Yankee @ the Oak 8/28 Afternoon

[Yankee Troller]

Mel and I went out to do a little derby fishing. Although the wind was whipping we figured we’d give it a go. We were greeted with 2-4’s which were fish-able. We set down in 60’ of water right out front and deployed our three Cannon Downriggers and two wires. As we were setting up it was building, but the screen looked promising.

It was tough to keep speed. I slammed the corner rigger down to 55’ with a Stinger Chrome Green Dot E-Chip/A-TOM-MIK shredded Sweet Pea, and then let out my wire. When that was done I went up to the helm to get the speed right as Mel had just set the center rigger with our Moor Sub-Troll on it. As I was taking her back from 2.5 to 2.0 at the ball I hear line ripping. I turn to see my corner rigger stretched backbehind the boat. I yelled over the whipping wind at this point “babe you want to catch that Salmon!?!?!?†She jumped on the rod with a big ol’ smile on her face and brought it to the net. It wasn’t a derby fish, but we quickly realized those 2-4s are now 6-8’s and growing fast. We tried to fish through it, but it just wasn’t gonna happen as it was building. It wasn’t long and we were pulling lines and heading in. There were some big dogs out there on the ride back in, and I was a little nervous as that might be the biggest water the Yank has seen.

When we got back to the dock I was informed by Paul C of Free Spirit that a guy in a 17’ Lund was next to him when he picked up and ran in. We were 10 minutes behind him, and never seen the Lund. As we sat at the dock wondering what happened to this guy there was still no sight of him. A good while later Paul sees him putting into the mouth of the creek and confronts the guy. Apparently, his big motor died. Paul told him he was stupid to even be out there when it was 3-5’s and the old guy tells him he is 70 years old and he doesn’t care if he dies out there! Some people are just amazing!

Anyway, the W/NW winds were pushing some warm water in there, and we had 74 degrees most of the way down the water column. The screen was good when we picked up in the 55-80’ range.

[KJ pluggin]

Wow, good to hear that the old guy made it back to port.

Nice fish guys.

[Just Hook'n]

Still amazes me what people in small boats go out in.

Some claim they can "ride" the top of the waves.

Scares the crap out of me thinking they will get sideways trying to solo net a fish or something and get swamped.