Favorite Coho Spinner

What's your favorite coho spinner? Mine would have to be a #3 blue fox in fire tiger. Been very successful with it.

Just wanted to hear from you guys.
Thanks!

I'd take a #4 or #5 Blue Fox with a hoochie on the back. Deeper or faster water, I'd take the same thing but with a Rvrfshr spinner. Those suckers can get down which I think is the limitation of the Blue Fox.

4.5 silver PenTac blade, baked on powder coated body and a hoochie.

I can get 'er done with one of these:

Rvrfshr #5's, if you want to get deeper than three feet in moving water



Fish on...

Todd

I agree with the limitation with the blue fox. I use them in slack water so they go deeper than in moving water. The firetiger pattern really seems to work well. Although not a spinner, Little Cleo's work well for me.

4.5 genuine silver blade from pen-tac.Green powder coated worm weight body with a half green/ chartruse hootchie.I call that homemade hootchiee spinner of mine "The Green Matelisheee.Good luck,

SZ


PS, My new order should be here tomorrow just in time to make a few up..

Right here.



It was a little deeper than 3 feet.

Blade needs to be gold....than that'd be a solid Husky spinner!!!!

Updated my photo to include DanS and SZ's spinners! I like 'em!

#5 RVRFSHRSPNNRS. Blue Fox are a bit light to begin with, add the extra surface area of the hoochie and you have to give them quite a bit of sink time to get them into the zone. Heavier hoochie spinners get into the zone more quickly and stay there longer. More time in the zone = well, you get the idea.

For WA silvers, Gold blades and body with green splatter style hoochies.

For AK silvers, silver blades with pink bodies and pink hoochies.

And finally, the most important part, it doesn't matter that much Most any combo with some scent, bling, and striking contrast (shock factor) will get the job done. See Todd and Parker's line ups as top shelf examples.

Having some more subtle stuff like dark colored jigs to twitch over stacked & dour fish can be a good thing to throw into the mix.

The DanS signature husky spinner is magic! But you forgot the W

Todd,

We're gonna need to talk about me getting an order like that put together for where I'm headed next weekend. I'm really liking what I see there!

Also, I have to agree with DanS on the #5 purple body vibrax. killer spinner! kings and Dolly's like em too.

The deep blue fox does the job in terms of going down deeper in the water, but in my opinion, doesn't get the job done as well.

Back in the day, I used Flash Glo spinners in gold or nickel and caught lots of fish.
Now I mainly use Blue Fox, Rvrfshr And Mepps.

I still use Flash Glos when we're fishing frog-water like the Chehalis. Silver on cloudy days, gold on sunny days.

I think any #5 blade is to big. no mater how much weight the body is they pull to hard to stay down with #5's. I would have to say parkers spinners look sweet i love the purple/gold with the purple hoochie but all of those colors are catchers. What about the Flying C.

Mepps Aglia spinners in pink have killed a lot of silvers for me+others as well, which is somewhat surprising, because nothing about them is terrible special.

I beg to differ.

+ many. The only time I drop below a 5 anymore is when the water is LOWWWW. Then it's a #3 copper, sans hootchie. Looking like that may be my starter for the opener this year.

i love number 5 blades

I've caught fish with a 5 blade, in pink.

I'm going to try a pink hootchie spinner with a half and half blade tomorrow. We'll see if that works. I'm fishing the Skagit btw.

where I do most of my spinner fishing it's a #4 silver rvrfshr with pink hoochie. I bring others but that's the one I use most. So much in fact that I used the same one for 2 seasons before I lost it another thing I found the vibrax good for is line twist, even with a swivel. As far as pen tac goes, the blades look good but the one time I ordered anything from them the order was wrong and the customer service worse.

I agree, black works very well. The all black blue fox is effective. Even a black body works well.

I've never had luck with the hootchies . I've had success with size 4 mepps aglia, size 4 rvrfshr (classy not hootchified), and vibrax.

Spinners for coho, a subject near and dear to my heart.

I don't know a lot about the Skagit, but I was there the other day for work (Mt. Vernon) and it reminded me quite a bit of my home water the lower Chehalis.

Here is FF02 with a #6 spinner, looks pink to me. I think that was before (or during) the first fall rains that year so the water was clear.



Oh yah a sharpie works wonders.



Another close up, I know this is a #6 french blade on some kind of cobbled together body.



