Tips for fishing deep around structure?

[michaelb]

Hey folks, my past experience with winter chinook has all been on fairly flat bottoms like the harbour, but I moved to Squamish a while back and have been trying to fish more complex spots in the sound this season, with complicated structure and pinnacles. It’s been really tricky for me to figure out how to fish the bottom in these zones— I set my depth on the riggers so that I bounce the shallowest spots, but I still think I probably spend a lot of time way off the bottom on each tack because sea depth varies so much. What approach do you guys take in these zones where it’s really difficult to find a long, even contour that you can get you gear on and keep it on? Do what I’m doing and just accept that you’re going to be off the bottom a lot of the time?

 

[Brett83]

I personally try to find the consistent depth areas of the structure. But spots closest to Squamish that can be tricky. When fishing bottom,I try fishing uphill as much as possible so your forced to bring up a couple feet at a time when you see the ball wiggle. That will keep you close.

 

[michaelb]

I personally try to find the consistent depth areas of the structure. But spots closest to Squamish that can be tricky. When fishing bottom,I try fishing uphill as much as possible so your forced to bring up a couple feet at a time when you see the ball wiggle. That will keep you close.

Good tip, thanks Brett— I’m used to fishing downhill because most of my experience on structure is jigging. Have to unlearn that tendency for downriggers.

 

[spring fever]

I do like to hunt the pinnacles-it takes a lot of concentration and your rigger needs to be very close. I prefer a hi speed rigger for this and it has to be adjusted very well-make sure if it hangs up the line will pay out giving you a chance to stop. Always have a knife or wire cutters next to the rigger in case you have to cut to save the rigger. Your speed has to stay constant-don't cut the power to play a fish without raising the ball or it will sink and hang up. Set your speed=lower the ball until it hits, Raise 3 to 5 ft Note the differential between the sounder and the rigger. Apply that differential to your sounder as you troll. Reset every tack. I keep my finger on the rigger button. Happy Hunting!!

 

[Hot-Streak]

I used to do mine hunting on a Navy ship. We would drive a large side scan sonar off the bottom of the ocean and adjust as we go for depth to keep it hovering just right. Tips from that job are that we planned our tracks/route ahead so that we could bring the towed sonar up and down easily. We also had a large sonar display of the bottom so we were already ready to bring it up over pinnacles and then down the other side to get a good scan.

What I have adapted from that to trolling on my own boat was to make sure I had a good bottom display at the back. I have 2 displays at the driver seat of the boat. One is a Raymarine that has my charts and normal chirp sonar on the display. For a 2nd display I bought a Lowrance MFD (sonar) that has downvision and side scan. It lets me see the bottom structure clearly but more important it lets me wifi the screen (mirror) it to a tablet or phone. I have used old tablet/phone as a display for the back.

Each downrigger has a display right near it so I can watch the bottom picture from the back and see upcoming changes to the structure/depth. When I make a run past structure I have the person driving drive a track i have planned that is safest for the current/set to not get pushed shallow. Then at the back I am watching the mirrored display for signs of fish but also changes in depth. Having the display right in front of me near the rigger lets me pull up the gear and send it down as needed almost instantly when i see structure/depth changes.

 

[Rain City]

I just stay in constant bounce mode. If it drags out, my gear is too deep. If it stops bouncing then it's too shallow. Fish by braille.