2016 Nanoose Bay/French Creek Reports

Bordeau & Hedgehog:-

Try any of these below with the Green Haze flasher pictured (it is a good allround flasher.....I've used it often and it's good). I'm pretty sure you'll get hits on these. (Although I can't guarantee how big they'll be...:rolleyes:........:D

Fish off French Creek are a lot of times partial to needlefish hoochies......( I find 38"......40lb test.....back of flasher to nose of hoochy, all hardware included, leader length works fine).

Chinook I got on Monday had needlefish in it's stomach. All the biggest salmon I ever got off F.C. over time were on needlefish hoochies.

Far left is the T-Rex.
You don't have to rig them like I do...you can use the good old double hook setup which is far easier to tie up.

Mine have tubing and glow beads inside them plus a little tiny bead at the eye of the hook to counteract the offset so the hook tracks straight instead of curling up.
Other guys just use a Siwash hook and a barrel swivel.

Real bait is always good too...but this time of year and summer there are too many Dogs and P-Cod out there waiting for a free meal.

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SeaFever, that is so nice of you helping out the guys trying to learn the ropes fishing in your area. Bonus points for the great pics. I love hoochies, so your my kind of guy. Good on you for going the extra mile in trying to be helpful to the newbs. There doesn't seem to be as many guys willing to do that on this forum any more, so you deserve a pat on the back for being so helpful. Keep up the great posts.
 
Seafarer...surely appreciate the gear pics and details on what you work with!

Spent the day out in the sun and calm water yesterday, all around the Chelsea and up just north of Gerald. Great day but no keepers, a few in the 23 inch range, and lots of shakers. Picked up a couple beauty ling and a nice yellow eye.

Fished from 70 to 200', tried the gament of spoons, a couple hoochies and the of course rolling chovies. Mostly hits on a green variation. Irish cream did most of the damage.

Arrived at schooner, a big tin boat clearly had a better day than most with a nice spring, some beauty ling and yellow eye.

Off to Nootka this coming week.

Tight lines...
 
Off F.C. there are various methods and depths for fishing Chinooks.

But one thing that has saved my butt on many an occasion is to find the 200ft contour and then get the tackle right on or as close to the bottom as possible.

Also after 4 pm to 4 :30 pm switch to tackle that has a glow component. Once the sun's angle hits a certain degree the light does not penetrate very greatly...even though it still looks sunny out.
The rays start to bounce off the water without entering very far.

When your tackle is down deep this can make a difference.

Awesome advise. Not sure if it works well in your area, but in the evening hours I tend to run pink/red/gold hoochies a lot for the same reason. The red spectrum of light is what shows up well once the sun starts striking the water at more of an angle. I like to fish shallow with a pink mini or pink/white full size a lot in the evening. There are glow hoochies with pink/red in them as well. An easy combo to tie is a variation of a full size hoochy with a needfish hoochy inside. Glow full size with pink needle fish inside and vice versa. Those mix and match hoochies work really well at times. It can't hurt that they're a little different than the stuff that drags past their nose everyday either I figure. Clear purple haze full size with a glow needlefish hoochy inside is a great combo. You get UV and glow working for you at the same time. Endless combinations available, some are sold pre-rigged that way. Way cheaper and more fun to come up with your own variations. Pink or glow needlefish hoochie inside a lot of different hoochies works great. Give mix N matching a try it gives the hoochie a fuller profile in the water, as well as covering more color variations in one lure.
 
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That's the beauty of using hoochies. They work well at any speed, so you can run them with plugs. I've had great days trolling super fast with Hoochies and plugs. You'd think springs wouldn't like a 4 1/2 mph troll for hoochies, but I've had killer days hitting big springs and coho at those speeds. The Comercial trollers fly compared to sporties and they do pretty well at those speeds. They are not using bait. They will be usually running hoochies or plugs. They do use spoons as well, but their spoons are much heavier gage metal than sports spoons, so they're designed to be used at faster speeds
 
Yes Rob knows his stuff. He also knows all there is to know about hoochies, so he's a great guy to ask about hoochie color recommendations for any area.
 
Out today off F.C.

