Fishing with Rod Discussion Forum
Fishing in British Columbia => Fishing Reports => Members' Fishing Reports => Topic started by: lucky on August 13, 2009, 02:45:19 PM
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After a bit of success in the salt last weekend Ive been eager to get back on the water, well this morning when I found out that I didn't have to work I knew right away where I'd be spending the day.
Arrived at the spot around 7 am "later than I normally start" and proceeded to launch the kayak. For the first hour I fished hard but paddled even harder as the tide was coming in pretty good. Before too long my arms were sore so I beached the kayak and started casting from shore.
After casting awhile from shore I hooked into a decent hatchery coho which came undone as I was trying to yard it up onto the rocks, this was a tragic loss but enough to keep there for at least another 1000 casts.
No more action from shore but as the tide started to slow down I decided to put the kayak back in the water for one last kick at the coho. Before long I was into a fish but it turned out to be a lingcod.
A short time later my rod bends and I know its a salmon this time, after some screaming runs I ease the larger fish into the small net, then I reach over the side and blindly stick my hand into the net feeling for a fin.
When I don't feel an adipose I start to smile thinking I have just landed a decent coho, but after dropping the fish into the bottom of the kayak I realized its not a coho but a hatchery chinook that is just over the legal size, bonus!
My line goes back down and a short while later I hook into a pink which makes it into the net, after that the fishing died down and I headed for home content that I was almost able to get a salmon hat trick.
Sure hope I don't have to work tomorrow!
(http://thumb0.webshots.net/t/55/555/0/95/18/2122095180099123620EvoIJa_th.jpg) (http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/2122095180099123620EvoIJa)
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Great to hear you hit some fish, lucky! I wish I had the day off today, so I could spend some time down there. Gonna have to pull the pontoon boat out and join you one of these days. :)
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Very nice again... ;) We were there (not there, but near there where the fish were not) a couple of mornings ago. Mark landed a bullhead, Joan landed a tiny jack, another guy landed a flounder and I found a half-eaten flounder, which I should have taken home (good for soup, as we Chinese often say ;D ).
(http://www.fishingwithrod.com/albums/blog-2009/090811_01.jpg)
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Great catch! sounds like fun!
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Top ones a coho by the looks but nice fish. Would be a hoot catching them on light gear in a kayak.
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i was going to say...thats a coho
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do coho have spots that look like this?
(http://thumb0.webshots.net/t/74/174/1/71/17/2190171170099123620RyRZkJ_th.jpg) (http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/2190171170099123620RyRZkJ)
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Hard to tell by looking at the back actually. I've found the spotting on the back of both species fairly similar. It's better to make comparison on the spotting on the tails and the colouration of the mouth.
If that is a coho, it's a biggy! :o
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Black gums and spots on top and bottom of tail.
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Not a big coho then. I guess you have to wait until October. ;)
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Very nice again... ;) We were there (not there, but near there where the fish were not) a couple of mornings ago. Mark landed a bullhead, Joan landed a tiny jack, another guy landed a flounder and I found a half-eaten flounder, which I should have taken home (good for soup, as we Chinese often say ;D ).
(http://www.fishingwithrod.com/albums/blog-2009/090811_01.jpg)
Rodney - I thought you were originally from Japan?
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The top fish is definitely a coho... you can't mistake that for a spring.
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coho gets my vote
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Last time down there I had a couple larger than usual fish on and I would have to guess they where Chin ook. Pulled in a few pink, but no more Coho into the net. Had my fill of eating pink for now. Might head down for the weekend when the high tides are slack. Trying other spots today.
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The yap and tail say coho which im pretty sure it is. The mouth is the best way to tell the difference. Coho do have black in their mouth but the skin around the teeth is white which you can see in the pic. Either way its legal and a nice fish so doesnt really matter.
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Never heard of a clipped Chinook. Do any hatcheries clip springs?