You might notice some similarities to all the spinners in my pictures. IMO you will get about 100 % correct answers on this thread. Which is what makes the coho such a great sport fish!

I fish a certain way in only a few rivers, and big/flashy/bright is what works for me. I am never surprised when someone catches fish on some color or design I have never had luck on. Confidence goes a looooong way for silvers. I have never had trouble getting a #5 or #6 Vibrax where I want it, but have had lots of luck with the RVRFSHRS too. They definitely fish deeper easier, but it all comes down to what kind of water you are in.

Gotta give my vote to Terminator spinners, gold (not brass) blade, nickel body, one pea-sized orange dot (nail polish) on the blade, no hoochie. Few coho can resist it, it sinks well, and the FB blade throws light like a champ. They don't seem to make them anymore and I picked up 50 or so in the discount bin at the Lacey Cabelas. Like Panther Martins, you want the ones with European blades, not the cheap Chinese blades.

The Bitch spinner returns! Time honored classic.

I was glad the question was put forward as "what is your favorite" instead of "what is the best."

Fish what you have confidence in, they all work, some better than others, at least on that day in that spot.

When the water dirties up, #6's, aka the choppers, or the helicopters, fished a few feet off the bank in the slow to medium speed water can dominate.

Everyone has their opinion, which is why i hate asking what is "best" lol because everyone has their "best" lure. I love to see what other fisherman use as their go-to lures. its really cool to see everyone mentioning a little bit different lure, and they all work. It proves that a lot of lures work for these fun fighting fish.

thanks for all the info you guys have provided so far! makes a great read for a beginner fisherman who wants to have some fun with these fish.

i used to be a big blue fox fan, but haven't really bought any for coho fishing since gi joes went under and $1.99 blue foxes on sale every couple weeks went extinct. the $4 or $5 that those things cost now is hard to swallow when there's the possibility of losing a dozen of them in a hard day of fishing.

since then i've mostly just used homemade spinners, for silvers i just take an inch or so of hollow core 1/4" pencil lead and slide a small hoochy over it, (rather than using an expensive brass body), then add a bead and a #4 or 5 silver blade. works well, and costs less than a buck to make.

My fav. is the Bitch in a 5 or 6 with a hoochie, big and flashy thats what works. It's also easier to recover them from the wood pile too and yep it's normally the free ones that work best.

The following have been shown before, Size 6, beaded chain, etc., My fishing habits have changed but I could go back or JUST ADD SOME PRAWN OR SAND SHRIMP. Size 6, done with a slow retreive, can be a real Coho producer.....

homemade spinners are the way to go now. very cheap and work

I have been very into making spinners this year. I have been collecting lots and lots of material in order to make my own. It is a tremendous amount of fun to play around with fishing stuff.

I will post some pictures of what I have come up with later tonight after I tinker with some more supplies of mine.

I have a couple of questions. I have been using the worm sinkers / egg sinkers for the bodies of my spinners. I haven't had much time to test them out on the water, but do you think I should switch to actual spinner bodies designed to be used for spinner making? I don't foresee a huge issue when it comes to hydrodynamics, but again, I haven't had time to test out my creations. Like I said, I will post some pictures later tonight.

Also, I am currently making up spinners with #4 blades because I got a lot of them a while ago, so I have a stock pile. But I am going to make up some with #5 blades now that I have been reading posts.

Thank you to whomever started this thread! It is so much fun seeing all of the ideas people come up with. Very creative people we fishermen are.

i feel that the only drawback to using lead bodies is that they aren't going to be quite as flashy or noisy as a brass body. i try to make up for that with a larger blade and the squid body.

i don't use #4s often in places like the chehalis with murky water. #5 is a minimum, if not a #6.

No problem TanTastic84. I as well love to see what people come up with. Its really cool to see all of these ideas work!

Anything with a #4.5 or #5 blade works for me!!!

Here's how they work











They've even been known to attract the occasional winter run when fishing in November...but I can't find the pics of that for some reason.

Boot kings will knock the piss outta them, too

As with most things, if you have reasonably proper gear and lures, then if you know what you're doing you will catch fish with them.

Fish on...

Todd

Parker - Very impressive line-up! It's not possible to buy spinners like that anywhere. I build my own spinners too, but they don't turn out like yours.

