Just got back late last night from a 3 day trip to Tofino with a couple of buddies, Dave and Scott, to fly fish for coho. Dave and I had been there before during a slow year so we were looking forward to this trip, especially after hearing there were more fish around than in the past. Wish we could have stayed longer because it took us a couple of days to dial in so another day could have been really profitable in terms of fishing action.
Day One-July 31Left for Horseshoe Bay to catch the ferry towing Scott's 20' Thunderjet. I was curious to see what it would be like to use a jet on the salt, besides the fact that the gas was going to cost us a mint. Luckily, he also had a 10 horse kicker which is what we would be using when bucktailing. Arrived at Tofino shortly after 11:00 and stopped in at Jay's Fishing Shop and Weigh West to see what we could find out. I'd fished the majority of the spots they told us about but the action changes daily out there so it's still quite often a crap shoot.
After checking in at the hotel, the Pacific Breeze, the cheapest hotel in town, we headed out on to the water. It was close to two by then, not a very ideal time to start fishing. In fact many of the boats were coming in because it was starting to do the afternoon blowup. We went straight out to Shot and the other rock island beside it but there wasn't any bait showing at all. We bucktailed around a bit, picked up a a couple of grilse and then headed over to the small group of islands off of Bartlett Is.
Same thing... a few grilse. By then it was really starting to blow up so we came back down the passage and went to Moser Point and then to the top end of the light house with no results. At this point in time we were starting to wonder where all these fish were supposed to be. We went in and chalked that day up to experience.
My arsonel of flies that I'd tied up for this and my other trip
Day Two-Aug.1 After hearing that it it had been quite good on the outside at The Humps (about 6 miles offshore) Scott, who has never flyfished for salmon before, was adament that we should start out there with the down riggers against Dave and mine's wishes to stay inside and track down those coho. Since it was Scott's boat we caved in so bright and early we headed off with the other boats, mostly guides, for the long, rough one hour plus boat ride out. The boat handled it fairly well as it greedily consumed fuel.
It wasn't gangbusters out there but a few boats were hooking up on smaller springs on anchovies and herring which we didn't have. We did manage to hook a wild coho which must be released on the outside. After battling the huge waves for a few hours Dave and I talked Scott into heading back to the inside. We were also getting tired of hearing Scott say, "If we had anchovies we ...."
We quickly checked out spots on the way back up to BS Passage and Kutcous where we heard there had been fish. One boat from Weigh West had been doing quite well on orange bucktails at Kutcous so we threw some out, except Dave who only had a pink and orange one. It turned out to be the better pattern because he got a few on it. I picked up one casting a pink clouser and nearly hooked a large spring on one that chased it all the way to the boat before swirling away two feet from the boat...quite a sight! Once again it started to really blow up so we headed in but at least we knew where to start the next day. Sure wish we could have gotten to the spot earlier by avoiding going to the Humps but at least I know where they are now.
Dave with a fish
One of mine caught casting
Day Three-Aug. 2When we got to the bay around the corner at Kutcous where we had action the previous day it was too shallow (low tide) and too much crap floating in the water so we headed out to bottom end of Tibbs (top of Bartlett Is.) Dave picked one up on that same fly but then Scott and I started getting into them on purple and white pattern. Scott lostall his while I landed mine.
Dave got into a real beauty which according to him I lost at the boat for him because I missed a netting opportunity. In my defence I didn't see the fish at all because it was in the glare of the sun
. The 10 pound coho never got to the net and when the fish sounded he broke Dave off. He thought his fishing was over since he lost THE fly but as it turned out a pink pattern he had worked even better. We ended up catching a handful of fish off the protected backside of Bartlett and a bunch more back at Kutcous fefore we had to stop fishing at 1:30 in order to catch the ferry to go back home.
Rock archway on Bartlett Is.
That was a good day...pinks and purple combinations being the ticket. All the Weigh West fly boats congregated around us the whole time we were out there. Hey, I'd do the same if I saw all those fish being hooked but they only managed to hook the odd one. One of the reasons we were doing well is because we were checking our flies every minute to keep them free of eel grass and we could tell they weren't.
Scott's first salmon on the fly
Another beauty
ConclusionBesides the extra gas a jet uses I wouldn't recommend using one in the chuck in shallow weedy areas unless it was a last resort. We had to pull the boat out three times so Scott could clear it but it was great to have your own boat to do the trip. The entire trip cost us less than $350 bones each... way less than half the cost of my Weigh West trip. Of course if you've never been up there before Weigh West is definitely the way to go to learn the area, epecially the travel in between fishing spots....you can be 500 yards away from land and still be in three feet of water and you'll be clamdigging in no time!
Also...on good fishing days it's quite possible to get into dozens of fish so you need a good catch and release landing net. I've been using one for so long when fishing for trout I'd forgotten how much normal nets like the one we had tear the scales off the fish's hide. Check the photos of the some of the ones we kept. BTW, great sunny warm weather with no fog! Cheers everybody.
Brent
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Topic: Coho on the Fly at Tofino (Read 3130 times)