Mooching Bonus

[BrownBear]

We were mooching in a bait layer at 90' in 130' of water, with lots of silver action but none of the kings we found there a few days before. Our guest's rod did it's little "moochie dance" as she called it, and then the rod really dove. A screeching (your pick- her or the reel) 75 yard run told us it was a king and a good one. She ended up as much outside the gunnel as in with my wife holding onto her belt, and the fish sounded, then started that heavy head shake we've learned to love on different tackle. Half an hour later she managed to win the battle on the light rod and 12# line. At 53# it was in the right weight range, but wrong species.


Here's a sampling of the silvers we limited on, but sadly no kings. Fun times!

 

[270ti]

That's awesome. Everything eats a cut plug, and you never know what'll bite!

 

[Kardinal_84]

Nice! Gotta love big fish on light gear!

 

[Garyak]

Nice catch! That's my favorite kind of surprise!

 

[AK2AZ]

Heck of a catch and I'm sure it made for a truly exciting fight and great memory.:topjob:

 

[kodiakcombo]

that sounds like fun, mooching? gotta give it a try. are you achored or drifting? we trolled up a limit of silvers and 5 kings for the four anglers aboard. They had a bonus face to face with a salmon shark that exploded next to the boat while trying to net the hog silver. The shark slapped the surface next to boat as the silver was being reeled in. We had a double so I went and gaffed the other salmon. Then the angler and netter said the shark attacked from under neath the boat toward the silver and inhaled it! we trolled in the same spot and never had another visit.

 

[AaronP]

Great fish!!!

 

[idakfisher]

12 lb test? WHAT'S UP WITH THAT?

 

[BrownBear]

...are you achored or drifting?

This spot we were anchored. We drift too, but that means all lines out the same side of the boat while laying in the trough. You can do it with different weights on the various lines, but anchoring lets you spread out the folks on both sides of the boat.

And yup.... Salmon sharks really put the end to a salmon bite!

 

[AKFly7]

Awesome, nice fish!

 

[BrownBear]

It's just plain weird out there this year!

We trolled among jumping silvers for two hours without a touch in water from 20' out all the way into the middle of the bay.

The heck with it, lets go halibut fishing.

Anchored in 110' and could see what looked like cod in the first 5' off bottom. Dropped darts and hooked up immediately.... On silvers!

Took us under half an hour to land 8 between the four of us. Things go that fast when you double up.... Three times in a row!

Two boats were already at the dock when we pulled up a couple of hours later, and between them they'd managed one silver while trolling half a day.

Go figger.

 

[ArcticNorseman]

That's a great day! Congrats. Being in Kodiak for the summer has been a blast. Hitting the rivers for salmon was good, except for road system kings. Hitting the salt has allowed me to put some butt, cod and rockfish in the freezer. A co-worker took a 9 ft salmon shark in Monashka bay last month . . . In a 16' skiff. Funny thing was a couple guys were in kayaks bating crab traps when they heard the .44 put and end to the fight. The other dozen sharks in the area caught whiff of the crab traps . . . Lol. Yeah, the kayakers paddled . . .

 

[Kardinal_84]

That's a great day! Congrats. Being in Kodiak for the summer has been a blast. Hitting the rivers for salmon was good, except for road system kings. Hitting the salt has allowed me to put some butt, cod and rockfish in the freezer. A co-worker took a 9 ft salmon shark in Monashka bay last month . . . In a 16' skiff. Funny thing was a couple guys were in kayaks bating crab traps when they heard the .44 put and end to the fight. The other dozen sharks in the area caught whiff of the crab traps . . . Lol. Yeah, the kayakers paddled . . .

Hopefully the kayakers paddled toward the Shark and had appropriate gear! Definitely on the wish list. I wouldn't be the first. Fished with three guys last month in Kodiak that have landed Salmon Sharks off of kayaks. No sharks but we managed some nice halibut!