I was searching for the salmon derby pics on FB but I guess they removed it.
There was one pic that I remember that was taken on a bend that had the sunken tree.
I can't believe how many anglers in that one pic. Someone even pointed out the guys on top of the banks who were jigging.
I saw on facebook the guy that won biggest coho was using jigs under a float.
I was doing that today. I was not trying to catch any salmon but got a coho on and lost it. Is there a way to avoid hooking the salmon while fishing for trout? I caught a few smolts around 10" but nothing big.
ya if u run your float/indicator at the right height for the pool and try to focus your drift/swing on the tail of the pool you can avoid a lot of salmon and get into the smaller fish that are busy eating salmon eggs. dont set your hook like a mad man and you wont snag salmon. keep your hook point buried in your roe bag in such a way that it will pop out when compressed, that will help you not to snag salmon that bump into your bait as well.
Of course the occasional salmon will bite or get flossed and pull down your float, but you can avoid almost 100% of foul hooks by hiding the hook point and running your bait below or above where the salmon are sitting .
Anyways, the point of the story is, targeting fish on their redds is unethical. although here in Ontario we have a heavy stocking program for pacific salmon and natural reproduction isn't completely critical to sustaining the fishery so if you shoot out there in September to grab up on a hen or two for steelhead bait for the rest of the year, I don't really see a problem with that, as long as the carcass/meat ends up in your garden etc and as long as you aren't selling roe illegally. Its the guys that haul as many salmon as they can in one night, stack the carcasses in the bush, bellies slit. I saw a recent picture from port hope like this. Keep it clean and legal and all is well.
Almost all actively spawning fish of any species wont eat anything, they may strike to kill and protect their redds though, thats why they hang out over them. However you can usually find some stragglers who aren't sitting on their redds and ethically speaking, those fish are fair game as they are probably feeding anyways. The ethical way to fish is to offer a food item(or imitation of one) and convince a feeding fish to eat it. Same thing goes for bass, trout, carp, etc etc. If there was a bass tournament in may/june and hundreds of anglers were hauling bass off their spawning beds (redds) the fishery would suffer big time and there would be a quite an uproar, thats why bass opener is not til after bass finish spawning. They are just too vulnerable during spawning.
