Wednesday 21 October 2020

Project Bottleneck



I volunteered to get involved with Project Bottleneck , " micro-trolling" , to tag, sample, and release young chinooks in their first year in the ocean .




 This is a project of the Pacific Salmon Foundation , carried out by non-profits such as, in this case , the BC Conservation Foundation.   I started in October, with Jeff and then with Aaron.  

 We're using gear that looks like regular salmon gear in miniature.  A little Dick-Nite spoon behind a little flasher .  The target fish bite it, but also sometimes larger salmon, and sometimes as many herring as salmon .  

 The salmon go into a tank with some anesthetic to calm them down before we take a tissue sample and insert a PIT tag .   

 Here's a herring . 
  

 There were quite a few humpback whales around still in October . 

Some sea-lions checked us out thoroughly one October day . 
   








 

Monday 19 October 2020

That was a Covid summer


  That was an odd summer.  Thank You to everyone who came to enjoy everything that was wonderful this past summer.  I didn't post so many photos.  For the ones I did, few show masks, which makes it look like everything is normal, but you know that everyone who got in my boat was part of their own family, or small socially isolated circle.  

  Things get better from here. I look forward to hearing from you. 

 Cheers ! - Rick 

Tuesday 15 September 2020

a different kind of success


 It's not all about catching fish.  This crew was delighted to see humpback whales, a lot of them, and have a good look around in the scenic back-country.  When we fished we did not catch any keepers on this half-day trip, which is my only blank trip in the motor boat this season, but they did spend time with their other interests.  They had a great time . The result is interest in a repeat trip, so that is the measure of success. . 






 

Wednesday 9 September 2020

We kept it .


  Big lingcod are females that we usually release.  But we kept this one.  

Friday 4 September 2020

Tuesday 1 September 2020

Friday 28 August 2020

Some to release , some to keep


 This family caught enough for many great dinners, and released the big ones as required. We all get involved in the procedure which is contributing to salmon science by taking a small tissue clip from the trailing edge of the tail and measuring for length. The tissue sample is checked for DNA which identifies the fishes home river system. We handle them in specific ways, and you can see the fishes head goes into water as we record his length, and then in short order it is released.  
 This one measured out to be about 30 lbs. , so we are calling it a Tyee. 





 

Thursday 27 August 2020

Cameron slips in a bit of family fishing



 Cameron Neufield is the inventor and maker of Spirit Lures .  He was in the area with his family and squeezed in an evening fishing.  In spite of science, women seem to be luckier .  

 I really have had great success with the Loonie Spoons . I wrote a blog post about them in January . 

https://spiritlures.com/ 

 https://www.blogger.com/u/2/blog/post/edit/1501577665328849399/576520977086470387?hl=en-GB 

Tuesday 25 August 2020

This fish kept us up late .


  Jordan brought his Dad to share the Tyee style rowboat fishing.  These are all wonderful fish and a big kick to land one on the simple light tackle.  These guys are hooked on this fishing and coming again next year.   It gets dark quickly, but we are fishing very nearby.  

 

Monday 24 August 2020

Scott loves the Tyee rowboat fishing


 Scott loves the mornings in a rowboat . He is pretty deadly on the hook-up.  Nice bright fish .  


Tuesday 18 August 2020

you might catch the darndest things


  A large hake grabbed the salmon plug and then had his tail bitten off by a dogfish shark on the way in.   We don't catch hake very often, which is interesting, because they have sharp predator teeth and big eyes for hunting, and while they are usually deep, we are often fishing deep, too.  Maybe they are smarter than salmon ?  Did I say that out loud ?