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Maybe it was a large coho? I'm really starting to wonder, in the past Ive caught plenty of both species and never had a problem telling the two apart. This fish fought like a chinook, and the large irregular shaped spots looked like chinook, as well there were spots on the bottom part of tail. Even a couple of fellows on shore thought it was a chinook.
Here's a headshot of a 7lb female coho from last week.
(http://thumb0.webshots.net/t/75/175/5/62/73/2381562730099123620SEOUPg_th.jpg) (http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/2381562730099123620SEOUPg)
And here's a headshot of the fish in question which was a 9lb female.
(http://thumb0.webshots.net/t/74/174/4/21/81/2190421810099123620EhRqMg_th.jpg) (http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/2190421810099123620EhRqMg)
Either way I knew that it was a legal fish, and actually if it had an adipose it would have been released because I initially thought it was a coho.
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Never heard of a clipped Chinook. Do any hatcheries clip springs?
Yup,
It's gotten me on the Vedder before. Thinking I had a coho when it was actually a spring.
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Yup,
It's gotten me on the Vedder before. Thinking I had a coho when it was actually a spring.
Red? I've never seen a clipped white.
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No it was a white. It was a Jack.
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looks like a coho to me.
i have caught lots of clipped springs on the vedder, jacks and adults... most are whites.
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And here's a headshot of the fish in question which was a 9lb female.
(http://thumb0.webshots.net/t/74/174/4/21/81/2190421810099123620EhRqMg_th.jpg) (http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/2190421810099123620EhRqMg)
It's definitely a coho, lucky. Check the white gumline along the teeth. That's the only way to be sure from simple observation. I thought it was a coho when I saw the initial picture, but didn't realize I could click on it to make it bigger and didn't want to say anything without certainty.
Now that I've looked at the picture above, I'm sure of it. nice fish!
:D
Tex
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I caught about 7 clipped reds in the ocean.
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I'll join the chorus that says coho. Nice fish.
The tail is a quick identifier that is an easy give away 95% of the time. Spots on top and bottom spring, no spots or a few on top only then coho. I've seen it wrong both ways though. I once caught a tyee size spring in the ocean that had not spots at all on the tail.
The mouth is the sure identifier. Black is spring, white line on gumline is coho.
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Just to beat the topic to death here are the links to fisheries identifiaction along with photos of the jaws of coho and chinooks.
http://www.pac.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/fm-gp/rec/species-especes/chinook-quinnat-eng.htm
http://www.pac.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/fm-gp/rec/species-especes/coho-eng.htm
The descriptions on these pages are good, but even they fail to mention that the tail is not a reliable indicator, but the jaw is.
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Good point Gman, the spots on the tail can fool you. Several years ago I caught a hatch coho in a river that had spots on the bottom half of the tail. Not as many spots as a chinook but certainly more spots than the top few on a coho. The number of spots threw me so much I had to look at the mouth to confirm my ID of the fish
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Coho.
Chinook teeth are much more pronounced and cut like a razor.
Chinook also have smaller eyes in relation to their head size.
They to clip some Chinook, for scientific purposes mostly.
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Nice looking fish Lucky. Yes - they do clip springs...here's a photo of one I released last Fall:
(http://photos-a.ak.fbcdn.net/photos-ak-snc1/v351/128/42/637281730/n637281730_1008160_9219.jpg)
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Nice fish. As others have said, especially once seeing the head shot, i would say coho. Legal catch either way. I have also caught clipped chinook on the vedder as well. Just a reminder, it helps stock assesment to cut the head off of any sport caught clipped salmon and deliver the head to your local sport head recovery depot. Helps asses stocks and you have a chance of winning a prize.
http://www.pac.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/fm-gp/rec/tag-etiquette/SHRP-PRTS-eng.htm (http://www.pac.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/fm-gp/rec/tag-etiquette/SHRP-PRTS-eng.htm)
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The head recovery program is awesome. A couple years ago I dropped the heads of two hatchery clipped springs with them. The fish were caught within 5 minutes of each other in the Strait of Georgia. Turns out one was from the Cowichan River and one was from the Clearwater!!!! I would have thought they were both from the same run.