Are the bodies Pen-Tac too? I have lots of Pen-Tac blades and bodies, but I have not tried powder paint on them. Maybe I should.....

Nicely done.

PenTac, RVRFSHR, MorTac, R&B, etc.

I get my parts through these guys. Great place to shop online!

http://www.barlowstackle.com/

I use whatever plain brass bodies I can find or from whomever has given me some to try out.

Set the oven to 300. Set a layer of foil on the bottom of the oven, as the coating will spill off the bodies as it melts.

Take a body and put it head up on a shaft and slightly bend the tip of the shaft so the body doesn't fall off.

Cook the bodies for 12 minutes.

Dip in your first coat of powder coat. Cook for 12 minutes. Bob likes to dip the first coat in white. I just stick with the same color.

Dip them again. Cook another 12 minutes.

Once you take them out of the oven, let them cool just enough so you don't ruin the coating, but work fast to get the shaft out of the body....as it will be coated solid. Takes some prying and spinning.

Use a very small drill bit to bore out the melted power coat in the butt section of the body.

PITA....and a labor of love, but my kids call it "Daddy Crafts".

All the credit for these spinners goes to Bob and Corey.

Those are some big fish Todd!

Oh and i tried the Skagit today, no luck. The water is pretty milky. Not many fish showing themselves. We need a rain.

"Favorite Spinner" is defintely the proper word choice. As you can see from the above responses you ask 50 coho fishermen what their favorite spinner is and you are likely get 50 different answers. But they all have one thing in common, they will all catch fish.

Coho are intersting in that they will at times hit anything and at times hit nothing.

But starting off with a big and flashy spinner with contrasting colors and a hootchie hanging off the back is a pretty good bet.

The hootchie seems very popular. I've honestly never thought about it. I've always just caught fish on a naked spinner.

I'll have to break out my stash and use them since I've started fishing down that way again. Caught my biggest coho on a Flash Glo.

I have caught 6 so far on Copper Vibrax #4 on a Puget Sound River. Currently my go to lure....gonna bat leadoff for me in the AM.

I like copper as well. Chartruese has been the best for me for coho, though. The fish up here have a very hard time resisting it.

Does anybody use spoons for coho?

For every time I use spinners for coho...I use spoons three or four times. Fluttering spoons make coho crazy. Copper or brass in clearer water, 50/50 or silver if it gets green at all.

Fish on...

Todd

i hit one on a hammered silver little cleo. I love the action of those spoons

Well, since this is a spinner thread I thought of the Flash Brites they used to sell at local tackle shops.

#5 blade and green beads.

I threw some spinners out on the skagit today with no luck. No very many fish around right now. I was throwing #3 blue foxes and little cleos

Mass production would be the #5 Vibrax.

up it to a #4 better yet #5---look for rollers-they will be there soon enough

5 seems really big. i've never used one but i'm sure they produce

What is the size difference between a #4 and #5? Is it 1/4". If a coho is there and he is going to bite a flashing piece of metal, he probably won't notice the difference.

I have fished for silvers in 3' of clear, still, water and they loved a #6 with a hoochie skirt. Size < color < depth <<<<<<<< fishing where the fish are at.

I will be hitting the Skykomish (hopefully) this Friday, Saturday or Sunday. Again, I have to post some pictures of the spinners I have made up, but I have made them mostly in size 4 and 5 blades.

From what I have heard over and over and over again, it's all about presentation and being ready to be flexible. Obviously there is no sure fire way to catch fish. But if you present any size lure at the right time, in the right location, when the fish want to bite, you will get results.

I just hope there are fish in the system this week. I am eagerly waiting for people to tell me they are running strong in the Skykomish.

But again, I am going to post a picture of my creations tonight. That is, if I have some time.

WTF ?
New meds ?








JFC

last fall for every cast i made with a spinner i made 200 casts with eggs and # > 800 casts with a jig.

but should i make casts with a spinner its a #4 or #5 silver or copper rvrfshr with 1 of 4 different hoochies and a dab of prism tape on the blade.

You throwing those on a Skagit head?

For the deep holes or just big pushing water I have a stash of the old Pentac #4 silver blades on the heavy (XS)? silver body, fish em plain or @ times like to dress some of them up w/ a little prism tape.
Fly like a rocket & get deep quick.



In the boulder gardens or flats/tail-outs I like the Blue Fox #4 silver or gold blade & orange or pink bell/body, really thin water I'll drop to a #3.

