Well no salmon today, but I did catch the biggest starry flounder I've ever seen. And it's seems like my four year old was able to fish too though! Will have too keep at it
Non-Fly Mooching?
- Thread starter Scudley Do Right
- Start date
Success!!! Definitely a whole lot of fun. Hit mid water column so I don't think we would have caught him pounding the bottom with jigs.
Thanks for all the info on here guys.
tacomabeer
Smolt
If I’m not flyfishing in the sound I’m mooching it’s how I learned to fish in the sound as a kid in the 80’s and it’s what I’m teaching my girls to do now. Though all they have caught is flounder and dogfish so far.
mtskibum16
Life of the Party
Ok for the dirt-bag-curious among us, what is the difference (or advantage/disadvantage) of mooching vs jigging? The extent of my knowledge is mooching is using cut-plug herring vs jigging is with an artificial salmon jig. If I'm not mistaken both methods are simulating a dead or injured falling baitfish. What is the difference in retrieve/presentation?
mtskibum16
Life of the Party
I have had lots of success casting flies from the boat in shallow water feeding grounds. Including during times the traditional methods of salmon fishing aren't very hot. I've always been surprised more gear anglers haven't targeted these areas. Seems that a cast or trolled cut plug herring, swimbait, flatfish, etc used in these areas could be very effective.
I was invited out to fish with a coworker last weekend. I haven't done much traditional gear fishing for salmon so I jumped on the opportunity. We started trolling, but other than releasing a couple nice "keeper" chinook (and a lingcod!) the trolling bite was slow for us. I was along for the ride and didn't have much to offer for technique or location suggestions. Finally I suggested I had success fly casting near shore in the shallows nearby in the past. We had the gear necessary and he seemed receptive to the idea, but despite my many reminders that I meant SHALLOW and close to shore he kept drifting us in 50' of water along the drop off and out of casting range of the shallower eelgrass beds. I just couldn't get past his programming of needing to fish over some depth. I think casting and retrieving swim baits in these areas could be really effective. I prefer to cast and retrieve than troll and also kind of hate dealing with bait (the whole process) so something like that (swimbait) is more attractive to me that trolling a cut plug, but I think that would work really well too.
For jigging, if the salmon are on a baitball, you are fishing a particular zone typically (just under a bait ball, or when fish are burying their faces in the sand). So you are keeping your bait in the zone longer. However, you can really have much water movement, becasue your jig has to be verticle to be able to fish right. Mooching is able to work the water column a bit more. So you can work over an area where fish are spread out, or at different depths and line angle is even encouraged to stop your gear from wrapping up on itself. Now that I have dedicated some time to mooching, I really like the benefits of working the water column, the last fish that I have caught were all suspended and I don't think that I would have hooked them if I had been pounding the bottom.
I think the depth game typically comes from where people are typically marking bait. When I fish in the South Sound, the herring is super thick typically in 120ft to 160ft and typically stacked on the bottom. So most of the people are following the bait and sticking on top of it. I'll fish shallower both in depth and gear level in the morning, and then drop out deeper as the morning progresses.
Scudley Do Right
Life of the Party
They closed it down, not much to report.
when the bait schools move in tight along the beach, a 1/2oz white bucktail set 3' under a large Thill Medalist float thrown to the edges of the chaos and retrieved with a small pop, pause, few retrieves and repeat can be deadly...when living in Half Moon Bay we found it a deadly alternative to retrieving lures when beach fishing for kings and stripers
Still mooch quite a bit; my outfit is a medium action 8 1/2 foot glass rod paired with one of my Shimano Batam direct drive reels. About 20years ago shortly after Shimano stop making their direct drive reels I bought 7 new reels (the last I saw on the market). Have 3 1500 LCs, 2 1000s and 2 50s that I replaced the handle side with one from the 1000s making them also direct which I hoped to be a lifetime horde of direct drive reels. I learn to count strips as I let the bait drop to track the depth. Those line counter reels (1500LCs) eliminate that need though I still strip on the drop just to have to count. Lately with the abundance of dogfish and rockfish have found it a great bait saver track my depth to stay away from the bottom twenty fishing the suspend bait or tops of the bottom bait. When possible fish 3 oz kidney weights
While I prefer freshly jigged bait I typically fish green label frozen that are cut frozen and into the brine before leaving the house. Use the old school recipe for the brine, rock salt, powder milk and laundry bluing. I keep the Sabic rod handy and jig fresh bait when possible. If there are any leftover bait after the day, especially if fresh I remove them from the brine, roll in borax and store in the refrig (good for 10 days or so and up to 6 weeks if frozen). Used the borax bait during those magical hours of early daylight jigging new bait as time allows.
