Its slowed down in here quite a bit. We had to really work for 6 humps today and did manage to limit yesterday. Hard saying what the next few days will bring. 50-60 feet, pink 3-4 inch hoochie and green- chrome hotspot. Also red,
white bucktail fly behind a green-chrome hotspot has worked well also. BANG ON!
Chrome

Fishing has slowed considerably along the west side of Whidbey as well. Humpies still seem to be around but not the big schools that were here earlier in the month.

Not seeing many Coho either.

Historically, till when can you expect to have decent numbers around in the Hollow? Would you still have reasonble chance of getting one in mid September?

Today was my first day out for pinks and it was only so so for my buddy and me. I landed my first one within 10-15 minutes of lines in the water but we lost a lot more than we kept after that. Went home with three pinks, lost eight or nine right at the boat and a couple more further out.

We started at shipwreck with some success and then made the mistake of running up closer to Mukelteo. We switched one rod from white dodger/pink squid to green flasher/army truck spoon running from 100'-150' deep and caught one humpy on that.

At the dock I talked with three guys in a boat who had all limited by noon, but I saw a lot of fish lost in other boats and lots of small fish. They said they stayed around shipwreck all morning.

I'm taking a boatload of kids out tomorrow so I hope I can get the fish into the boat I've promised!

Today was quite good except we couldn't get them in the boat. Went 5 for 17 by 9am. Took until 1pm to get the other 7. Probably went 12 for 25 today. They were all through the water column. The rod with 6oz lead did as well as the ones on the down riggers between 50 and 60.

We fished Friday and Saturday for them and had no problem finding them. We ended up staying a bit north by the small village south of the Mukilteo ramp.

Fished one rod with a 4 oz sinker, another on a downrigger at 30 feet and another down at 55 feet. Couldn't determine a pattern as all caught fish. The 55 foot one limited first, the 4 oz sinker next and the 30 ft downrigger last. All were fishing 0 dodgers and squid.

Went 6 for 10 this morning by 8:30.

We were only fishing one rod. I brought out a guy from work with me and told him if he gets a fish, he may need to give the rod a good yank to get it to release from the down rigger. His idea of a good yank and mine are quite different. He snapped the rod like a twig. We ended up landing the fish with half a rod. And of course, this was the only day I did not bring the extra rod...

Humpies have really soft mouths. Light poles,sharp hooks and no hook set might produce more fish to the boat!

You're right. That is why I use my steelhead gear rather than my regular downrigger rods.

I've increased my catch percentage by going to larger hooks. The smaller 1/0 and 2/0 just don't keep them on the line as well as 4/0 and 5/0 for me.

I've never felt the need to set the hook. The rod on my boat was broken trying to get the line released from the downrigger.

Yup, slower. We caught 4 plus one coho, fished till 11am, lost several. Not as hot as last week. Report over on www.WashingtonLakes.com