Presentations for Silvers

As has been discussed at length around here, coho can be a tough nut to crack. Just when you think you have them dialed in, they teach you otherwise. That said, I think coho are a lot like most fish in that the presentation likely plays a larger part in getting them to bite than the lure.

I have personally had a few different presentations work, but none seems to be more productive over time than the others. I've had them hit a stripped fly, a swung fly, and even a dead drift presentation at times. On one occasion, I took several fish from the same drift with a greased-line presentation, steelhead style. Lately, however, I have been having trouble getting them to succumb to any of my old tricks, and as tends to happen after extended periods of skunking, I am beginning to question my methods.

Do any of you have favorite presentations for silvers you would like to share? Fly selection is not the intent of this topic, but if it seems vital to the method in question, then please feel free to suggest "magic" bugs.

I have had the privilege to fish over huge numbers of coho when chums and humpies were also present. The conventional wisdom is strip for coho and pinks, dead drift for chums. I think that’s generally correct, but have hooked lots of coho on a dead drift and chums when striping. I think it’s a good idea to begin with the "proper" presentation than start changing up if that doesn’t work.

Try a wog if you see lots of rollers and have no takes on conventional methods. On occasion they love them.

I am interested in this.

I fish primarily for silvers in frog water, and brushy flats on the Chehalis. I have hooked a lot of fish on twitched jigs. I have had them aggressively chase swum jigs right to the side of the boat, and when I noticed that aggression switched over to a flyrod and a fly that looked the exact same as the jig, but have not had a single bump yet.

I have spent a lot of time on fly design, coming up with flies that utilize round powder coated brass heads, and marabou bodies. These look just like my jigs, but I just cant figure out how to make them fish the same.

I'm going to try a different approach this year, and use a lightly weighted pattern on the sink tip I use for ling cod and see if that with a faster strip give me different results.

Only had one chance to fish the wog but, damn, it was memorable. We found a pod waiting to go up a trib. They were just milling around and seemingly pissed off. Nothing like seeing a gonzo nose come up and eat a bunch of pink deer hair!

I don't fly fish for salmon much. I've been skunked often enough steelhead fishing to know better than to fly fish for salmon on purpose. With the aforementioned qualifier, I have caught salmon of every species (even masu) on flies. Other than pinks and chums, which of course don't count, I think the best way of targeting salmon with flies (in freshwater) is to do it in Alaska where the damn things strike, as opposed to WA, where they normally don't.

What I think I've learned about coho fishing is that for every day the fish is removed from saltwater, they are exponentially far less willing to strike. So fishing for fresh fish is most productive. And in AK they will hit wogs almost as willingly as they will hit a stripped streamer. I intend to experiment more with wogs in WA, but haven't gotten around to it yet.

I don't know if fly pattern matters much, as I've caught most of my fly caught salmon on steelhead flies while I was steelhead fishing. If I'm targeting coho, I use a marabou streamer. If there's a better pattern or style, I don't know what it is. Most of my coho success has been random, and I attribute that to fishing too far upstream of tidewater for fish that were several or more days from the salt. When I fish for coho now, I look for fish that I think are no more than 24 hours from saltwater, and hookups seem to be more regular than random. I'm thinking that is the key factor.

Sg

OK. So far, I'm convinced that a wog is worthy of the old college try. If it proves futile, to KK's point, at least it will have been fun trying.

RR: Check your PMs. I think I have a potential solution to your jig emulation dilemma, but I'm afraid to post something so blasphemous in the company of elitists such as may be watching this thread. (If anyone else wants to know my suggestion, send a PM, but be advised, it's not for the pure at heart.)

Sg: It's interesting (at least to me) that you have caught incidental salmon while fishing for steelhead. My experience has been exactly the opposite. Either way, I am sure we are both equally delighted when such accidents happen.

I generally agree with your observation that fresh salmon are better biters. Come to think of it, even when darker fish are around, most of the salmon I have caught on flies have been relatively bright (one good justification for wasting time trying to catch them on flies, IMO). I must cite one exception to that rule, however, for the sake of argument. I have had decent success on colored-up fish on the Satsop. Of course, those were Satsop silvers, which are (were?) renowned for being snappy. Actually, as I expressed to RR, I think the fact that the numbers of silvers have been down on the Satsop in recent years may explain why I'm not catching many silvers on flies these days.

AP: That picture is awesome and exemplifies a classic definition of a wild, hook-nosed coho, IMO.

Thanks for the thoughts, guys.

Very cool picture Kaiser Dog!

Damn. Awesome picture.

Along the lines of this thread. The most aggressive silvers I have ever found were staged in about a 1/2 mile area below a small creek on a medium river. I had some of the most violent grabs I have ever experienced from 10+ lb buck fire engines. I have never had cohos act that way before or since. We fished over these fish for about an hour (moved on because they were boots) and they were grabbing so hard that you started to brace yourself for impact when the spinner got in the zone.

I think I could have wogged these.

