if you have a double and a large net, net the first one, leave it in the net (still attached to the line) and net the second one. That's how I usually handle such things. Works like a charm especially on smaller fish like pinks.

SENSEI · Posted: Sun Sep 18, 2011 5:05 pm Post subject:

well, I guess(starcraft) Tom doesn't want to show off his prize but we went out on friday from Everett launch and fished humpy hollow and down into area 9 south of shipwreck. we trolled shallow for a spell . we were targeting silvers and after about 20 minutes I told Tom to drop down to 120 to 130 ft. we trolled there about 20 minutes and his pole went down and realeased. 15 minutes of playing that fish we got it to the boat. It was a nice hook nose silver that must have topped 14 lbs.we didn't have a scale with us.
He has posted a pic of it on his facebook page.
about 30 minutes later he landed a nice 10 to 12 lb. silver.
we eventually landed a nice 6 to 7 lb and then it slowed way down. several hits and misses into the day. we came home with 3 nice fish .

starcrafttom · Posted: Sun Sep 18, 2011 10:42 pm Post subject:

Now thats a nice fish with the blood dripping off of it. Laughing

Roger did a great job of putting us in the fish. I would not have guest that we would be hooking up at 135ft deep but thats where the fish are right now.

I was really happy about the whole day. I was using a gold/green flasher that I got in canada and its becoming my go to color. I teemed this up with a new small brads cut plug and a 5 ft leader. . This is also becoming my go to lure along with lee davis herring heads. with a small herring or a anchovy or a baitrax artifical herring.

Either of these baits are easy to use and tune. I buy them unrigged as they come with trebles, which we cant use here. I just buy two hook herring riggs and thread those on. if any one wants I could do a video later, let me know. Just make sure you use a 5 bead chain swivel between the flasher and the lures.

As for what to put in the cut plug for smell. I use
bilge pads instead of the foam pad they comes in the lures. Just cut the pad in to small 1 inch by 1/3 inch strips and place in a tupper wear container. Then cover the strips with your favorite fish oil. herring , anchovy, krill,... what ever you like. The pads will soak up to 25 times their weight in oil but do not soak up water at all. Wink

I did this last year and I am just now running out of pads and plan to make a new batch soon.
You can also use strips of fish, tuna in oil, or what ever you like.

With the rain today the coho will be coming and getting into the rivers soon.
Go get some now.

chromer · Posted: Sun Sep 18, 2011 11:34 pm Post subject:

I am finding same with the gold/green flasher. In fact, I just retape my green boards with side of gold prism tape.

Catch 22 · Posted: Sun Sep 18, 2011 11:49 pm Post subject:

I must have missed something, I thought the forecast for the water today was supposed to be like 20 knots so i decided to try the rivers. I fished out in front of Haller park in down town Arlington. I fished for two hours without a bite using spinners, then moved two hundred yards down stream and switched my gear, got 5 fish in a less than an hour. All pinks, so they went back in, I was hoping for coho. How are people doing for coho in area 10? I will be back out there asap.