Sockeye fever is simple. People want to fill the freezer, and with a limit of 3 fish per day it can happen quickly. It means 3 am mornings, standing thigh deep in glacial melt swinging ounces of led and a snagging hook with an 8wt for hours on end.
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| Regulations say you can't use a bare hook but it wouldn't matter for catching them |
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| A good wide gap and short shank make for great hooking and holding power |
Pound for pound sockeye (red) salmon are the hardest fighting fish out there. The first run salmon average about 8 lbs and we use 25 lb mono to construct a 9' leader. With the drag cranked these guys still peel line.
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| I put this one through my finger |
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The pliers come in handy for removing hooks (from fingers)
and the scissors I use to bleed the salmon before knocking them |
The second run of reds started in just the last 2 or 3 days. By now there are over 700,000 salmon in the Kenai River and working their way to its headwaters. The Kenai River automated fish count reports can be heard at (907) 262-9097. The fish in this run average 14 pounds or so and put everything into the fight.
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This is sockeye fishing at it's worst. Combat, shoulder to shoulder,
what ever you call it I prefer trout |
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| These salmon run the gauntlet as they battle upstream to their spawning grounds |
There are places where the crowds dissipate and fish still hold. They way to access these little places is by hiking a little or using a drift boat to get to gravel bars along the Kenai. There are a dozen ways to prepare salmon, from the grill, smoker, canner, hung dried, cold smoked, etc. They are all delicious.
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| The pay-off is a smoker full of fresh salmon. |
The second run of King Salmon is in hard as well. About 1,000 to 1,500 kings enter the Kenai every day now.
Sweet! Looks like a great time, aside from battling the others that have the same goal.
ReplyDeleteThere will be a day when I can fish for sea-run sockeye. All we have in Utah are kokanee in a few lakes and I have yet to catch one of those, but my time is coming.
LOAH- Those Kokanee can be tricky. They're actually land-locked sockeye that enter the moving water to spawn. I had a big learning curve with them a few years back in Co. Try anything red, maybe big. Don't bother hitting them over the head if they're anything but chrome; spawning spoils their meat and they lose their fight too. I'd wait until that trip to Alaska to take your spoils.
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