Mooching for Pinks

[Gobble Doc]

Does anyone here have success around Humpy Hollow catching pinks besides trolling (this summer/fall)?  My situation is that my boat can't troll slow enough with my current engine set-up so I'm wondering if it is very effective to mooch a herring or jig or buzz bomb or some other combination?  I tried this 2 years ago and didn't have much success and eventually just waited to intercept the fish in the Snohomish. 

[Goldeneye]

They will hit a buzz bomb pretty well.  We used to do that when we found a good concentration of fish on the sounder.  Fished with lighter gear to make it fun.

[h20hunter]

Sure have....just use a small pink or pink/white buzz bomb. I like to let a lot of line out, get a little angle on the line as long as I'm away from the trollers.....jig it, real it up a bit, jig it, real it up a bit. Repeat.

[iRem]

I fly fish for most species and I usually kill them the pinks in the salt and rivers. You should be able to dead drift with the pinks, cast and retrieve and you should do just fine if your on top of them!

[Bullkllr]

People do really well casting a lead head jig in the salt, kinda like in the rivers. And you can use lighter gear than if trolling.

[WSU]

What everyone above said.  They are active near the surface and you will see jumpers.  Get in front of them and your are in business.

[lokidog]

Gobble, I have a Happy Troll plate that you would be more than welcome to try out to slow yourself down a little.  The only thing is you do lose a little bit of maneuverability with it.  You can also drag a drift sock or just a plastic bucket if your speed reduction needs are only a little. 

I troll with a 150 on my 21' Trophy and a 90 on my 19' Alumaweld and they go plenty slow for pinks, maybe not for winter blackmouth but pinks, coho, and kings off the coast I do fine.  It is about 1.8 to 2.2 mph.

[Dan-o]

People do really well casting a lead head jig in the salt, kinda like in the rivers. And you can use lighter gear than if trolling.

 

We crush them when we anchor up and cast pink lead head jigs in the salt.   And we definitely do significantly better when we "jig" them than a straight retrieve.

I'm just guessing, since I'm not actually a pink salmon in real life, but I try to jig them like a shrimp that's darting along......   works great for us.

[Kola16]

Just wait for the Indians to go out and round them up in a net, then cast right into it. Mooch from the Indians! Oh, wrong type of mooching 

I really need to put a line in the water this weekend

[Gobble Doc]

Loki,

Thanks for the generous offer.  I've got a 13' Boston Whaler with a 40 Hp Yamaha on it and by GPS I think I'm trolling around 3-4 mph.  A couple years ago when I went out everyone around me was trolling and catching fish after fish with downriggers while I didn't have any luck jigging a pink buzz bomb.  Maybe I was out there at the wrong tides and the angle was too shallow?  I go back and forth thinking I'll put on a down rigger and then decide that I can't troll slow enough to use them effectively anyway so I default back to the idea of mooching.  I have had great luck flyfishing the rivers and throwing pink jigs in the Snohomish so I thought I would try to figure out the salt.  Thanks for the ideas. 

What about a deep six and something like a pink hoochie on a flasher...?  I've never pulled a bucket to slow down but I just have visions of a bucket, rope, propellers, fishing line all ending up in the same spot.   

[GEARHEAD]

spot and stalk them, target jumpers, get south of them and cast a 3inch pink buzzbomb.  Where there is one fish, there may be 6 or 60. they are very very aggressive, you will hook them more reliably by letting the buzzbomb fall a ways, so no need to get too jiggy with it.

[D-Rock425]

I've seen guys catch them from shore with buzz bombs down by the ferry.

[gaddy]

just a thought but with that kind of speed would leaded line & needlefish work?

[lokidog]

We use a deep six on the middle line with a dodger and flasher, depending on how tight your release is, you might need to use a smaller dodger/flasher.  We catch probably as many on it as the downriggers.  It helps to have a line counter real so you can repeat depth, though I often use a spinning real on that one. 

[Button Nubbs]

drag some buckets. you can cover more water and if you have downriggers you can control depth easier.

[Bullkllr]

Or you could try the obvious and actually get a trolling motor. Its a pretty critical piece of equipment in many/most fisheries around here.