Magic Carpet Ride

Nick Clayton said:
So bad ass!!! Of all the cool things there are to do with a fly rod in Alaska, this right here would probably be at the top of my list. So insanely jealous!

I spent a little time in the Neah Bay area trying this years ago. Had a couple shallow water spots where I had had encounters with halibut. Didn't spend much time dedicating to it though, as it was tough to stay motivated knowing that even under the best of circumstances the numbers weren't going to be great.
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I would think soaking some scent (Ala shark fishing) down near the bottom anchored up in some of these shallow spots would be the ticket.... of course you have to do it quick because if you blink the season is over ;)
 
Halibut can be caught in the surf here on the Central California coast in the summer. Right in the surf line. They’re small, 20” is a good one.
 
damn nice halbies...hard to go wrong with white flies in the salt, regardless of the target...and pink for a bleeding gill...slam
 
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G_Smolt said:
Last winter, a friend and I started riffing on the idea of getting halibut to eat a fly. We knew it had been done before (not necessarily a frequent thing here in AK, but we DO have some crazies around), but a lot of the "fly-caught" halibut we've seen were either caught fishing jigs on mono "with a fly rod" or some such qualifier...we wanted to see if a fella could cast an actual fly on an actual flyline and catch halibut.

In late May of this year, we put our plan in action with some success - we DID get halibut to eat out flies (see also: this post), but to paraphrase ol' Ben Kenobi, "these aren't the fish we are looking for"...

Yesterday we tried a different location, one with more tidal current and a sandy/shell bottom. With the wind moving the same way as the tide, there was no way we were gonna be able to drift it, so we set the hook and got busy casting. The first fish of the day was a big-ass Buffalo sculpin. The second fish was a 20" halibut. The third fish ate mid-strip, and by the big head-shakes it was immediately apparent this was the size class of fish we had been looking for. As if that wasn't crystal clear, the fish then decided it didn't like the situation and made a long-ass run for deeper water. After about 5-6 minutes of give and take, I convinced it to stick around for dinner. At 36", about 20lb, and bending my 12wt EPR to the cork, this was the fish we were after.
View attachment 19209

Several high-fives and a few little halibut later, something inhaled my fly as it was sinking into the zone. I thought I may have hooked the bottom at first, but then the "bottom" decided it didn't like the yanky lip-stingin' situation it was in and took off for the depths. After about 10 minutes of mostly give and a little take, I managed to peel it off the bottom and got busy winchin'. When all the spray and shouting settled down, we took a pic of my next months' fish n chip supply...
View attachment 19210

46", about 45 lbs, and the new benchmark of this particular fly journey. I got a feeling this might be my new rabbithole, and I'm pretty OK with that.

Peace, y'all
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This is so awesome. Love how you guys think. Massive kudos for pushing the envelope and pulling off a daunting challenge.

Cabezon said:
@Nick Clayton and @SilverFly Hmmm. A new fly fishery in Washington to pioneer???
Steve
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That's a job for Nick. I've been halibut fishing a total of 3X, and have yet to see one that wasn't already in deep-fried form.

G_Smolt said:
Yep, still the same t20/t14, only adjustment I made was to strengthen the connection between the 2. Looking at getting an AirFlo Depthfinder 700gr head if they ever get any back in stock - I think the120' 50# running line would let me fish down to about 90'-100' without issue
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Love the Depthfinder, thats my go to albacore line and it will let you fish at those depths. Not to hijack, but this is semi-relevant since halibut crossed my mind more than once when I spent 2 months of spare time hand-crafting "Stupid-Deep Line 1.0" with Plasti-Dip and tungsten powder. Tuna was the main drive behind that OCD episode, but have yet to catch one on it. It has taken a few rockfish though. Including the bigger one here off the jetty punching casts between mats of drifting eel grass on a ripping ebb tide.

20160902_183357.jpg

If I ever get to Alaska, I'll have to make a SDL 2.0 and would appreciate some collaborative feedback before I go down that rabbit hole again.

Should be a lot easier this time since I have a better idea of what I'm doing now. IIRC, line 1.0 is built on a continuous 100# gel-spun core with a 900 grain head (blue) tapering into the running line (green) for a total length of 225'. Its caught rockfish at 100', but should put a fly past 150' depending on current. For 2.0, I'm thinking about the same head weight since it actually casts decent on a 12wt (13-14wt would be better), but building the head/front section on 100' of 130# for durability - and raw winching strength. Then transitioning into 300' of coated 80# running line to reduce water resistance and increase depth range.

Anyway, halibut on the fly is up there on my FF fantasy list, so thank you @G_Smolt for proving it can be done!
 
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Nice work on the line, @SilverFly ! I'm in the process of rigging another line right now, and I'm leaning towards the minimalist approach - 28' 650gr sinker, 11ips (pretty sure it was part of a billfish sinking line) looped to 180' of coated 65# spectra with fathom marks - as I see it, the 2 critical components to this fishery are 1) being able to send a heavy, short head to the zone with the absolute minimum drag, and 2) knowing exactly how much like you have out. The spectra, although less than ideal for handling, should give me the least drag of any running lines, and the yellow coated powerpro is easy to fathom-mark.
 
G_Smolt said:
Last winter, a friend and I started riffing on the idea of getting halibut to eat a fly. We knew it had been done before (not necessarily a frequent thing here in AK, but we DO have some crazies around), but a lot of the "fly-caught" halibut we've seen were either caught fishing jigs on mono "with a fly rod" or some such qualifier...we wanted to see if a fella could cast an actual fly on an actual flyline and catch halibut.

