Home Forums Fishing Saltwater Winter king action

Been fun hitting the water again after hunting and trapping season. A few kings around around. Love eating the cold water kings. Crazy amounts of fat.

Going to commercial troll a lot this winter. Been fun being outside so much this year.

Fat kings. Food for kings.
Be gentle with me...dumb question...do you pull your boat out daily in winter or do you moor it? So if you moor it...what happens if it is pretty cold in the morning and you crank it over, does ice damage the raw water pump impeller? If you pull the boat at night, do you dry crank it to clear the impeller. I know they supposedly are self draining and normal salinity water doesn't freeze much until it drops to 28 or so.

I keep it in the harbor. I keep engines in the water which is always above freezing. Never had had impeller issues. I am lower SE ak. Usually it’s above freezing

Heck yeah!!! This makes me a little more motivated to try and get out and maybe get one. Not too many cruising around here though, you are in a way better area Joel! Nice work! Flasher/bait?

11" flasher and either a skinny g or hoochie. I feel like I could have done better with smaller stuff like coho killers or wee g's. Everything they are eating right now is small. trap shack for the skinny g and 039r hoochie.

Thanks for the info! Much appreciated! I think I have some of those

Glad to see you're getting out and getting on the fish, im super jealous..

Still running that purple dank?

Purple drank has been slow. Need to give it a try this year.

The purple nurple was hot a few years ago though. Green lantern has been killing it.

I fished out of Homer a couple weeks ago. The hot lure of the day ended up being a blue tipped rainbow spinner. I never would have tried that on that day but glad thecaptain is way smarter than me.

Very nice! Great pictures.

Very nice. It appears you have a very capable deck hand too!

Indeed.

Nice!

Winter doldrums here so I’ve been tying leaders, dipping jig heads and mooching weights and putting up a hundred or so more hoochies ….. tying up some Mylar skirts too since I’m bored. Head to the tackle shop now….😀

Hoping to get the new boat in the water in the next 2 weeks

Pretty nice one this morning right in front of town. Giving the kids crap because none of them wanted to go.

Been steady king fishing this winter/spring. 1-2 a trip usually. Nice to have the boat in the harbor a 1 minute drive away from the house.

Black lips for the win! Love those Kings!

Man, I need to get to work. I usually do this stuff while watching March Madness game. No cable TV any more.

Hey Calvin, hang a picture of on O3R hootchy. Charlie White talked a bit about this one. I think it's green. Used to buy all my hootchies from Tyee Tackle in BC, but they folded.

They are known in some locales as Blackmouths . . .

Would not know Kings are gone here in SC AK so forgot what to call them!!!!

O39r?

Yeah, that one

I will get a pic next time I am down at the boat.

Yep, Puget Sound lingo for winter fish.
We have Springers coming in now....Spring Chinook.
Columbia, Willamette and their tributaries.

Nice fish and boat OP !

Wrapped up 6 long days of herring pounding. Everything happened fast. Just need to harvest later this week. The wife joined me this year. Embrace the misery..grin

I hit a 30 pound feeder white king out at the mouth of prince william sound with the large version of the O39R behind a plain jane red/mylar hotspot flasher. 60# leader, and that fish nearly straightened a 6/0 eagle claw stainless siwash dragging that flasher though the water on that first looooong run. That fish was a live wire. I've tried that color down south off vancouver island: nothing.

Green back with a little chartreuse and maybe blending to almost blue on top, with a glitter belly. https://www.englundmarine.com/products/octopus-hoochie-o39r-5pk%7CGDS-O39R.html

That’s the variation I like. Lots of belly options in 39

Calvin, you selling those or fishing for fun and family eats?..mb

Thanks C. We get the Gold Stars locally, but I've never seen that color. Looks close to the Radiant Lures "Oil Slick" pattern which I like.

They will open up the terminal area for hatchery kings on June 1 for us.

Can't figure out what the seiner (with its net out) had to do with (filling?) the smolt pens

Catching herring to put into pens for roe on kelp. They have a net inside the pens and transfer the herring from the seine into those nets. We do pretty much the same process to pass our brood stock past the barrier net here at the hatchery.

The one I tried was the 4.25 size...B&Js in Anchorage sold them, along with 4.25 size OAL12R (I think) "purple haze" white ones with pearly effect. That color works offshore down here.

Been in a bit of a hoochie rut lately. Did some good inshore up near the top of vancouver island with a UV/glow version of the one they call the "turd", made by yo-zuri. Squid-shaped, over 5" long. Otherwise getting them up there on WCVI with small spoons inshore, and ancient #7 superiors offshore. A while back inshore the 3.5 size "army truck" pattern except with a uv-white belly instead of glow-white was white-hot, made by North Pacific.

I saw they pretty much shut down all king fishing from California up into oregon. Not looking good. I wish I had the answer.

Becoming threatened in Oregon. Ocean fishery has been shut down here and in Ca.

Closure link

Sounds like water issues in CA/OR?

Sounds like there is a pile of kings around right now. Probably go put a hurt on them after this weather systems moves through.

Kelp/Roe fishery done. OK product. Won't find out how we did until sept

Looked like corn-mealed flounders at first

Ski season is over now, hooters next, then kings

What do you shoot your hooters with? 22?

.221 Fireball loaded way down with 55 FMJ's and an s/s Tikka T1X .22 LR

How many Leaves were you allowed? Oil spill finished our pounding in the Sound.

This year, 900 a permit, with 2 permits per pound. 600 for a single permit per pound.

Once we dialed into what was going on, we did well today sport fishing. Me and the ‘horn had 8 keeps, lost 2 keeps, and two shakes.

Had 3 keeps, doubled, shook 1 for our limit of 4 for the two of us. Decided to troll bottom for a dinner Hali and doubled and shook 2 keeps. Dropped down again and shook another keep. Gave up on Hali and came home.



Had some nice snow to pack the stomach cavity.

Just got finished with half of one of them.
Cut into strips and marinated with sweet baby rays teriyaki
Sprinkled with Tony’s and put into a 500 degree oven is hard to beat !

Nice job Calvin and Raghorn! You guys are killing me with a tote load of good eats. Went camping up here a couple nights ago and it was 30 below in the morning...

Should be down ya'lls way 3rd week of May for a few days.

Nice. Let go fishing

Wife was having some people over so I decide to go hide. Went down to the boat and started trolling about a mile from the harbor and caught 2 keeps in about 1.5 hours. One red, one white variegated king.
Pretty good Fishing, considering I left the dock at 11 AM

The big one was hooked right in the stomach. It wasn’t the easiest fish to get into the net solo. Before the Dudley do rights say something it’s perfectly legal to keep a fish foul hooked in the salt water.

Those pics sure make a guy hungry. Mb

We eating the light colored one tonight, courtesy of Mr. Davis of Kodiak Custom Tackle fame. They eat good.

Calvin what is the maker of your net dragging boat ,it looks a lot like the shrimp boats that were made here in the 70s from wood/fiberglass/ or steel

Had the pleasure of fishing with Calvin and raghorn one morning a week or so ago when I was down on the island for a quick trip.

As always Joel put us right in a swarm of kings! Made it look easy and I took a box of king meat back north.

Great times with great people is what life is all about. Glad I was able to hang with you two for a bit!

Always good fishing with you. I am sure we will do it again

They're both great guys and fish killers.