2024 Gulf Island Reports

Fished all day active pass. Caught and released flounder and rock fish and undersized ling. Shocked to see others keep fish like flounder when you have a 300,000 boat. wild world
 
Have been fishing the Porlier and north Galiano area the last week with fairly good success for springs 10-18 but finding a LOT of shakers on my usual stuff (hoochies and/or spoons behind a flasher). Dug through my old gear and switched over to some vintage 5-6"tomic plugs to avoid the littles and have not looked back... They seem to be fishing as well as my hoochies and spoons for springs and get only the very occasional shaker or undersized fish. Set 'em and forget 'em till they get hammered and the pin pops. And it's a whole lot more fun to play without the flasher as every fish seems to rocket to the surface and put on a show. I'm a convert... :)
 
My plug selection was somewhat limited as dredged what I could find out of old tackleboxes mothballed in the garage - but found that the ones with green definitely outperformed the others. Same with hoochies and spoons.
 
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Didn’t take anything home but action was hot off the Flat Tops from 10:30 to noon Tuesday. I might have had more action after noon but dragging shakers around without seeing them hit doesn’t help. Somehow in 2024 I have managed to mostly avoid shakers until this September.

We did get 4 or 5 big wild cohos to the boat and one spring that might have made the bottom end of the slot but I lost it trying to just lift it onto the swim platform by the leader instead of grabbing the net.

I lost a favourite flasher and Flashfly when a hit popped the clip and the rod went straight. I grabbed the rod to reel down hard and caught up with nothing but limp line. I saw a fish surface and thrash a bit behind the boat that I unfortunately believe was fighting my flasher. The line was cut clean with no fraying and no sign of the terminal knot making me think it broke at the clip when the fish hit. That was a first for me.
 
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Have been fishing the Porlier and north Galiano area the last week with fairly good success for springs 10-18 but finding a LOT of shakers on my usual stuff (hoochies and/or spoons behind a flasher). Dug through my old gear and switched over to some vintage 5-6"tomic plugs to avoid the littles and have not looked back... They seem to be fishing as well as my hoochies and spoons for springs and get only the very occasional shaker or undersized fish. Set 'em and forget 'em till they get hammered and the pin pops. And it's a whole lot more fun to play without the flasher as every fish seems to rocket to the surface and put on a show. I'm a convert... :)
Size matters. Plugs or cut plug
Years ago I found that if I wanted to NOT be catching a lot of mackerel or smallish Coho or even Springs using BIG bait worked. The BIGGER the better. Big bait equaled big fish for the most part. Most of the time.
 
Hey there. What are the "Flat tops " by Gabriola?
I've only fished over there a couple of times.
Thanks.
 
Still some fish between Carlos Island and Thrasher ( Flat Tops area) find the bait and you should get some fish. Unless your running Plugs check those lines every 10 minutes… the little buggers are out in force..
 
Well, I think we were the only idiots at Porlier this afternoon. Threw in the salmon gear on the inside while we were waiting for the current to slow enough to try bottomfishing. Managed one dark spring in about 40 min of trolling. After that we fought what remained of the current and a substantial wind for at least 1 1/2 hours in an unsuccessful attempt for lings. Had planned on trying for salmon again afterwards, but had been beaten up by the wind enough to call it a day and pound back to Ladysmith.
 
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