In late May of this year, we put our plan in action with some success - we DID get halibut to eat out flies (see also: this post), but to paraphrase ol' Ben Kenobi, "these aren't the fish we are looking for"...

Yesterday we tried a different location, one with more tidal current and a sandy/shell bottom. With the wind moving the same way as the tide, there was no way we were gonna be able to drift it, so we set the hook and got busy casting. The first fish of the day was a big-ass Buffalo sculpin. The second fish was a 20" halibut. The third fish ate mid-strip, and by the big head-shakes it was immediately apparent this was the size class of fish we had been looking for. As if that wasn't crystal clear, the fish then decided it didn't like the situation and made a long-ass run for deeper water. After about 5-6 minutes of give and take, I convinced it to stick around for dinner. At 36", about 20lb, and bending my 12wt EPR to the cork, this was the fish we were after.
View attachment 19209

Several high-fives and a few little halibut later, something inhaled my fly as it was sinking into the zone. I thought I may have hooked the bottom at first, but then the "bottom" decided it didn't like the yanky lip-stingin' situation it was in and took off for the depths. After about 10 minutes of mostly give and a little take, I managed to peel it off the bottom and got busy winchin'. When all the spray and shouting settled down, we took a pic of my next months' fish n chip supply...
View attachment 19210

46", about 45 lbs, and the new benchmark of this particular fly journey. I got a feeling this might be my new rabbithole, and I'm pretty OK with that.

Peace, y'all
Click to expand...
Hell yeah! That's fvckin rad!
 
G_Smolt said:
Nice work on the line, @SilverFly ! I'm in the process of rigging another line right now, and I'm leaning towards the minimalist approach - 28' 650gr sinker, 11ips (pretty sure it was part of a billfish sinking line) looped to 180' of coated 65# spectra with fathom marks - as I see it, the 2 critical components to this fishery are 1) being able to send a heavy, short head to the zone with the absolute minimum drag, and 2) knowing exactly how much like you have out. The spectra, although less than ideal for handling, should give me the least drag of any running lines, and the yellow coated powerpro is easy to fathom-mark.
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Thanks. Minimalist is frequently the best approach. Spectra is an incredible material and we're on the same page with reducing drag as the key to getting stupid deep. 65# should slice water like a hot knife through butter. I used Spectra (although 100# Tuff Line) as the core for that reason (and the low stretch). Agreed it's less than idea for running line, if not down-right dangerous stripping for strong fish. That's why I spent so many hours wearing respirator coating 200+ feet of it. Still pretty thin stuff, but doesn't want to tie knots like uncoated.

I won't bore everyone with the deets on the process but if I build another I will use Jerry Brown hollow braid. IIRC, when I was starting the project @Nick Clayton discussed stuffing hollow braid with various grades of T-line to make custom lines for lings. I should've listened. Taking what I learned from the last project I think I know how to coat this stuff much quicker and with much more durable results. The big difference with the hollow core is that the taper will be determined by the thickness of the material stuffed into it. No endless, tedious hours of building the profile. Still plenty of experimenting to iron this out, but I learned a lot about what NOT to do.

1656013046004.png
 
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SilverFly said:
This is so awesome. Love how you guys think. Massive kudos for pushing the envelope and pulling off a daunting challenge.



That's a job for Nick. I've been halibut fishing a total of 3X, and have yet to see one that wasn't already in deep-fried form.



Love the Depthfinder, thats my go to albacore line and it will let you fish at those depths. Not to hijack, but this is semi-relevant since halibut crossed my mind more than once when I spent 2 months of spare time hand-crafting "Stupid-Deep Line 1.0" with Plasti-Dip and tungsten powder. Tuna was the main drive behind that OCD episode, but have yet to catch one on it. It has taken a few rockfish though. Including the bigger one here off the jetty punching casts between mats of drifting eel grass on a ripping ebb tide.

View attachment 19553

If I ever get to Alaska, I'll have to make a SDL 2.0 and would appreciate some collaborative feedback before I go down that rabbit hole again.

Should be a lot easier this time since I have a better idea of what I'm doing now. IIRC, line 1.0 is built on a continuous 100# gel-spun core with a 900 grain head (blue) tapering into the running line (green) for a total length of 225'. Its caught rockfish at 100', but should put a fly past 150' depending on current. For 2.0, I'm thinking about the same head weight since it actually casts decent on a 12wt (13-14wt would be better), but building the head/front section on 100' of 130# for durability - and raw winching strength. Then transitioning into 300' of coated 80# running line to reduce water resistance and increase depth range.

Anyway, halibut on the fly is up there on my FF fantasy list, so thank you @G_Smolt for proving it can be done!
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If you REALLY want to get down, the Airflo CCT 470 is the stuff. Not sure if they still sell it, but I loaded up on it to make sure I never run out.
 
Evan B said:
If you REALLY want to get down, the Airflo CCT 470 is the stuff. Not sure if they still sell it, but I loaded up on it to make sure I never run out.
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Damn. Wanna part with 30' of that? I only have 2 short tips (10' and 12') of that sweet t24 left myownself...
 
Evan B said:
If you REALLY want to get down, the Airflo CCT 470 is the stuff. Not sure if they still sell it, but I loaded up on it to make sure I never run out.
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Guessing they don't. Nothing on AF's website or a quick Google. Got any specs? Inquiring minds want to know!
 
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