2024 Secret Cove, Pender Harbour and Texada Reports

[kingblazer84]

Pirate Rock for quick coho limit this morning. It’s beautiful out here!!

the old go to.. lucky guy

 

[Last_Call]

fished a couple hours at Epsom both this past Saturday and Sunday and was very steady action for coho for us. 30-50' on the rigger with lots of flash seemed to work for us. Ran a white flashfly on one side and white UV hootchie on the other. 50/50 mix of hatchery/wild on saturday and then 25/75 hatchery wild on sunday doing the same thing at same location. Managed to avoid the chinook for the most part but did pick up a couple both days.

 

[NOM1908]

We anchor for salmon on the drop offs of the shoal in 125’ - 165’. They are bycatch when we fish too close to bottom . Seems like some spots we anchor there is heaps of them . Seems like they are up hunting herring like everything else .

I’ll be giving this a try next time. Thanks!

 

[MiddlepointBight]

In general the SOG isn't really halibut habitat. The odd one is taken by salmon fishers trolling bait close to bottom.

Aye! Hear of 1-2 per year up here.

 

[MiddlepointBight]

Been out last three days for a few hours each (can't help myself with these calm seas!! banger conditions except for the big tides, which are getting better and better this week). Shoutout to my 2 young boys for sharing the stoked and providing a conduit to "give mom a break"

Day 1: Epsom - bait had moved on and was slow for me (wasn't on the convention tack though), zipped up the Bjerre and doubled with two teener chinook on the first drop at sunset at the high slack. Gaff released and went feeding right back into the bail ball.
Day 2: Bjerre - fished the rising tide. Good amount of bait and consistent fishing. 50/50 coho / chinook, no hatch.
Day 3: Bjerre - fished the low slack into rising tide. More bait and consistent fishing. 75/25 coho / chinook, no hatch. Finished the day with a beautiful high teens chinook that we'll hopefully re-unit with next week!

Calm seas, high pressure, Secret Cove popsicles for the kids, sunsets and great outlook for chinook retention opening. Smiles all around! See you on the water.

Gentle SE breeze up... totally fishable and very tempting. Winds light at both Sentry Shoal and Halibut Bank buoys.

 

[ab1752]

Double in first 5 mins on hatchery springs south Texada, 110 and 100 hoochies. 74 and 70 cms.

 

[sherrett]

Fished 7:30 - 10 this morning at Epsom for the opening morning. Found some chinook and coho at a pretty steady clip.

By 9:30 we bet on ourselves, put some smaller ones back to keep fishing, and it paid off.



79 cm, 73 cm and 71 cm back to the dock for me and the two littles. 79 was a thick, solid fish.



Fish didn’t seem too concentrated. We got them anywhere from 120’ to 220’. Spoons FTW.

 

[Howesoundhound]

Epsom had tons of Coho at 45 and 58 feet, though I didn't get any good sized hatches. We managed to get two keeper Chinooks at 110 feet on the rigger.

 

[Netanyahu]

Finally we can use the Sunshine Coast waters! Managed to get to the slip without anyone pointing and shouting "they are Fishers stop them" Pushed off from the gas bar with clean go go juice at 5:35ish PM. Mercer frozen herring not live.. "troller" got to use the gas not just have the gas. Epsom millpond was productive in under 10 minutes, fish on, lost. Then Coho to the side, wrong model. Go deeper! Supper on deck as we watched the tips. Wife working the gear and the table. Way to soon it was over, 2 nice high slot volunteers in the box. Home processing in 2.5 hours and looking forward to the weekend. Test trip done the sea is still whole.

 

[MiddlepointBight]

Love seeing all these reports and hearing all the hooting and hollaring out there!

Epsom on fire. Incredible amounts of coho out there as well from surface to ~99' on rigger for me. Chinook below that. Not sure if it was just good luck, but we saw ~75% hatchery coho yesterday.

Bjerre has also been very consistent - worth a tack if you're looking for a change of scenery.

 

[Bottomfeeder1]

Finally we can use the Sunshine Coast waters! Managed to get to the slip without anyone pointing and shouting "they are Fishers stop them" Pushed off from the gas bar with clean go go juice at 5:35ish PM. Mercer frozen herring not live.. "troller" got to use the gas not just have the gas. Epsom millpond was productive in under 10 minutes, fish on, lost. Then Coho to the side, wrong model. Go deeper! Supper on deck as we watched the tips. Wife working the gear and the table. Way to soon it was over, 2 nice high slot volunteers in the box. Home processing in 2.5 hours and looking forward to the weekend. Test trip done the sea is still whole.

