This is my first season fishing salmon and I'm hoping to get a chance at a few Chum in the next few weeks. I've heard they're pretty aggressive and tough fighters, so it should be pretty exciting.

I think the gear I have right now is a bit cheap/light for Chum and may not in fact be capable of landing a big, hard fighting fish. Does anyone have any suggestions for rod/reel/line? I don't have a whole lot of money to spend, but a little investment now will hopefully pay off.

Currently I've got cheap wal-mart gear.. Shakespeare Ugly Stick rod, 7' long, medium action, 8-20lb. Shakespeare Sigma bait casting reel. 20lb Berkley Fireline Crystal main line, 12lb Stren Flourocast leaders.

cheap walmart gear was designed for chum

depends on where your fishing. Up on the north end we have been shut out on them due to commercial overfishing and WDFW mismanagement so we may as well be using horse shoes.


Fishy

Sounds like you're all set.

Remember the S Rivers in Puget Sound are closed to targeting Chums.

If you are where it is open, a float and jig and prawn setup in rivers is highly effective, using preferably a 10'6" rod, but you might get by for the few weeks they are available with your current gear.

They are better as fighters, than food fish compared to Silvers.

S Rivers?

"S Rivers" means our local Puget Sound streams...Skagit, Stillaguamish, Snohmish, Skykomish, Snoqualimie.

Fish on...

Todd

Region 6...close to taking of Chum..........well sports that is....cowboys get to over fish them........grrrrrrrrrr

Good luck, they're a blast to catch, let us know how you do.

SOunds like you have gear to fight them and land them. A little on the short side to turn a blazing 20# buck but still one hell of a fight. Chart and orange good colors.

Tru'dat...

BUT....

Remember that rec folks took the high road at NOF and testified that they would rather see those fish hit the gravel. There is precious little rec retention of GH chum... even when it was open season for them.

check out my recent posts about catching silvers. i'd tell you....but ive been getting BLASTED for letting 'secrets' out.

Your whole life is all about getting "blasted"...... never knew it bothered you, though.

Doc:

I remember well.......the "extra number was 525 Chum"...Ron Warren gave them to the cowboys........BUT my problem, is they have exceeded that number AND STILL CONTINUE TO FISH........and of course catching silvers at the same time................grrrrrrrrrr need to tighten this "loop hole up"!!!!!!

A bit light for the rod, but you should be OK. Watch out for high sticking when you get ready to land the fish.......snap!

i'd say fish what you have. no reason to go out and spend money for chums. however if you feel you must, check pawn shops for a stiff beater chum gear. chum fishing requires low budget. chums have a way of busting poles.

nah. i really dont care. but. i had a 30 fish day on a river the other day. next day....saw 3 boats ahead of us doing the technique. not well, granted. but they still cut down our numbers to 10-15 fish. We had to invent some new ways to do it to fish behind the guys. once we figured it out our numbers went up. But we also had to work harder to do it. doesnt bother me to much, bt i hadnt realized how much this technique has caught on. So the guys paying attention can go back and re-read that post. for the lazy guys....they wont go back and look ( shrug) i threw the community a bone....only gonna do it once

BUT i actually used it to exclusively fish for chums. in the salt/fresh mix in estuary's ive had 40-60 fish days. days where you quit because your arm was cramping to much to even hold a rod. if you have numbers in the river and wander around a bit you can still do 30 fish days...no problem ( shrug) best way ive found to fish for them.

SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!