Hoochies add a nice look, don't know if they up my catch rate thou...



c/22

anyone have experience with R&B lures?

Ask Stam, I think he has...

I placed an order for spoons and received it all quickly and easily.

2/3 white matte silver spoon has a thing for summer runs during the early summer high water.

i heard the black oxide spoon kills silvers

Anything with a shinny blade that's turning and down low in the "STRIKE ZONE" will net ya a Ho........Not so sold on the color really.Good luck,
SZ

I've never met a smart ho caught on a spinner...........just sayin.

very true

Orange and brass Lil' Lightning, formerly available at Wal Mart. Than I'm not afraid of loosing $4.50 . I had a Mepps C-best I found that worked great until I lost it, hard to find lure.

Thanks to the guy who left a bunch of Chartreuse #4 Blue Foxes on an underwater log that I was able to resurrect at low tide on the local honey hole. Currently my favorite Coho lure.

If you're spending $4.50 on a coho lure, then you are overspending by quite a bit

Fish on...

Todd

Those blue foxes you found was the best catch yet! good find!

PINK #4 BLUE FOX VIBRAX!!! Don't care the water clarity, flow, depth, etc. that is
My go to spinner

Cool thread.....I have told a couple fishin buds about it and suggested they read.
FYI ....the #4 coppper is tearing it up for me so far. I have caught 11 and lost 4 so far since 09/01/2012.
I have observed...w/polarized glasses countless followups/drive bys. and a couple hits but no feel. Probably 15 cutties as well.
tonight me and pal entered the river after 6:30 PM and had a fish a coho a piece before dark. Had to work some but when I went to copper....4 minutes later a fish had followed close and whacked it not far from the shore.
I felt compelled to purchase 10 #4 rvrfshr as a result. gl

One interesting thing about this post is that every combination imaginable works!
Pictures here show just about any combination with a fish!

Flash-glo's from the old days.....prices on the stickers..... .39 to .69, these are some I bought and have just kept the orginal card and Flash-glo's.

Many times there would sales, 3 for a dollar. But then gas, at the time, was less than .50 a gallon.

This type of spinners caught 10's of thousands of fish,,,,late 60's and early 70's......cast and trolling......Silvers and Kings....

Here is my donor stash from last year. I have "repurposed" a lot of the parts and pieces from these.



I like Flash Glo bodies but have put silver blades on them instead of the nickel blades they come with (at least the ones I had). I can remember catching lots of silvers on flash-glos trolling around Monte when I was a youngster. My first salmon ever was a silver on the Thorne with a flash-glo. I still remember it clearly.

Most of these had something about them that I didn't like, those got parted out others got re-hoochied and back into the mix.

spinners for coho?? seems like alot of work......may give it a try one day.

Has anyone tried the all black blue fox?? does it work? i picked one up today and wanted to see if anyone had experience with it

I used the black blade/john deere green body vibrax in Alaska a couple years ago and it worked well, but so did the silver blade/blue body, both in size 4 or 5.

I don't think Blue Fox makes the black body/JD green body variation any more.

ClearCreek

Clear creek? where are you from? if you don't mind me asking.. lol but ya i hope the all black works

Rocket Red...that #5 silver Rvrfshr spinner with the blue sticker on the outside of the blade is one of mine!

I'll pm you my address and you can mail it back to me

TIA

Fish on...

Todd

have you tried the all black todd?

Black works just fine in low and clear water...I usually stick a little bit of color on it, most often a small silver sticker on the inside of the black blade.

Don't be afraid to size down to #3 blacks in those conditions.

Fish on...

Todd

ok. The black blade has a brass back, so maybe that'll help

Ha, well I guess it was yours at one time (in parts anyways). That one caught my first Chehalis silver last fall, except it had a hoochie at the time (and does now).




I have bought probably every color of Vibrax they ever made, even though I fish with the same colors 90% 95% of the time.

Yes, I have tried black (for silvers) and they went into the donor pile. I took off the black blade, and put on a silver blade and they are back in the lineup.

I have a very scientific testing methodology. Whenever we are on biting fish, I have someone (or myself) switch to one of the colors/patterns we don't normally use and see if it holds up. Black has never held up, or even got close. YMMV.

i tried the all black today and had a silver on, but it spit the hook. Maybe it was just luck...idk.