First Salmon of the season

[bassfighter]

It was a hot evening for everyone, I believe everyone has more than one salmon for the night, caught the salmon from 12:30am-3:00am with tweaked glow cleo and rattler.

 

I landed 3 out of five, and was contented. I lost 3 spoon and three fish a week before, my braid spiderwire fusion from last year broke, I do not know the reason behind it. I was using 12lb mono last night on slow retreive and was more prepared.

 

Another angler was nice enough to help me land these hogs. Most fish were caught by anglers using roe, but those that used artificial lures did their share as well.

 

It is too bad that the best time to avoid the crowd is after midnight, and from pass experience, the fish were also more active. I hope I can do this every night, for it is so addictive.

 

I also attached one image of the lures that I tweaked, One was cleo, and the other three were inexpensive lures from Walmart. There are some glow tape and paint on them, and the coins to make them heavier. I don't have to worry too much of losing the lures for they are cheap and do the job quite well.

 

Tightlines

[danw]

Nice fish, that pretty creative with the lures.

[ccmtcanada]

Great results!!! Nice work on the lures as well....always feels good when you catch em on something home made.

[Golfisher]

WTG. Neat idea on the coins; how did you fix them to the spoons? I assume they didn't affect the lure's movement?

[tonyb]

Change those gawd awful hooks

 

Tony

[bassfighter]

Goldfisher,

 

I caught more fish when I tweak my equipment and lures, meaning the tweak lure was able to give me more success, rather than just using lures right out of the package. Once a sportman of any field reaches a certain level of expertise, every moment is a personal mental battle, and skill is just secondary.

 

The coins had to be bent to the shape of the spoon, use 5 minute clear epoxy glue to glue them on and apply glow tape or paint available from the dollar store. Dollarama or other cheaper spoon lures from le baron are way too light, and the spoon do not go down deep enough. Le baron sells them for 0.50 cents. If you do a lot at the same time while watching TV, it is worth the time and money. I also sharpen my hooks, re-tie my line, flash the lures and recheck them every so often when fishing.

 

I used to just use glow cleo, and it can be costly if you lose them at $4 each, and one can lose our focus on fishing when using lighter line for fear of losing one, and we end up retreiving it too fast where the lures just barely sink to the bottom. I used these lures on rivers as well so I do not have to worry on few hang ups. We all learn from our past mistakes and failures and I lost tons of cleo when I started fishing for salmon or trout.

 

To tweak our lures and catch fish is so psycologically and mentally uplifting. It will make an angler even more confident, these are my magic lures for salmon and trout, it also works on bass, pike, musky and walleye.

 

Applying the slowest possible retrieve is also the key, but slow enough to avoid weeds or hang ups, I also stop my retrieve every so often so the lures will sink down again to create a different action. As for the rattler, I will jerk it gently once in a while and stop to let it sink again. The fish normally hits it hard and has more time to get the hook set. I lose the salmon once in a while because the hooks get bent or it became dull, or my line broke. Due to the slow retreive process of the lures, I can fill the fish hitting my lure but then they might choose to ignore it often as well. It takes years of practice to be able to control the lure to where I want it to go. I also use my rod to control the depth of the lure to cover the surface or bottom of the water.

 

Another pointers: With the way I retreive my lure at such a slow speed, I will feel small tugs at times, I would like to assume that most of the tugs come from the lure hitting some weeds or bottom, therefore I do not necessarily get too excited and yank it, I believe that if it was a laidback salmon trying to catch the lure, I would give it few more seconds so the fish will not to give up in chasing my lure. It is only when the rod had bent or my lure was pulled hard, then I will set and reset the lure. I have seen many anglers using faster retrieve, I believe they might catch more if they slow down a notch, but again, everyone has their own personal style of retreiving lures.

 

Having lots of Passion, Patience and a little luck is the key to success.

 

Tightlines

[frozen-fire]

wow...very well said.

 

nice results by the way. did you lose the other two fish due to line breaking? or did they shake it off?

[fishermccann]

no it was god who let them go!!!!!!!!!1

[fatherof3]

nice fish and good job on being creative on your lures

[ecxstriper]

I can't seem to use anything out of the box , not sure if this always good . I enjoy tweaking and or breaking my stuff trying to get more out of them, but I learn alot more that way! Nice job looks like it was a great night.

[Guest Johnny Bass]

Great report and great info.Good job Joshua. Those are very creative lures.

[addict]

nice fish crafty lure mods.

[bassmaster4]

nice salmon thats pretty cool what you did with the lures

[mikeymikey]

That is a good size fish you caught there...

 

I really do like your mofified lures.

 

Now your cheap lures are 2 cent more expensive.

 

Just my 2 cent! or should I say your 2 cent. hehe

Edited September 19, 2007 by mikeymikey

[bassfighter]

Response to Frozen-fire

 

The fish were not shaking when the line broke after a short fight, it felt like someone had cut the line, or it got cut from the salmon’s teeth, (unlikely) . More probable cause of line breaking might be due to defective product. I was using my last year's Spiderwire fusion 12lb, and it broke twice and cause me to lose two lures that cost me $10, I am now confuse why the fusion broke. Spider wire was discontinuing the line couple of years ago and I bought them at BPS, at a good deal. The braid never gave me trouble on bass, or walleye or trout this year. The fish were around 20 lber.

 

I am not confident in using these spiderwire fusion for now, have to investigate further the product and had change to fresh new line.

 

The third fish was caught and lost on another second reel with an 8 lb mono, and it also broke, but this time I was too anxious and pulled it way too hard after a good fight while the fish was going away from me, I was playing with my drag and set it way too tight It was my fault.

 

The 3 fish caught and lost were first for the season, and I was not mentally prepared, I also caught them after 4 hours of being skunk chugging spoons, and was not expecting them to hit after midnight. I was half asleep, not too focus that anything else might happen, even contemplating of going home. The whole evening before midnight was not too productive for everyone, only 4 were caught by anglers using roe before midnight. I caught the first one at 12:30am. There were only 6 of us anglers left by then.

 

The last time I went out to get even with the fish, I had new line, more at ease in using my tweaked lure, and more focus, got there after midnight and fresh in my touch, feel and determination. I landed the first fish after ½ hour upon my arrival. There were lots of anglers then. The guy beside me landed a 25-30 fish, and I had kept his picture as well.

[frozen-fire]

thanks for the response...

 

would definitely like to hit up a pier with you... can check out your modified spoons.