Herring in Sooke?

[yammy5]

Has anyone seen big schools of large herring in Sooke lately? We are pulling the boat out of Sooke this weekend but first I wanted to jig up some hali-bait for the spring. Got lots last year in the fall.

Thanks!!

 

[Sea Ranger]

Hi Yammy5,
I might be wrong on this but I believe that all the bait out there right now(and there is a lot) is mostly small herring.... We caught some from a bait ball about 2 weeks ago and all the herring was about 3 inches long. The Herring spawn in Feb/March so there is still a lot of time left for them to grow and fatten up. I'm not sure that the small Herring are in fact the same ones that will be spawning but I'm assuming that they are..... Steve.

 

[yammy5]

Thanks, appreciate the reply ~ sounds like we might just be wasting our gas looking for them. We'll try again in the spring.
Cheers.

 

[The Fish Assassin]

I seen a few schools of herring in the bait freezer at Candian Tire.

Take only what you need.

 

[Sea Ranger]

I'll be heading out on Sunday and will report on the size of the bait out there at this time of year. I hope to find some larger ones myself... Steve.

 

[TheRock]

Last year Yammy and I hit a massive school of full size herring off of Otter pt. around end of September I think it was, they were boiling every where and went through them with out dip nets, we filled our fish tub with 5-7 inch herring ! Would be nice to find the full size herring again..

 

[Sea Ranger]

Was out on Sunday, Didn't find any bait balls but saw a lot of small Cohos jumping everywhere. Next time I'll try and remember to bring along my dip net. Need to get some more Herring for the freezer.

 

[Mer-Sea]

Hello.
What I would like to know is "How to keep their mouths closed during freezing? " Is there a trick to it ? Every time I find bait, the fish sufficate, and have their mouths open.
thank Claude

 

[chris73]

Give them a sip of your secret brew and they will close their mouths forever![]