Last night I had to attend the Upper Fraser Valley Sport Fishing Advisory Committee fall meeting, so it only made sense to make a half-day fishing trip out of it.
From what others have reported, it seems like fishing is winding down on the Vedder. Because the river rose a couple of feet late last week, it was likely most of the fresher fish had moved to the upper sections of the river. I decided to focus my afternoon's effort in mid river.
I met up with a couple others who had already been on the flow since first light. Itosh reported very little success in the lower river but some improvement at a spot in mid river. I arrived to find him with a coho jack on the river bank.
Because they had been fishing the spot for quite awhile, I suggested that we walk to a spot slightly further upstream where I have caught fish in the past. We walked up and found the prime piece of water unoccupied. It looked extremely fishy so I wasted no time to float a piece of roe through it.
There were a couple of misses first, which I thought were snags. I shortened the float depth slightly, put on a fresh piece of roe. With one cast, the float dove just after it started drifting. A coho salmon exploded on the surface once I set the hook. I guided it into the shallow bay but struggled to beach it for awhile once I saw the absence of the adipose fin. The 10lb or so doe was eventually slid onto the bank and I finally have a hatchery marked coho salmon in the bag.
The fishing only got better. Once I bled my catch and resumed fishing, I proceeded to hook another one on the next cast. It was another big coho salmon, but the hook popped out this time within seconds. The others also connected with their shares of adult coho salmon, but they all came off the hook.
There were also chum salmon in the pool and a few also liked our roe. These were of course carefully released after each brief battle.
We spent about two hours at the first spot until the fishing gradually died off. With a couple more jacks landed by Itosh, there were no other coho salmon caught so it was time to make a move.
Our second and last spot of the day was flowing slightly faster, so it was difficult to say if we would encounter any fish. We fished along the shallows, hoping to connect with coho salmon that might move through.
There were indeed coho. It did not take long for me to hook one, but it was the wrong colour. It is not unusual to come across fish that are much coloured in November.
Here Itosh caught me handling a boot, away from the river bank of course.
The action did not end there. I had the float depth set at 2ft and the bites kept on coming. The next fish was much better, a silver wild coho that was around 4 or 5lb. It looked kind of flossed.
Itosh continued to catch his share of jacks.
We landed a few more fish and also missed a few more bites before we walked back to our cars in darkness.
This is a peaceful time to be fishing on the Vedder, with the odd nice fish mixed in between. This was the most enjoyable trip for me so far this season.
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Topic: Chilliwack River, November 8th 2010 (Read 3808 times)