June 15-18 Jim Moffat Group – Salmon, Halibut …and Elephants!?

Posted by admin on June 25, 2009 under Fishing Reports | Be the First to Comment

The final group led by Jim Moffat arrived at Gerry’s Fishing Charters late on the 15^th, and we had them in the boats and on the water as quickly as possible. The Chinook salmon had been congregating over towards the shallow sandy flats between Venture Banks and “Ops” (a giant radar ring antenna known locally as “The Elephant Cage” ) for the last few days and even though we only got to fish a few hours, we had plenty of action. Fishing right off the bottom provided some great Chinook fishing with plenty of fish played and landed by all boats.  This area is not particularly noted for its Chinook and fishing, but hey… sometimes the fish are where they are! On the way home, Jack, Jim, Barry and I found ourselves in the midst of a pod of about a dozen Orcas. Very cool anytime, but with the heavy fog and diminishing light, it was a surreal experience! On the 16^th, the rain had stopped and the fog had lifted, so I took the crew out to do a bit of halibut fishing offshore. The guests quickly got their limit among plenty of feeding Humpback whales and we were off to fish Salmon at Cape Edenshaw. It was one of those spectacular days where we managed to stay on top of the fish for hours by moving in and offshore with the tidelines (and the bait). In addition to the fish we kept, we released many Chinook in the 20lb range. A great day. Day 3 was much the same as day 2, though the commercial trollers who started up on June 15th were starting to make a noticeable (though temporary) impact on the fishing. We landed 6 Chinook and several coho. The last day was a “mop up day” of sorts. We were largely targeting coho to max out limits. We boated 8 coho and lost many others, before targeting and getting our final Chinook and Halibut. The boys were tubbed out! Thanks to Jim, Barry, Jack, Chris and Ryan for a great trip!