Are people giving you guys the gears over there for fishing lol !!

 

[sherrett]

Fished Epsom Point yesterday for the slack low tide, 8:30 - 10:30 am. Bite felt slower than two days before when we were out but we managed to find some willing dance partners.

Two slot chinooks into the box from out deep in ~200' where we marked tons of really promising fish arcs on bait but only got sporadic bites. Trolled onto the hump, pulled the lines up and tapped the throttle on the kicker to see if any coho fancied our offerings. Got one hatch and a few wilds.



Just about to pull up lines when we got one final bite. Screaming reel and a slow retrieval and we landed an 84 cm chinook that quickly went back and kicked off to live another day.



Water was so flat it made it simple to spot a few humpbacks feeding in deeper waters as they showed their tail flukes.

 

[GWT75]

Fished Epsom on opening morning of the 15th. Did very well - lots of fish, both species and plenty of action. Went back out with the kids later in the day and didn't get the same success despite a massive amount of bait showing. Action in the morning was with mainly hootchie. Spoon had sporadic action. One of the fish (our biggest) had a 10" herring in stomach. Others had smaller (no smaller than 5" though). Springs were deeper than 100'

Morning of 16th we tried Epsom again. Not as much success but ground out a few hatch coho. Had a ~70CM Coho to the boat that fought like a spring but it was wild so back it went. Then in afternoon went north to entrance of Agamemnon Channel and had much more success there. 3" spoon outperformed the hootchie. Fish shallower.

Not lights out fishing, but when we found em, seemed to be pretty decent. Have to put in the time and effort. Saw orcas and humpbacks 2x over the 2 days. Amazing conditions.

 

[Netanyahu]

Weekend recap: Epsom, Evening trip, one down low with Herring, one up a bit with skinny G. 2 Springs, home. Next up a full day, traps .down, start with springs, 2 in the box, Coho time, find them, Managed the first Hali encounter of the year. (Smallest one yet) Likely lost one other the swivel broke of all things. Sunday, rain day, wind. 2 springs, move to Pirate Rock, work the lee, could not get the lines down! Spoons, white hooch. All wild though? Chapman fish? Nice size. Crabs were cooperative. Overall full on action, Epsom contours normal tacks even included the "Gap" and it did not disappoint. Fun to be back in the game.

 

[PuertoMoody]

Weekend recap: Epsom, Evening trip, one down low with Herring, one up a bit with skinny G. 2 Springs, home. Next up a full day, traps .down, start with springs, 2 in the box, Coho time, find them, Managed the first Hali encounter of the year. (Smallest one yet) Likely lost one other the swivel broke of all things. Sunday, rain day, wind. 2 springs, move to Pirate Rock, work the lee, could not get the lines down! Spoons, white hooch. All wild though? Chapman fish? Nice size. Crabs were cooperative. Overall full on action, Epsom contours normal tacks even included the "Gap" and it did not disappoint. Fun to be back in the game.

That's Awesome ! Well done.
I just moved our boat to Pender for a week of fishing in August hoping to get a hali. did you get that trolling near the bottom at Epsom ? Has anyone had a lucky jigging for Hali Epsom or Pender area ?

 

[NOM1908]

Weekend recap: Epsom, Evening trip, one down low with Herring, one up a bit with skinny G. 2 Springs, home. Next up a full day, traps .down, start with springs, 2 in the box, Coho time, find them, Managed the first Hali encounter of the year. (Smallest one yet) Likely lost one other the swivel broke of all things. Sunday, rain day, wind. 2 springs, move to Pirate Rock, work the lee, could not get the lines down! Spoons, white hooch. All wild though? Chapman fish? Nice size. Crabs were cooperative. Overall full on action, Epsom contours normal tacks even included the "Gap" and it did not disappoint. Fun to be back in the game.

Had a similar experience at Pirate rock Sunday. We could barely get both down riggers in the water, kept hitting on the way down.

 

[Netanyahu]

That's Awesome ! Well done.
I just moved our boat to Pender for a week of fishing in August hoping to get a hali. did you get that trolling near the bottom at Epsom ? Has anyone had a lucky jigging for Hali Epsom or Pender area ?

See posts one page back, also Bjerre Shoal same gig. And if you jig everything is on the menu. Know your RCA's and enjoy!

 

[sherrett]

Fished the west part of Epsom this morning for the high slack tide, about 9 - 11. Tried in shallow, tried out deep. Tried the shoal drops and contours, everywhere from 80’ to 250’. No joy from any salmon species.



Changed tactics and jigged up a pair of ling cod for lunch. Felt like a solid fallback plan and looking forward to getting back out to find the chinooks.