While we don't see the moochers that we once did the method seems to be becoming more popular and still remains effect. With our limited seasons this year mooched 5 days this year for Chinook. Legal fish 4 of the trips with the best day was several Chinook topped by a 20#er and bycatch of 7 coho and pink that a spinning herring looked good.
curt
While I prefer freshly jigged bait I typically fish green label frozen that are cut frozen and into the brine before leaving the house. Use the old school recipe for the brine, rock salt, powder milk and laundry bluing. I keep the Sabic rod handy and jig fresh bait when possible. If there are any leftover bait after the day, especially if fresh I remove them from the brine, roll in borax and store in the refrig (good for 10 days or so and up to 6 weeks if frozen). Used the borax bait during those magical hours of early daylight jigging new bait as time allows.
While we don't see the moochers that we once did the method seems to be becoming more popular and still remains effect. With our limited seasons this year mooched 5 days this year for Chinook. Legal fish 4 of the trips with the best day was several Chinook topped by a 20#er and bycatch of 7 coho and pink that a spinning herring looked good.
curt
SeaRunner
Steelhead
Good tip on the left overs in borax. How do they compare to brined? Do they lose much quality?
Scudley Do Right
Life of the Party
I think mrs stewart's bluing is what people used back in the day. I don't see a noticable difference from borax or brined bait. I just started using borax again with herring over $10.
Pescaphile
Steelhead
I still like to use my old Penn 109s for mooching. I keep the anti-reverse off and work the bait up and down by alternating between reeling and dropping. With the anti-reverse off, I can drop instantly without disengaging anything - just take hand from handle and thumb spool like using a direct drive reel. To measure depth, I count the number of cycles the reel's level wind mechanism on my initial drop.
Regarding the use of the left-over herring after being borax; some 15 years like this year there was a lot of PS herring and we had no trouble jigging fresh bait boraxing the left-over bait for the next trip. My son and I fished the fresh herring brined bait side by side with the borax baits. We mooched, trolled the baits with 3 ounces for coho and behind fish flashes in Willapa Bay over the course of the whole season. At the end there was a one fish difference between the two baits. The only downside of the borax baits is that the borax would cake on the bait and affect the spin until the borax dissolved, usually in a minute or two. A very economical way of extending the life of the herring. Have also used those boraxed baits on Columbia River springers and buoy 10 Chinook and coho with good success.
As an aside I still like that salt brine first as it seems to toughen the bait more than just borax. Back in my sturgeon fishing days we used a lot of sand shrimp. To extend life of the shrimp we would roll them in borax and what was not to be used fresh they were frozen. In side by side fishing the sturgeon seemed to prefer the borax bait. Done the same thing with prawns for steelhead and sockeye again it was obvious that fish like borax.
Curt
As an aside I still like that salt brine first as it seems to toughen the bait more than just borax. Back in my sturgeon fishing days we used a lot of sand shrimp. To extend life of the shrimp we would roll them in borax and what was not to be used fresh they were frozen. In side by side fishing the sturgeon seemed to prefer the borax bait. Done the same thing with prawns for steelhead and sockeye again it was obvious that fish like borax.
Curt
Here is my first mooch caught Coho going crazy
How ethical is it to mooch in selective fisheries? I have decided that I do not want to troll for Silvers this September, but I know that I am gonna suck at estimating depth to jig for them and I like how mooching lets me work the whole water column. I know exactly where to go where I can find tons of Silvers stacked up waiting to enter certain “S” rivers but I also know that most of the fish I will hook will be wilds I need to release. We all know the release statistics when it comes to using bait, but as I understand, don’t the fish usually bite the trailing hook that isn’t buried anyways? How close should I tie my hooks together to give the fish I let go the best chance of survival?
How ethical is it to mooch in selective fisheries? I have decided that I do not want to troll for Silvers this September, but I know that I am gonna suck at estimating depth to jig for them and I like how mooching lets me work the whole water column. I know exactly where to go where I can find tons of Silvers stacked up waiting to enter certain “S” rivers but I also know that most of the fish I will hook will be wilds I need to release. We all know the release statistics when it comes to using bait, but as I understand, don’t the fish usually bite the trailing hook that isn’t buried anyways? How close should I tie my hooks together to give the fish I let go the best chance of survival?
