These were just the two we decided to keep. We fair hooked about 10 fish in 2 hours, foul hooked as many. If you restrict the hook setting to when you actually FEEL the bite you can amazingly hook them INSIDE the jaw line. WOW what a freakin bit of news that is. Try bait if your tired of standing in the snag line. It helps you double the amount of fair hooked fish if you have fresh roe.

Adam ain't BS'n anybody when he says he can fair hook all the fish he wants, (well almost all the fish he wants).

Notice the fellow behind me in the picture. DO NOT STAND SO CLOSE TO THE HOLE. . Now those fish get pushed a few feet against the bank but you can still see them. He tells me that. I tell him to call me when he finds one that'll bite now that he has introduced himself to every bit of 'nookie in the hole.

In the 20 minutes it took us to clean up and leave nobody landed another fish out of that hole. Its not some secret spot, there are 200 places just like it on the Skok.


Notice the horde in the picture. Now just downstream I saw fish swirling, and rising lazily. Just about totally undisturbed. Do you think anybody in that line of [CRACKERS] tried to pitch bait, lures, or a fly to the 50 kings sitting at the end of that pool? One or two left the line, made a couple casts, then went back in the middle of the line.

And to those of you who stand on the side of the road with 20 other people and wonder how your going to enjoy yourself fishing in the midst of that mayhem, I have your answer: Your not going to enjoy yourself. Why do people convince themselves that they must stand in the middle of the biggest crowd in order to catch fish?

If anybody doubts that those fish bite readily I am ready to put some money on it. $200 says that I can get a king to bite anytime in the next 7 days unless river conditions become extreme. Just because a person sucks at fishing don't assume the rest of us have to resort to snagging.


What makes somebody think to themselves "Gee that 3 feet of water between that lil kid in the yellow jacket, and the guy in the red shirt looks great."?

Quit eating lead paint.





This last pic is the end of the pool where the fish are holding. Its just as empty of people in the evening, and the schools run (and bite) as they move through.




I've only got an hour today to fish. So thats why I am ranting so much. Its not the crowds that bother me, its the idiots who don't listen, pay attention, or otherwise give those fish the respect they deserve. They are Kings.
When I say respect, I am referring to the work it takes to legally harvest a fish. Its no different then someone spot lighting elk, and calling it hunting. Then telling people he 'hunts' because he's too lazy and stupid to do the scouting, and hiking required to do it legally. That kind of individual has no respect for the game he chases.


Kudos to the one gentleman who was otherwise completely clueless, and yet paid attention to the few words I offered him. He even did a fantastic job with the net, followed all my directions and avoided getting wrapped around the legs by my fish. I cut off my gear and gave it to him before I left. His awe and fascination with the tremendous run of fish struck us both. I'm sure he hooked some fish. I hope he has a great season. I wish I had gotten his name.


Tight Lines to you all,

Vince


PS...I saw almost as many kings on the Skok as I did Springers on the XXXX river this June. Had to brag, it was pretty awesome.

Amen! Great post Vince and awesome photos!

Here's my $200 safety net! If I share some with you, do I get half?

Great post vhawk! Nice fish too!

are you trying to say that there is a way to get those fish without snagging??? I wont beleive it! :p

nice work!

Vhawk-

You make that bet on the "offcolorwhite" river fish pix from last June instead of the Skok and you got a deal ( > ; or something

Great day of Flossing!
Just like the Samish, the fish move fast all over trying to get away from all the feet and legs and end up flossed.
You can say anything you want, but you were flossing and you don't need a long leader in that river to floss.
I did not say that was a bad thing based on the fishery and where you were.

Vhawk,

I've seen you down there ... fishing. Frankly I am NOT impressed with your post in a big way. In fact.... I find the your post arrogant and confrontational. If you EVER try to give me any advice we are going to have a problem.


For everyone else .... It's just that this situation really really rubs me the wrong way. I'm sorry I'm a nice guy to run into on the river and still am. I am polite when given advice from self proclaimed experts, as we all know that it's just part of fishing. This is different.

yeah i aint gonna lie and say i haven't flossed a fish on that river cause there are so many of them. it just happens.

BUT i have in fact seen alot of the fish i catch on eggs, rise up from the bottom to take them. those fish do bite, you just have to find a place where they are not so spooked. and they take spoons quite well too.

Hoglander if this is the part of his post that rubs you the wrong way:

"If you restrict the hook setting to when you actually FEEL the bite you can amazingly hook them INSIDE the jaw line. WOW what a freakin bit of news that is."

It was slam on snaggers and you should not be offended .


oops, I see what your talking about. I guess vhawk could have used some better words like crackers for instance? he gave really good advice but he may have been a little spun up.

This:

Notice the horde in the picture. Now just downstream I saw fish swirling, and rising lazily. Just about totally undisturbed. Do you think anybody in that line of idiots tried to pitch bait, lures, or a fly to the 50 kings sitting at the end of that pool? One or two left the line, made a couple casts, then went back in the middle of the line. MORONS.

P.S I like what you did to the confused icon BOB

Hoglander, sorry I strike you as arrogant. Which guy in that picture with the 60 people lined up over 100 yards of river is you?


And what kind of problem would we have should I advise you that green has been a good color lately? Are you going to offer to punch me? Or is the pepper spray still your weapon of choice?