I said way cool picture before I read that everyone else said way cool damn picture.


Hey AKP to the D.





Nice pic

Gonzo indeed.

FF02,

Negative regarding being delighted when a salmon grabs my fly while I'm steelhead fishing. I matriculated from the old school where you earn demerits for hooking non-target species. And if you hook a pink or chum and play it to hand, you get two demerits for not breaking it off once you determine it's not a steelhead. And that's no matter how long it took to tie that particular fly.

In those days, incidental salmon were a distraction to steelheading and reduced the number of minutes in the day spent steelhead fishing. Now that I'm older and possibly wiser I tolerate distractions pretty well in the spirit of adding diversity to my life.

Regarding the Wog, I think it's worth a try because it fits what I've learned about change ups being important to productive coho fishing. Just have it in the gear rotation.

Sg

I'm thinking I need to find a body material for a wog that will keep it afloat with a dual dropper of a barbell-eyed marabou spider (jig) and a plastic bead suspended beneath it. Strip that rig back through some frog water and look out!

Well... I'll at least try the wog. Should be fun.

Oh crap! Where'd you get that avatar? Funniest thing all day.

Sg

Google images. Wasn't as easy as I expected to find it. Searching for "Ascot" turned up a bunch of pictures of British royalty, some of whom were wearing ascots, but it wasn't what I was looking for. Doing a search for "Ascot tie," however, yielded better results. I was hoping to find something with some paisleys or some such on it, but as the song says, you can't always get....

Even with a multitude of fresh and biting silvers around (AK) i have a hard time getting them to respond to a fly. I usually try for an hour or two and then catch 15 to 20 on bait to make myself feel better, and then give a few more casts with the bug rod

Of the patterns I have tried that seem to do fairly well, a pink and white marabou and rabbit streamer, such as the Dolly Llama, has done as well as anything else. Twitching and stripping through frog water and slow seams over...obviously...holding fish. Big gaudy flash flies (pink and silver, pink and gold) can work very well also.

I would be curious to know if anyone has wogged one up in Washington.

PS - F the skagit and its silvers.

Coley,

I've only fished 3 places in AK for silvers. I'm glad I had confidence in flies because I don't take any other gear up there. Had zero problem getting silvers to hit, which is what caused me to try the Wog. My experience caused me to believe that 175% of AK silvers hit. (A sort of joke, floated into a pool and spotted 4 silvers, got out and fished, caught 7.) In all three places, I was in or just a short distance upstream of tidewater, and the fish were likely less than 48 hours, maybe less than 24 hours, out of the ocean.

I haven't used the wog in WA but still intend to when I can get out under the right conditions.

Sg

Washington coho aren't worth fishing for in my opinion. I've wasted way too much of my life trying to get them to take a fly with VERY little success.

As with Salmo, I've taken them incidental to steelheading a few times so don't even take credit for them. Most have been caught while fishing steelhead on the Sky during December-Feb. Chromers too. Suprised the hell out of me everytime that there were coho arriving that late.

Washington coho; especially Puget Sound coho, are indeed a tough nut to crack but to fair they are tough on all gear types. As has been touch on the major reason our coho are so tough if the high fishing pressure they have recieved which seems to have left us with mostly non-aggressive fish with the few aggressive fish quickly removed from the population by anglers very year.

Coho seem much easier in the salt again as mentioned enough are caught incidentially in our steelhead and other river fishing to indicate that they should be a possible fish to target in our rivers. Over the rivers I have caught lots of them while fishing for sea-runs cutthroat. When I began to target coho I used my cutthroat success as a foundation upon which to built a strategy to chase them.

That strategy includes smallish flies, strip retrieves, etc with constant changing of fly color and variation with the speed of the strip during retrieves. As with the cutthroat the coho seem to be easier on the fly in specific locations. I like slow froggy water, sloughs and side channels and as with the cutthroat having wood in the water seems to be an asset an in this case having rolling fish seems to be a good thing. If I were limited to one fly it would be a Knudson spider in a size #4. I would have a variety tied with different color bodies; including chartreuse, black, orange, yellow and pearl. I would also include in my fly box some flash flies, muddlers, and bait fish patterns. While most would be in that 1 inch length I would include some smaller and larger flies in the mix. Nearly all the flies I use are unweighted though if one wants to cover all situation the use of weighted "jig" type flies can be an asset.

For presentation I fish mostly sinking lines; including both sink tips and full sinking lines and once in a while I have success with dry lines and a fly fished just under the surface. If I had to limit myself to single line it would be full sinking line with a moderate sink rate. In almost all cases a stripped retrieve will outfish a swung fly though our coho can be pretty fussy about the retrieve rate and length of strip. Consistent success requires constant experimentation. One thing I have learned is that after one takes a fish or two out of a pod changing flies (at least color) and/or retrieve rate can add a fish or two to the day's catch.

