Jefferson Head - Coho

With July 1 came the retention of coho in Marine areas 9 & 10.  We had a number of good coho reports come from Jefferson Head yesterday with limits being the rule.  These fish are no means record breakers with the average resident coho being 1 1/2 - 2 1/2 pounds, however they are easy to catch with a variety of techniques.  A small white dodger with a yellow/white or lime green/white coho fly combination with a small strip of herring on the forward hook will be a great offering.  Fish the dodger/fly combination with a short leader (1 1/2 X length of the dodger) and troll fast enough to get it to rotate giving the fly a very erratic side to side action.  Early in the AM one can fish the surface layers down to 25 feet and expect to find fish.  Look for signs of these fish.  Look for jumpers, schools of bait fish, fish the rips etc.  Other baits that work effectively are small spoons such as coho killers or kingfishers by Silver Horde or smaller squids such as the Mini Sardines by Yamashita (distributed by Silver Horde)

These are very fine eating fish as they are still feeding on krill at the present time and just starting to transition to bait fish.  When on the krill these fish are butter fat and have bright red flesh.  They make for some fine eating when a fillet is placed on a piece of tin foil with a pat of butter, sea salt, some slices of lemon and a few rounds of Walla Walla sweet onion then throw it on the BBQ and cook it just until its not quite done.  (The residual heat in the fish will will finish it to perfection.)