The springers I have caught have been somewhat downriver, and I have been trolling w/ herring. I have hoglined a few times w/ kwikfish w/o much success.

This year it looks like I will be fishing mostly around the Longview/St. Helens area. I hear that wobblers are used with quite a bit of success around the mouths of the tributaries of the CR.

When does one use a wobbler instead of kwikfish? Deeper water? Slower current?

I bought a Brad's #00 W-14 (kind of chrome/chartruese). Is this a good choice?

Slab:

I thought wobbler was a spoon, but I think your refering to Mag Warts, Brad's, and fatfishes vs. Kwikies.

I usually use either herring, kwikfish, or prawnspinners when fishing in the St. Helens area. I've tried mag warts in Multonomah Channel before, but no takers. Its seems like herring for the troll and kwikfish for the anchor fishing is the standard norm for the lower river. I wouldn't doubt it though if this was a monkey see monkey do type of attitude that has developed down there.

Then above Bonneville its all about the orange mag wart.

BD

If you mean the big metal spoons (clancy's, alvins, bob's) they are mostly used later in the year, after the water heats up. This time of year, herring or kwickies are the ticket.

Yes, I mean the big, fat spoons. I think Brad's copied the others.

I, too have used the bright mag warts and fatfish at the Wind River bubble. It's funny how you use different stuff to catch the same fish at different locations.

So true and it is weird how at one location one thing works and yet it does not at another location for the same species of fish.

Silver Hilton, Niled it on the head

This past Monday has only been my third trip to the Columbia for springers around the Kalama area, so I am definitely an amatuer. But sometimes that can be an advantage since you do something unconventional because you do not know better. I was trolling along Deer Island downstream of St Helens while waiting to anchor when the river started to flow out . Since I only had anchovies because I couldn't find any decent herring, and the anchovies didn't spin very well when trolled, I put out a silver and chartruse Brad's wobbler. After trolling downriver for 20 minutes, the rod doubled over and my son landed a 16 lb springer. We saw a sea lion with a salmon about 10 minutes late. When the river was flowing at a decent rate, we anchored down river of the power plant and put out kwikfish with an anchovie wrap and some smelly jelly. We caught a 8 lb native steelhead (released before the sea lions got too close) and had another big take down that didn't hook up. Another boat nearby caught one springer and had a take down that didn't stick. At 3:00 the gill netters strung out their nets and started drifting through the area. As they came upon the anchored boats, they would motor toward the river center to clear the sport fishermen then pull the net all the way to the bank once the net had drifted about 30 yards below the anchored sport fishermen. After this happened about 5 times most of us picked up anchor and called it quits.

Deepwater

What Mr. Hilton said..but now in my own words :p Springer, it should wiggle , Roll, or spin with a prawn, Summer Chinook.. (if they let us fish for them this year) It's a spinner show....Blood red beads and 4.5 Colorado blade...gold VMC #2 Treble. Fall, Wobblers..Alvin, Brads Wobbler, Simon, and the Simon spin-off.... by Brad's...it's shaped the same but has a hammered look. Blue tape or a blue slash on the lower half of a Brad is very good in the Fall. You will see the results as the year progresses. :p

Louis F.

Silver Hilton did pretty much nail it with the exception of calling them Bob's instead of Brad's. :p

Interesting to hear that someone did catch a springer on a Brad's Wobbler though.

Sunday two fishermen came into Bob's in Longview to enter a 16&1/2 and 12 pound springers in their fishing derby caught on BW-16 Wiggler's (metalic pink or serise with the black bill).
They said they did real well with them last year.
They were fishing just down stream from the mouth of the Toutle on the Chapman rd side (across from the Toutle) and were plunking them.

Yesterday the boats were catching them on Brad's Mag Wiggler color #37 & #36 which are basically popular Kwickfish colors.
They were also catching them at the mouth of the Toutle in the Castle Rock area.

A lot of folks saw them and momentarily cleaned Bob's out of those two colors.

Dano

Ah, well, it's an honest slip. Way to go, Scott, I'd say you've got it pretty well figured out. Welcome back from the boat.

Hey, it's good to see you Andrew and Faster Water on this site!

Dano

Plunking w/Brad's plugs, now that a new one? That's an expensive break off from the bank!

BD