As noted once the fish get close to spawning (getting colored) they tend to get much more aggressive and better biters. However those fish are generally not very good fighters and in my opinion not really worth targeting; they have more important things to do. Fresh run/bright fish be another matter. Traveling fish have typically been a tough nut for me to crack with my best success being with tide water fish. For those fish I like to target locations where those traveling fish are likely to pause. I have best luck on fish that have have stopped migrating and are schooled up though those fish that have been holding for any length of time are not as like to respond to the fly as the ones that have been there for a day or two.

A major factor in freshwater coho fishing for these non-aggressive fish is that they seem to lose interest in the fly before taking it. For that reason fishing in situations with reduced visibility can be the key. The most obvious example is our rivers after a significant rise while still fairly turbid - like that 12 to 18 inch visibility situation. Glacial water may be the best. When the river is clear I like fishing around snags. logs, and root wads where I can surprise the fish with the retrieved fly so that I get a reaction bite - in short try to present the fly so that fsih doesn't see the bug until it is within a foot or two of the fish. The idea is get the fish to take before losing interest.

Even with all the above the reality is the fly angler will have blank days but I have had enough multiple fish days (even some double digit ones) to make the coho game worthwhile.

BTW -
I too have caught coho well into the year include a number in March. Have taken fish as late as the last day of March in both the Snoqualmie and Skagit system. At one time Washington had coho with a wide variety of run timing. Some of that variety still exists - I have caught coho in our local rivers every month of the year except April and May.

Tight lines
Curt

Thanks for all the thoughts, Smalma. Some good stuff in there. I have found many of the same things.

The biggest difference between what you and I do seems to be that you prefer a full sink line. Given the type of water you are focusing on, I think that makes a lot of sense, and it probably keeps you in the zone a lot better than a floater. For the most part, I have developed an opinion that a floating line is always the best tool (mostly because it allows the angler to mend for optimal presentations). In this case, I can definitely see where carrying an extra spool with a sinking line might be prudent.

FleaFlicker -
I have caught coho with a floating line with skated muddlers or a spider just under the surface. However I really dislike fishing weighted flies (don't fish them for sea-runs, steelhead, salmon or Dollies) so when I want to get deeper (the norm for coho) the sinking line beomes my best option.

That said I know that the "jiggy" action a weighted fly fished on a dry line appeals to coho. However if I'm competing with gear guys for the biters the spider on a sinking line allows me to provide a presentation the coho don't normally see.

Tight lines
Curt

The trick I used in AK was to thread a simple marabou fly on the tippet (i.e. sliding) and then tie a small brass bead to the end of the tippet. With this rig the fly was nearly weightless between strips. It seems to work best with very short and fast strips. Very twitchy.

I think therein lies a key point, not just proximity to salt, but also lack of pressure and/or exposure to predatory influence, man or other.

I have had wonderful days catching silvers on the fly. Mostly in cases similar to what you describe. My local streams are 3-4 days from the salt for most fish, and many show up having felt, or feel pressure shortly after arrival. As in WA, lots of the biters seem to get weeded out early on, and the more tight lipped fish mill around in the meat holes for a while staring at spinners and spoons all day as new fish roll in and perpetuate the cycle.

Showing them something they haven't seen, or in a way they haven't seen it definitely seems to work. That having been said, I have had more days than I can count pulling out every trick on the book trying to get stingy WA silvers to bite. Sometimes they just don't.

Knudson's Spider is a new one for me though I will have to give that a try shortly after hell freezes over and I fish for silvers in WA again!

Ooooh. Fancy!

Reverse spiders looks really good in the water. I have yet to catch a fish on one, but in the time I have been fishing them, I haven't gotten a coho on anything else, either. I have been fishing them a lot lately. All that movement, in front of the right fish, has got to equal play time.

I like it. The ol' zig when everyone else zags. I'll give it a go.

coho hate stuff that wants to eat their children. Try egg sucking leeches, but use a Trout Bead as the egg threaded ahead of a regular BIG black or purple woolly bugger.....it looks more realistic than a chennile "egg" and it helps the fly sink. Another trick is a mouse brown or dark olive mottled barbell eyed bunny leech, stripped, zigged, zagged, pulled, darted, dropped etc through a run. Make it look like a living critter. If they hit it they crush it....nothing subtle. Even anorexic silvers will whack these at times. Cherry bomb bucks DETEST anything trying to eat their kids, but those are for entertainment only and must be released......no smokehouse !!

A pegged glass trout bead a half inch above, a black n green leech, or bugger kills hos in my neck of the woods when they are on the bite. But like everyone says... Coho are a tuff nut to crack. 'specially when throwin fur...

I wish you could toss wogs in this one little piss trickle stream, but these particular fish are so g.d. spooky by now, anything but stealth casts/presentations gets you busted by the fish. Even raising your rod tip to roll back out will peel fish outta the pack! But there again, I am fishing an "in between" time right now... with the hatchery turds all but booty, just waitin for legit hi finners to show their hook'd noses.

In low (low) light try using flies tied with glow in the dark materials.

You may be surprised...

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