Willamette sturgeon report 12-23 and 12-26

bass
bass
The story starts with me finding a Lamiglas 7' BFC rod at Dick's for 129.97. The angels sang when I picked it up and I thought it would be a great gift for my wife to give to me on Christmas. I bought the rod, but when I decided to go fishing on the 23rd I asked my wife to give me my rod early. Turns out that Santa does not like that. The 23rd was a frustrating day on the water. I fished all day for 3 shakers, while watching Brian (minnowmagnet) land 27. I had plenty of bites, but I just could not seem to hook the fish.

When I got home I knew what I had to do. I quickly wrote an apology letter to Santa and express mailed it to the North pole. I begged forgiveness for using my present before Christmas and asked him to bless it with some good mojo when he stopped by Christmas night. I waited breathlessly when I heard him come down the chimney Christmas night, but let out a sigh of relief when I heard the door to the garage open - it was going to be all right.

On the 26th, I went back to Swan Island and it was a different story. In the first half hour I caught 2 shakers and 2 keepers. Here is a pick of my first keeper on the new rod:

PC260592Small_zps9f23cfdc.jpg

That rod is a dream when it comes to fighting the fish. It has a much smoother bend progression than my tiger stik. The Lamiglas bends sort of evenly all the way down the blank. The tiger stik has a soft tip for the first 15" or so, but is a pool cue after that. The tiger stik is a fine rod, but man is the new rod sweet!

Anyway after that first flurry of action the bite just died for Brian (minnowmagnet) and I. He had caught 7 during that same period. After a bit we decided to move further out of the harbor. Boats closer to the mouth seemed to be doing well. I went all the way to the edge of the current where I marked a few fish. I dropped anchor, but Brian decided to look around further and eventually went back into the harbor to fish. I did not see him again that day, but he said he never found a really good bite back in the harbor.

I only fished this first spot for about 20 minutes. I did not get a bite there and was trying to decide what to do when I was visited by the tadpole of wisdom.

PC260593Small_zpsb455b182.jpg

Seriously, a tadpole came swimming by right under the surface. Blew my mind. Well I decided it was a sign so I pulled anchor and headed down river. I looked for fish in all my usual spots but really was not marking much. I did not want to fish out in the main current because there was a lot of big wood coming down the river. I had pretty much given up hope of marking fish and was heading back up to the harbor when I marked a few fish in a spot I had never fished before. It was a big relatively shallow flay (35'). I decided to drop anchor and fish. Man was that fortunate.

That was the fastest sturgeon fishing I have ever had. As soon as I dropped down I would get bit within 30 seconds or so. I ended up catching 30 fish from that spot in a little less than 4 hours. I caught 22 shakers, 6 keeper sized and 2 oversized from that spot. It was just bam, bam bam. The fish were fighting so hard it was a blast:

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Here is the 5.5' fish pulling me upriver into the current at 1.6mph. I love the way that Lamiglas cushions the fight.
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Here is a crappy picture of the 5.5' fish:

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Here is a close up of the 5' fish:

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I also had about the strangest sturgeon bite ever. I felt tap, tap tap and then nothing. The tension went out of my line so I started reeling. I could not get the slack out and as I reeled I noticed the line angle getting shallower and shallower. When I got tight on the fish it was right under the surface and did this tail walking kind of jump when I finally got the line tight and the hook in the fish. Totally bizarre!

As the day was winding down the bite never dwindled. I was hoping to get to 40 fish for the day but could not quite get there. It was getting to be close to 4 so I knew I had to leave soon since it was a 1/2 trip back to the ramp in the kayak. I said last cast to myself and lobbed the anchovy chunk into the muddy water. A few seconds later I feel the tap, tap, tap and when I tighten up to set the circle hook I knew I had another big fish. Unfortunately, after a 20 minute battle my line snapped. I definitely should have retied with so many fish rolling up my line! Hard to do it though when the bite is so hot.

Well, it was getting late and I hate to end on that kind of note so I quickly re-tied for one last cast. I was rewarded with this big keeper to end the day:

PC260606Small_zps67ce69e4.jpg

So the moral of the story is two-fold. First, don't try and short cut on Santa. Second, always listen to the tadpole of wisdom :)
 
troutdude
troutdude
Fantastic write up, and awesome pics, of a stupendous outing! Thanks for sharing...and keep a look-out, for that tadpole!
 
T
TimberTodd
Thanks for the great report Bass. So does the tadpole of wisdom become a frog of knowledge?
 
jamisonace
jamisonace
Great report bass. Your posts always make me jealous. I need to get my boys up there to do that. Would I be OK with 7'9" 50 pound rods?
 
bass
bass
jamisonace said:
Great report bass. Your posts always make me jealous. I need to get my boys up there to do that. Would I be OK with 7'9" 50 pound rods?

