2023 Ucluelet Reports

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The highlight of the trip today.
We were in behind Effingham looking for Coho and getting a few. Running my light gear, 9’6 ultra light action mooching rods with north coast reels loaded with 12# test line. Had a dummy flasher on one side with a spoon and a purple haze 8” flasher with some kind of a bubble gum splatter spoon on the other at 35‘. The rod at 35’ goes of and starts to scream. After 10 min battle we land this 25# beauty. What a blast lol.

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Great looking fish! Haven’t seen you on the dock this year.
Relentfish.
 
Never noticed your boat either. We been out 6 days already, last day tomorrow, we will just fish a couple hours in the morning then pull the boat. You know me,, if you can see your bait your too late lol. Boat leaving the dock by 5:00 am and back around 2 ish.
 
Trolled out front from Red Can to Black Rock last night and this morning. Lots of nice size Coho but of only 2 out of 12 were hatchery. Lost a few screamer Chinooks in the mix.
 
Got home a few days ago... all I gotta say is it was epic salmon fishing. Tons of springs and coho were pretty consistant too! We didn't venture far for salmon working the red can north up twards wya. Had so many double headers and went often where we were working a sweat up trying to get both rods down before the other one popped! Silver hord 4'' ''bob marley'' or ''maveric'' colors were our top producers. STS flasher and the gibs green blade with moonjelly and red stripe did the twirling for us. Lings seemed very slow compared to last year but did troll up 4 chickens out at South Bank. Love the place so much, can't wait to get back.
 
nice report. I am heading out tuesday for first 4 day trip, hopefully I can report back with a matching report.:p
 
Juts got back early this morning after a 23 hr pull home, had a nap and cleaned the boat all the equipment and its all drying out.

Was an awesome trip again this year with plenty of fish. Not the biggest average we’ve seen out there but all nice eating fish. We did keep a couple in the small side like 8/10lb range as the kids brought them in and wanted to keep them so why not. I would say most of the ones we kept we averaged from 14 - 20 lbs with a couple 20 lb and the one big one at 25 lb. We rotated through the kids and women on different days for the first few days then after they were tired just my son and I and grandson finished up, we set a goal of 4 springs a day for ourselves as the priority then went for bottom fish or coho after. Most days springs were done with in an hour or two at the most, one morning we didn’t even make a full tack we were done in 45 mins and had 4 springs in the box between 15 - 18 lbs. We did go for Halibut 2 days just to some humps on the inner banks but had no luck. We did get into a few decent lings, black bass and vermilion on some close spots so we did get some decent white meat. We just didn’t feel like chasing out to far for halibut but went for the close fish instead.

No issues getting coho on the inside, Beg, Effingham both produced easy and darn nice sized coho. For springs we concentrated out front of little beach / light house area running in the 120’ to 170’ of water. As my earlier updates we also picked up a few at Effingham with our big one coming from Effingham. Gear was ran at 75’ and 93 - 110’ on the deep side with pretty similar results from either side.

Just ran spoons, the usual stuff, skinny g, west coast tackle halo series in various colours with any chartreuse
/ white glow, no bananas combo working. Also did quite well on uv white glow hootchie or chartreuse green/white hootchie. Flashers we ran mostly glow chartreuse or any combination of what ever. Kept them charged and rotated out on the glow box again as i have the last couple years, sure seems to make a difference especially on the deep ran gear.

Our big fish was 25# but I lost a nice battle to a brute on day 4 and could not repeat it. It was a real nice pig of a fish that just hung down and heavy for most of the battle with long slow head shakes. I was able to get him to the boat 3 times, on the second time he jumped the net clearing the water and net easily. I had him to the boat for the 3rd time and was just bringing him along side for a net attempt and he gave one more nasty head shake and tossed the hook. It was a real heart breaker but I laughed it off and just told my son we can’t win them all, they have to win some now and again. He was easily a 25# plus fish I would say pushing 30# for sure as we did have 3 good looks at it, it was a brute.

Will be working on a video of the trip over the next while and will post it when its ready.

Thanks again to the few of us that shared our intel as we all fished out there boys, thats the way to keep it going and helps us all to have a great successful time.
 
Supposed to leave Friday for fishing in Ukee. I understand HWY 4 may be closed. Can anyone please tell me what the alternate route is like and how long it takes from Duke Point? Is it even worth it?
Thanks!
 
Supposed to leave Friday for fishing in Ukee. I understand HWY 4 may be closed. Can anyone please tell me what the alternate route is like and how long it takes from Duke Point? Is it even worth it?
Thanks!
It should be open by Friday
If not it takes about 3hrs from duke point to port alberni if not pilling a boat if you drive like a mainlander on the back road Lol
 
Just back from 4 days in UKEE, here goes.. First day light rain became monsoon... We started fishing outside little beach, using skinny g's and herring aid spoons.. Rods barely down to depth and fishing starts. Started at 60 ft then down to 90. Continually hits from coho's and most I saw were split 50/50 hatch vs wild. Got a couple mid teen chinooks, and 2 decent hatch cohos, and then quit in heavy rain. Next day fog and usual weather, fished same place .Went up to try Wya for tide change, only 6 boats there and no hits after 90 mins, so back to red can area. Same action, Boats all around catching fish, and coho everywhere. Most boats are back to dock around noon , done for the day. Friday, made trip to Rats Nose for hali's... Not too productive, jigging lost 2, switched to trolling, caught one chicken and several teenager springs all the while dragging bottom for halis at 160 ft. Coho plenty out there ...Weather flat calm and hot... Today, were only one short of limit springs, so back to the red can area... Fish are still there in umbers and size getting bigger. Quite a few guys at fish processors. To beat cohos , I switched to large green white squids and 5 inch turds..

In cleaning the springs, they were packed with needle fish.. coho had small herring.. There are massive bait balls on the screen in a lot of areas. Only saw one sammy the seal... no others around...

ice at AMYS is usual gone by dinner time.. thats 5 bins.... They are very busy..

Now the road...... road was closed tues just after we passed thru, till weds morning, then closed fri... I talked with commercial driver... if 10 mil of rain and or 15 knots of wind blow.... the road will close for the day... at 630 tonight, we were 10 from front of line, while west bound had 107 go thru before they switch... still at least another hun on west bound side to come in.
 
Out at Wya since 7 this morning. Kind of slow. Only have a 12# spring and a hatch coho. 6 ft swell this morning. Seem to have laid down a bit now.
 
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