4 nice hatchery Coho (wife fishes too) between 2pm and 6pm.....low slack was around 12.15pm. Mostly caught deep 180 to 200ft in water varying from 200ft deep to 400ft deep.

Lots of things worked for Coho today. Caught quite a few wilds and many undersize as well.

Numerous undersize Chinook. Couldn't scrape up a legal but the guy in front of me back at the dock got a 23lb'er right on the bottom in 200ft of water. Said he used a green/white hoochie.

Didn't mark much of anything on the finder while out there.
More Dogfish out there than last year. Caught several today.

Wind died down and was way better than predicted. Mostly overcast darkish skies so used a plain chrome flasher with a U/V body (turns bluish underwater) a lot of the time. Later switched to green/glow.

Fished with one rod half the time as I lost a c/ball when the gagnon broke because the clip had worn it through where it clips on. The one day I didn't carry a spare ball....:(
 
Seafever, you're the best! Many thanks for the picture, it is worth a thousand words. So that's how you change your leader length quickly. Good tip!
I am learning a lot by reading all your posts. Went out at Fingers the other day and trolled a bit faster then I usually did. Got a 12 lbs Chinook. Thank you!
Keep it up.
Read you later!
 
Fished french creek today from 11:30 to 3:00 (lazy man's hours). Same as it has been all month: constant action, 18 fish to the boat but all small. Managed to wack our four hatch hos and one spring #10. Splatter back needlefish any depth but best down in the mud. All around a great day on the water.
 
Great advice....:cool:...two thumbs up...

Last Chinook I caught out front was as red as could be. The Coho were mostly full of little tiny pinkish shrimp.

Earlier on in the year a lot of krill was reported off F.C.
Salmon get their red color from eating krill.shrimp etc. and the color gets in their meat.
Krill goes up and down in the water column from deep (800ft plus) on up to surface at night.

So that's one possible food source for them out front beyond baitfish.

Most of my bigger Coho come from about lure depth of 80ft plus., even though there's lots of markings on the finder in the 30 to 50ft range.
And I get most of my nicer Coho on Chinook gear while fishing for Chinook at Chinook speeds.

My wife doesn't like it when I run plugs. And for a long time I wasn't a big believer in them off F.C. either. But more and more I like them....every time I've run one I've gotten a hit on it.
I just use 4 or 5 inch and go about 3 1/2 to 4 miles an hour.
All these lures got hits yesterday out front of F.C. both Chinook and Coho.

The two hoochies to the right with red tails got the biggest Coho.

The spoon far left (Its' called a " Herring Aid"...from Harbour Chandler) worked very well too.

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Seafever, whats that Apex looking metal thing in the middle of the pic? And do you fish it naked?
 
Was out from 4-7ish tonite and had to weed through the regular undersize springs and wild coho. Manged too land a decent 9lb spring down deep at 220' on #727 plug( thx rob from PNT!!) that I had just bought this afternoon. Great night on the water before it blew up!
 
All these lures got hits yesterday out front of F.C. both Chinook and Coho.

The two hoochies to the right with red tails got the biggest Coho.

The spoon far left (Its' called a " Herring Aid"...from Harbour Chandler) worked very well too.

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The hoochies that you had with the red tails in the picture. Just curious do you use felt pens or dye to add extra colors. I use felt pens at times, but it has never seemed to produce. I kind of have the feeling it leaves a lingering odor they're not fond of. One in the picture looks like it is a black and glow octopus hooch with a pink/red needlefish inside it. What type of hoochy is that exactly. I've had luck on a similar looking rig. I took a black and clear (with metal flake gltter) octopus hoochy and put a pink needlefish hoochie inside it, and it worked well.

As usual keep up the great reports SeaFever.
 
WishinIWasFishin1:- that is a lure I made myself out of an old metal flasher. I made a couple of them.
Fairly easy to make. Cut out a blank with tin snips, bend to size, drill holes, file off burr and add hardware/tape.
It has a nice action. I've caught several fish on it so far. By itself or 5 ft behind a flasher.
It is not the same as an Apex. It has rolling action.

