Hi All
Once again we have settled into a blustery high pressure system which has given us some gorgeous sunshine but strong north west winds have limited our fishing possibilities. I am writing this Wednesday July 5 and the weather forecast does look like lighter winds for today, through Saturday. Hopefully we can get offshore on a hali hunt and give you the low down.
Fishing slowed down from last week. Austin and Cree, which were on fire last week have definitely mellowed. That’s not to say you’d be wasting your time there but limiting out by 10:30 am might be a tad on the hopeful side.
I fished there with guests Jaime and Jacinthe from Victoria. We had the gear in the water by 7am and fished through two tides. We caught two decent fish in the teens on a glow green and white skinny g at 50′ on the rigger but the bite went off and did not come back on. I decided to move after the tide change and headed south to Seabird Rocks located in front of Pachena Bay. We fished tight to structure with a uv green moon jelly flasher matched with a skinny g at 27′ and a glow white hootchie and lime green flasher at 33′. We hit a beauty immediately on the hootchie and boxed a 16 pounder. Shortly after we caught another fish in the high teens on the skinny g. The skinny g hit once again but this time the fish managed to shake the lure and continue on it’s journey. That was it for the afternoon bite. We returned to Seabird Rocks the next morning and once again the skinny g in green and white glow proved to be the hot lures. We managed 4 lovely spring salmon to 20 lbs including one screamer that took a hundred meters of line. It wasn’t crazy fishing by any means but still very productive.
The winds returned that afternoon and forced us to return to calmer flatter water.
The winds have been strong ever since making fishing around the north side of the Deer Group (Kirby, Edward King and Flemming) challenging at best. Effingham, Austin and Cree are fishable in such strong winds but the bite has not been nearly as good as it was last week.
It still looks like small spoons and hootchies are the ticket. The salmon we are cleaning at the table are full of tiny immature herring and needle fish. The skinny gs have been leading the way. I’ve had great success with the green/white glow and no bananas, cop car and silver/gold have been very good as well. Yesterday I stopped in to the marine store in Ucluelet and they echoed my thoughts on the skinny gs. They have definitely have been hot over at Ucluelet as well. The Silverhorde Purple Spoon is also working well.
So what are my thoughts if you are coming Bamfield way in the next few days?
Firstly stop at Harbourside and get the latest news on what’s happening on the water. If I am out on the water chat with Aussie John or Brett. They will give you the scoop.
I have returning guests Curtis and Martin for the next 5 days and I think we will start out by heading over to Seabird and Pachena. Friday looks like a great day to hunt hali’s so we will head out to the banks and fish the humps about 12 miles out. Spreader bars with salmon bellies and extra large herring will be the order of the day.
In the meantime please feel free to email or phone the lodge.
We have had a cancellation or two in August during prime time for lodging. Get on it now! It won’t last long. We have dates open in our self contained suites on Saturday August 5 to Tuesday August 8 and then again Monday August 14 to the 20th. You cannot fish Bamfield at a better time than those dates!
As per usual, the tackle store is stocked, fuel both gas and diesel, fish ice, drink ice all available. Stop in to say hi, we’ll leave the light on for you…
Tight lines and full boxes…
Coach (aka Jonathan), Aussie John, Tom and Brett