If you enjoy fishing in a crowd that's fine. Some people honestly enjoy it as a social event. This post was really directed more at people who fish in the middle of a crowd and then whine about the crowding later.
Also I don't hand out advice unsolicited. I get irritated at anglers that come over and ask me what I am using, where the fish are, and if they can fish next to me. And then ignore my advice and spook the fish in the hole. It is annoying and rude.
BigFin did you not read my post? The major theme was all about getting away from the crowd. The fish that were in front of me were not wound up, or pressured by anybody but me and my girlfriend. In fact we went through a huge skein of fresh eggs in about 2 hours because they kept getting crushed. I didn't see anybody else fishing bait, although I didn't spend a whole lot of time surveying the crowd.


I managed to get in about an hour of fishing at the end of the day today. I got to see a maestro walk down the bank picking out pockets of water to fish. He was pretty much by himself. I saw him hook 2 nice fish on an aerofly in about 15 minutes. He said he had landed 12 fish that day. Meanwhile the guys just downstream of us landed 0 fish the last hour of the day. I doubt a guy goes through the trouble and expense of buying aeroflies just to snag fish. The one I saw landed was hooked right in the mouth. Thats the kind of guy I look for to answer my questions.

I too had a chance to witness the buggy whippin of the Skok and morons in a line harassing the run.

I was dissapointed because I left empty handed. Had a couple of bites but I refusedto do a 300 degree "whish". I saw more fish foul hooked than in the mouth.

I fished eggs for quite a while with little luck. Tried various corky colors with and w/o a small piece of yarn.

I am curious if a guy could use a float and jig on a dirft? I saw Vinces reference to an aerofly and wondered if a jig presentation would work.

I feel like the poorest fisherman on the planet if I can't even catch a Salmon outta the Skok.

I reread my post after getting some sleep. "Idiots" was probably a term I usually wouldn't write about such a large group of strangers. It still puzzles me why anybody who was trying to legitimately trying to hook a fish would stand in the middle of a line of snaggers.

Almost everyone who I have talked with who has gone off by themselves has done exceptionally well. I have had a few hours of lockjawed action even then, but it still is better then standing in line running 8 foot leaders through nervous fish.

Vhawk,

Gotta agree with you totaly. When you got 43 people standing there,(87 is the highest in that hole so far I've counted) 2 people using bait, 41 people jerking every cast it's kinda obvious what they are doing. Then the same people sit and byatch about the snagging on the other side which is legal if they use a single hook. I have foul hooked one fish this year. I won't say how many I've hooked so some certain people will think I'm bragging. Use good bait and wait for the bite and belive it or not amazing things will happen.

free drifted some eggs this morning...sweeeeet....made a believer out of me...

i fished it today from 8 to about 4 and only 4 out of 30 fish were hooked in the body. didn't keep any cause i aint carring them all the way back to the road. hehe its a far walk with a fish. did catch a few chromers though that i wish i would have cept. oh well.

and yeah i know that tail out vhawk is talking about. i always fish that while everyone else is in the line of people. and i hook more fish there then the whole line combined.

today i was fishing a little nook between some snaggs and a head of a hole, and theres was like 3 oter guys. we were hooking more fish 90% legal "in the mouth" then the line of 20 guys below us.

just find a place with a school of fish all to your self and you will get biters, or at least have a hwole lot more flossing action if you don't believe they hit.

but in all just get otu there and have fun guys its only a sport. we aint getting paid millions to do it so what do we have to complain about. we aint professional athletes.

there was a guy throwing a bobber and jig below the bridge today. but i don't know how well he was doing. he had a school of about 10 fish and i didn't want to go and disturb them. and ruin his fishing.

but i amagine it would work good, if you could find some undisturb fish. i was gonna try it today but i forgot the jigs in the truck.

I'm going to be bobber and jig fishing tomorrow. Maybe some bobbers and eggs too. Found fish piled up in some backwater slough out behind Hunters Farm.

Today we had a great group of guys out fishing that same hole I got the picture of. Maybe 15 total. Nobody snagging fish. And I didn't see one foul hooked fish out of the 5-6 i saw netted over the course of about an hour.

I'll post pictures tomorrow of the lucky neighbor girl we took fishing with us. She took her first king on her first cast. Set the hook like a girl scout. I asked her "what was that?"

And she says "I think I felt a fish".

And so I take the rod from her, and tell her when she sets the hook she needs to do it like a man. So as I begin to bring the rod up to show her how its done the fish she hooked takes off.

I'm guessing it was between 22-25 pounds. Biggest I saw today.


Vince

I had great sucess on 9-1. Was dialed in big time. Was using 12# flouro leader and a single orange corkie and red 5/0 hook. CnR'd two nice sized bucks. Im guessing a 12# and 18#'er in less thatn an hour.

What was really great is that I was one of only 3 other guys fishing the hole. Two days prior it looked like vhawks picture. About 20 guys tossing into a stretch of hole 30 ft long ....pretty silly

Some tribal kids showed up and snagged 14-15 fish. Big ones too!

The tide came in and the bite totally turned off so I split.
It was a good day

OMG Talljeeper! a 5/0 hook, WTF, sounds like a snag rig to me. Me and fishhead5 fish 10lb line 8lb leaders size 1 or 2 hooks and a small cluster of eggs and we hook fish after fish. Also I have seen numerous board members from here and the other board who claim to be fisherman but are nothing more than snaggers. So all of you that claim to be holier than thou need to take a step back and look in the mirror.
Peace
Superfly

omg! size 1 or 2 hooks. gee why not use a treble hook with some lead rapped around it. jk

yeah i like it when i see everyone using huge 3/0 to 5/0 hooks. its a joke.

but i'm like you 10lb main line and 8lb leader sometimes 10lb leader if i'm fishing by a snag. and #4 hooks. i like to use the smallest gear possible, lightest rods. its so fun fighting big fish on light wieght steelhead gear.