Sure. I often fish with a salmon rod. I have an 8'6" okuma 20-50lb test rod with a shimano reel and an 8'6" buzz ramsey 20-50lb test rod with an ambassadeur 6500C2. Both are excellent rods as long as I do not need more than 6oz. Around 6oz I prefer using my bigger rods and reels. For the record you can fish with 4oz or less around Swan Island pretty much every day of the year. I could have used my okuma rod on Friday, but I really wanted to give the new rod a workout.

Thanks TD and TT. It was a really fun day out on the water. The weather was perfect, very little wind and no rain. I will definitely be keeping my eyes peeled for for any amphibians in the future!
 
jamisonace
jamisonace
Thanks! My boys just saw your pic and they want to go this week. Looks like I'll be making plans to head north.

bass said:
Sure. I often fish with a salmon rod. I have an 8'6" okuma 20-50lb test rod with a shimano reel and an 8'6" buzz ramsey 20-50lb test rod with an ambassadeur 6500C2. Both are excellent rods as long as I do not need more than 6oz. Around 6oz I prefer using my bigger rods and reels. For the record you can fish with 4oz or less around Swan Island pretty much every day of the year. I could have used my okuma rod on Friday, but I really wanted to give the new rod a workout.

Thanks TD and TT. It was a really fun day out on the water. The weather was perfect, very little wind and no rain. I will definitely be keeping my eyes peeled for for any amphibians in the future!
 
T
Throbbit _Shane
In the summer do you wear a dry suit? Id like to try this some day. Seems like it would be a blast.

Great report as always.
 
O
OnTheDrop
Good job bass,

I absolutely LOVE breaking in a new rod.

Good report as always. When things slow down in a couple months for me, I'm gunna drag the drifter out in the Willamette and let some buddies tango with some sturgeon.

Cheers buddy,

P.S. Your posts always remind me of being a teenager and camping out overnight in our parents boats. Not sure why our Dads let us take the boats out in te first place, let alone anchor up and fish all night. ( Whoops, that might be illegal ) Sturgeon bite good allllll night.
 
bass
bass
Throbbit _Shane said:
In the summer do you wear a dry suit? Id like to try this some day. Seems like it would be a blast.

Great report as always.

I assume you meant winter and not summer. I have a dry suit, but in the winter I usually wear waders and a semi-dry top. I keep saving the dry suit for the ocean, but I just never seem to get up the gumption (or maybe it is courage) to venture out. If it is really cold, I wear the dry suit (water + air temp < 80) but otherwise I am in the waders and semi-dry top. In the summer I am in shorts :)

Glad you liked the write up. You post a lot of great stuff so it is really nice to hear that you like the stuff I post as well!
 
bass
bass
SteelmonKiller20 said:
Good job bass,

I absolutely LOVE breaking in a new rod.

Good report as always. When things slow down in a couple months for me, I'm gunna drag the drifter out in the Willamette and let some buddies tango with some sturgeon.

Cheers buddy,

P.S. Your posts always remind me of being a teenager and camping out overnight in our parents boats. Not sure why our Dads let us take the boats out in te first place, let alone anchor up and fish all night. ( Whoops, that might be illegal ) Sturgeon bite good allllll night.

I like breaking a rod in like that :)

I am also pretty psyched that I remind you of being a teenager since I am a lot closer to feeding worms than being a teenager myself. Of course, my wife would say that I never really matured much beyond my teenage years so maybe it is just that you are pretty insightful :)
 
B
BaldTexan
Great day of fishing and the best way to break in a new rod! Can't imagine fighting that many sturgeon in one day. After one or two oversize fish my arms are baked!...that could be because of the POS HW Ugly Stik I use for sturgeon fishing at the West Linn dock maybe.

What size/type hook do you use? I seem to miss on average at least a half dozen really good bites before I can get the hook set on one.
 
C_Run
C_Run
One of these days.... Another great report. I know you usually anchor when you fish for sturgeon but do you always anchor?
 
bass
bass
BaldTexan said:
Great day of fishing and the best way to break in a new rod! Can't imagine fighting that many sturgeon in one day. After one or two oversize fish my arms are baked!...that could be because of the POS HW Ugly Stik I use for sturgeon fishing at the West Linn dock maybe.

What size/type hook do you use? I seem to miss on average at least a half dozen really good bites before I can get the hook set on one.

I was definitely tired and sore after that day!

I like circle hooks. I mostly use Gamakatsu 6/0 circle octopus hooks, but I do carry from 4/0 to 8/0. I like that the fish mostly hook themselves when I reel the line tight and they are pretty much always hooked in the mouth.
 
bass
bass
C_Run said:
One of these days.... Another great report. I know you usually anchor when you fish for sturgeon but do you always anchor?


I always anchor. However, last Friday it was calm and minnowmagnet was very successful at gently holding his position with this paddle. I have never tried that but he made it work well. This is sort of like anchoring without and anchor. I have never tried just drifting for sturgeon. Sturgeon often bite very softly so I think it would be pretty tough to know you were getting bite while trying to control your drift on the river. It is just a lot easier to sit on anchor. I am all about easy :)
 

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