Oh right SF, I seem to remember something now about you making those a few years ago. That's pretty cool they have produced fish for you. Anything remarkable?
 
Didn't get out till close to 7 tonite, was trying down deep for springs and had only released one undersize till about 9 when the action started. First time I've heard my new Amundson TMX-5 getting line peeled off of it while in the rod holder other than going down on the rigger! On the other end was a nice 16lb white spring that I landed solo. Was again using the #727-5" plug and hooked up at 180' in 220'. Lost another one shortly after that spit the hook out almost immediately. Glad I went out as most weather predictions called for high winds but it was not bad at all.
 
Big Guy:-

I used to use felt pens, Sharpies and the like.....but I gave up on that because over time the applied color tends to bleed out and soften on the edges. For instance if you make a straight edge line with a Sharpie, in a little while it will start to expand out and blur. Also some felt pens and Sharpies do not turn out the same color on the hoochie that they are when you first apply them.
And.....if you put these marked hoochies in the box with your other vinyl they will often transfer some of the color if left for awhile.

Those in the picture are pinky red needlefish hoochies added to a Yozuri black/white and a Supertackle splatter/glow/purple.
Think I got those pinky red needles at PNT.

I like using SuperTackle glow needlfish hoochies for inserts too. They are a bit stiffer. But when I use a needlfish insert in a U/v or clear hoochy I scrape the eyeballs off the needlefish.
SuperTackle hoochies don't have much eyeball...so they are easy to prep for an insert than a Yozuri, where you have to scrape the red off as well. But that's just the way I do it.....:cool::p
SuperTack hoochies for inserts are cheaper than the others too.

SeaFever thanks for the response. I also kind of gave up on the felt pen modifications. You have to keep them in separate zip locks bags so they don't bleed colours onto your other gear. Although you can create some really cool colour combinations that way.

I kind of figured you were using a pink needlefish inside the full size. That is one of my favorite colours to insert in other hoochies. Another combination that was killer for me before was a green/white octopus hoochy with a pink needlefish inside. Not sure of the pattern but it might have been a Yamashita OMW13. Not up on all my codes so I could be wrong, or maybe they've discontinued the colour. Lots of colours have been dropped in recent years.

You do some really cool stuff with your hoochies. Thanks for all your posts. The pictures are great. Much appreciated.
 
This is the best year yet that I've seen for good practical advice. Not just guys going I caught one here or there but giving great detail on how they did it. Fantastic! I've been fishing for many years but I'm always looking for new ideas to try and it looks like I've come to the right place. Perhaps if I ever retire and can spend more hours on the water I'll have time to come up with my own rigs.

Seafever (fish whisperer)has gone above and beyond a simple post and elevated this site to something worthy of studying and reading. Really, I think he should teach a class or two or maybe write a book. And thanks to everyone else who helps make this particular site so great. Someday I hope to be "master of the fish"
 
You do some really cool stuff with your hoochies. Thanks for all your posts. The pictures are great. Much appreciated.

Likewise! I don't even fish F.C. but I very much enjoy reading the posts so I can learn some techniques to try out in my area :D
 
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On the far left are glow hoochies...one of which I call a "602" hoochy (from PNT). Straight Glow hoochies are good on days when it's dark, gloomy, overcast.

The Army Truck Glow hoochy combined with a Purple Haze flasher is often deadly off F.C anytime.

The ArmyTruck/Glow spoons are good many a time too.

The black/red spoon is known as a " Nasty Boy" and is very good often off F.C. One year it was THE spoon in Alberni Inlet and murdered Sockeye. (3.5 inch....27 inch leader). It also was extremely good for Chinook and Coho that year as well there. Off F.C. the 3.5 inch version is quite good. Interestingly, they brought the ' Nasty Boy' color combo out in a hoochy for a couple of years with the same dark red as the spoon.....but the hoochy didn't catch jack crap (at least for me).. However the spoon is often "hot".

The one on the end is called a "Kitchen Sink" ( black, green, glow) and has been used from Comox to Nanaimo by many a fisherman with great success.

Note the addition of eyes SF has put on many of his spoons, we do the same. Another called the Kermit Coyote is another good producer in the area.

Good luck out there!
 
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