Ok, looking for some help with Humpies. I'm down with the wee Dick Nites and droppers to slay humpies. I'm planning on taking the 2 and 4 yr olds this year. Anyone have a hot setup for a diver and ??????? Something I could pull instead of cast? I just can't see the kids casting yet. Thanks!

are you in a boat or on the bank?

Bill Herzog did the absolute best pink fishing article I have ever seen in STS about four years ago. It would be well worth your time to go to the library and look it up. In his article he went into great detail on exactly how to and where to anchor, what rig to use and exactly how to set it up. I don't have a copy of it, or I would post it.

50/50 or pink #1 Dick Nite, 5 feet behind your leader. The kids will have a blast. Good luck.

If you're talking in the salt, a small Dipsey Diver and Coyote spoon works well. I've had good luck with pink/white and the pearl bikini patterns. You could also run a small Jet Planer off a dropper (very easy to reel in for the little ones) and again a spoon.

Keith

I wasn't going to mention spots 'cause it always seems to rile up the boys. I'll be in a drift boat, Lower Skagit. If I can do a dickie behind a diver that works for me! Thanks!-

Here's an easy set-up for you and your kids to try:

Main line to a three-way swivel, 30" of leader attached to a small "Wicked Willie" spoon (hot pink on one side, pearl white w/ small red dot on the other), and 8"-12" of dropper to a small one-ounce cannon-ball weight. Might need to adjust the amount of lead depending on the river flow.

If you find a good place to anchor up in a humpy travelling lane, you should have some good action. Just make sure you're working your weight down on the river bottom, letting it bounce a little bit.

This is a proven set-up a certain guide-friend showed me years ago, and proven to catch many a humpy on the lower Skagit.

Enjoy those little ones while they're still young. My little fisherman isn't so little any more...and he out-fishes me most of the time.

Good Luck

I have the STS article Dave was talking about. If you want a copy of the article e-mail me and I will send it to you.

for the salt, small pink hoochie, with a single hook behind a hot spot (doesnt matter what color) with 40 lb test with 18-22 inches of leader. fish it about 40 feet down. in the rivers float fish sand shrimp or something pink or both. or frog dick nite. you can also pull jet divers with a pink with shinny wings spin n glow with sand shrimp. good luck!

Not to sound ignorant, but when do they start running in the Skagit? I fished it for the first time two years ago near Mt. Vernon and had a blast. We caught well over a hundred in two days, but I actually don't remember what time of year it was.

If you check the regs, the season opens on Aug. 16 from Gilligan Creek to the mouth of the river.

Above there opens on Sept. 16th. for Coho, etc. The pinks will be around likely till mid-late October like they wre a couple years ago...but they get nasty looking after a while in the river!

We caught them off our beach till our arms got tired a couple years back...great fun on light tackle!

Mike

What about Humpies for adults? Does anyone remember the 7 to 8 pound Humpies? Fishing the straits back in the late 70's you could expect to see 1 in 5 Humpies in the "heavy" catagory. You don't see them any more and I've often wondered why.

Kyle,

If it were me... I'd fish the Snohomish instead of the Skagit. The floods of '03 had much more effect up there than down here. Plus, the last couple of years the vis in the lower Skagit has been pretty bad due to glacial runoff from the Suiattle river. They're expecting over a million humpies back to the Snohomish system and it's a lot closer.

Launch the drifter near the end of an incoming tide at Maple st. in Snohomish. Row (or electric motor) upstream to just above the mouth of the Pilchuck river. Set the anchor and as the tide starts going out, put out a chartreuse tip #1 Dick Nite on a 4' leader, with about an inch of pencil lead for weight about 40' downstream and let the current do it's thing.

Doesn't get much easier.

SOTD,

Troll a 2" pink Apex off of a down rigger with a 00 chrome dodger and about 90% of the fish you will catch are 6LBS + I have a pic here somewhere of a string of 12 humpies the kids and I caught two years ago and the smallest is 6 lbs and the biggest was close to 10bs. I have no idea why but every one around me was trying to figure out what we where doing.

Have the kids twitch jigs off the back of the boat. They can watch the fish move up and grab 'em.

a coulpe of years ago watch Bill H and a couple of friends pound on them fishing a shrimp on a bait diver. mixer bar area mid skagit below where the sauk flow in. we ahd a blast fly fishing for them.

Thanks Guys!!

Kyle,

Find a spot where you can drop a plunking rig with a spinglow/shrimp combo above a 6oz sinker. Worked well when I was in the Skagit area a few years ago. The kids will think the sandshrimp are pretty cool.

Sol,

We caught lots of big humpies in 2003, the biggest was caught by my 4 year in Sekiu, this 12 pounder. (sorry, same photo used again and again)
The smallest pinks we caught were in the 5lb range with many above 10lbs caught in late August. We hope to repeat this again this year, but we have to get another Sponge Bob rod.

Get a 3 1/2" or bigger mud bug lure, remove hooks, and paint it flat black. Get some of the small (2-3") pink hootchies and tie them on about a 24" fluorocarbon leader and put on the back eye of the mud bug. Tie mud bug to your main line. Let the mudbug drift back and dive on it's own. The wiggle will give movement to the hootchie. A little shrimp or anise smelly jelly on the hootchie wouldn't hurt. Watch the light rod tip wiggle a little and when it hits the water, hand the rod to one of the kids.

Good luck,

Steve