Excellent Offshore Fishing action mid October
What a sweet stretch of fall weather..I had to turn down another day of fall boat maintenance and storage work to do a charter yesterday with a great young couple from Alberta....tough decision!
Traveled past our normal inshore haunts and saw a couple Coho jumpers and birds working, man it was tempting to stop but when the offshore forecast is 4-6 knts and 2 meters at 12 seconds I had to get out there. Neither of my guests had ever fished the Saltwater so I thought a great way for them to cut their teeth would be to hook into great numbers and variety of bottomfish, with thoughts of Feeder Chinook still on the back burner for later in the trip.
After travelling 30 minutes from the harbour, we dropped in on the first reef approx. 1 mile offshore. I was showing my newbie guest the drill on freespool with the levelwind to drop, how to hold the rod, jig techniques etc. and the first drop didn't even make it to the bottom 70 feet away. I handed the rod off for to him for his first fish of the day that bent him over a few times and I know he really wasn't expecting the first fish to bark line out like that....After a few minutes we released the first Ling Cod that was probably right on the 20 lb mark. After another 15 minutes and handful of rockfish later, I was leaning over the gunwale to help him release a 4 lb. Silvergrey Rockfish when I saw a shadow below the boat that I was surprised it actually took this long to see...I told him to stop reeling and slowly look over the edge. After he had his first look at the huge Ling Cod that was pushing the mid to high 40's, I thought I might have to turn on the deck hose and clean up what what starting to run down his pant leg,,,lol,,,
I knew we weren't planning on keeping this predatory beast who was on the reef to spawn, so we watched the action for a while before pulling the cod away from her right at the surface. I got soaked and the Rockfish was scared to death, literally....
This kind of fun lasted for a while longer, and my guests were feeling good sea legs and experienced enough after 20 -30 fish to head out a little further to another reef for a change of scenery. The move was worth the short run out as the lings were on fire, and the Snapper we caught were huge on average. Fishing shallow enough that the release was survival was excellent for the big Yellow-eye.
We fished in the sun and light swell and breeze for a few more hours while porpoises and diving birds hung close to the boat, we managed to pick out a limit of tasty bottomfish, while releasing many during the day. Though the condictions were more than favourable for Salmon fishing, the crew was very content with all that had happened so far, and ready for a late lunch in Tofino.
Back to the boat work this A.M., but with the forecast looking the same for the week ahead, I think I will be back out there for one last trip before heading north with my son for our annual hunt...
