Don’t mess with Texas! 2

When you see a lot of whale pictures in my reports you know the fishing is good. Sunny days and a relatively calm ocean have been the scene here the last few days with plenty of action to keep the rods bent. Two boats worth of Texans, with Robert "Permagrin" Aguilera on board to keep them honest, have kept the halibut and salmon rods jumping on the Polar Bear and Makai the last three days. The silver salmon action has been a everything from a "slow pick" to fairly wide open and we had a full boat limit of shiny silver salmon on the Polar Bear yesterday by 10:20 a.m and two days earlier it was an all day program to get our silvers.  

Halibut and ling cod fishing has been absolutely ridiculous on the ocean with one spot producing wide open action on "perfect size" chicken halibut from 15 to 30 pounds and wear-your-arms-out ling cod action. The Texans and Mr. Permagrin really wanted to try their luck at some big halibut, so we ventured slightly offshore a few days ago to a sandy hump that comes up from 550 feet to 225 feet, dropping pipe jigs, gut rigs, and scampi tail jigs to the ocean floor. Robert was the first to hook up on our boat, hammering a 115 pound 'but on a 2 lb pipe jig rigged with a Berkley Gulp grub and a salmon belly strip. Two other barnies smoked 100 lb Berkley Big Game braid off the Penn 340 GTi's before coming unbuttoned. A 122 pound halibut snapped up a silver salmon head and carcass rigged with two 12/0 J-hooks and came aboard the Polar Bear 20 minutes later. It was the same scene over on the Makai with Rick Preddy and Jim Elliot landing 115 and 172 pound halibut with Capt. Troy Thain. Both boats rounded out their halibut limits with halibut from 25 to 90 pounds.

Julia Kearney and Alan Sloka doubled up with a 17 lb Chinook and a 15 lb silver mooching herring in the ocean, one of many doubles, triples, and quad hookups the last few days on salmon. Just prior to this double I was staring at a huge bait ball on the Lowrance HDS and said something like "Here we go guys!" 

The Texas gang with halibut from 60 to 172 pounds

Rick and Sally Preddy and Jim Elliot with a mess of fish and chips 

Robert Aguilera with a keeper-sized ling cod. Rob definitely earned his ling cod merit badge the last few days here in Craig cranking up countless oversize lingers on pipe jigs. He finally raised the white flat yesterday…"That's it…I'm done!" 

Rob brings in a silver on the Pacific while a humpback whale breaches nearby

"The only thing that would top off today is a whale show on the way home." Ask and you shall recieve! A couple of humpback whale pics I snapped with my Nikon D70 rigged with a Nikon 18-200 lens on the way home yesterday.  

Capt. Rob Endsley

www.princeofwalessportfishing.com