More combat fishing pics

[Okanagan]

I was going to fly fish catch and release sockeye in the section of slower poor water shown below,  but even that had more people than I like to get into with light gear.



Native Indian subsistence gill netters, not commercial.  Never did time it to catch a pic of fish in the net as they pulled it.  They caught lots.

[Todd Rahm]

Native Indian subsistence gill netters

Yipper, and using Native Indian traditional aluminum boat and motor too I see. 

[pitw]

Native Indian subsistence gill netters

Yipper, and using Native Indian traditional aluminum boat and motor too I see. 

  I gather there is some of the same thoughts on natives subsistence gathering in your country as ours.


  If two lines get fouled down there fishing is there much blood shed?  I still think postal when I look at it.

[Okanagan]

 If two lines get fouled down there fishing is there much blood shed?  I still think postal when I look at it.

All of my experience has been cordial.  I have heard of fist fights but never seen any.  Most people cooperate very well, rooting for each other when somebody hooks one, helping or at least getting out of the way.   My line tangled with the older guy above me as soon as he moved closer this morning.  It was a pretty good tangle so I cut my leader and retied.  No sweat.  Saw two or three other such minor tangles, usually just shake them free from each other.   It comes with the territory so no need to get bothered, and most are easy.    I fished by a grouch once, years ago, but most people have been good company.

One time alone on shore I hooked a Chinook too big to handle with sockeye gear and a couple of guys with a boat invited me to hop in and they followed the fish till I played it out and netted it for me, then returned me to my spot on shore.  Otherwise it would have spooled me and broken off almost certainly.

When someone hooks a fish I've not seen anyone not get his line out of the way.  It is courtesy to use heavy enough line and gear not to play a fish forever in a crowd, and most people get that.  Oh, I did see one guy not pull his line and it cost another fisherman a fish three years ago but it appeared to be cluelessness rather than malice.

This morning is the first time I've fished near enough to anyone this year to cross lines, and since I got there early and was one spot from the downstream end of the line, I only had one person, the guy below me, to avoid.  Plus once in awhile had to keep away from the older guy above me.   Sockeye in swift water are almost always hooked downstream from the fisherman, and almost all of them fight downstream.

My main reason for avoiding the combat lines is not arguments but that I like to fish differently than many people.  In a row of people everybody has to do synchronized casting, about the same distance out  (way out there is the norm) and use the same weight.  When done that way, it is amazing how few tangles there are.  But many of the fish are in close, about where men stand thigh pocket deep in their waders, and I like to use light sinkers and short casts and hammer such fish.  But that causes frequent tangles.   So I go off alone.  

[FinsnFur]

Interesting
So is it safe to assume that's NOT your tent in that first pic?

[KySongDog]

Interesting read, thanks, Okanagan.  Is there a reason everyone congregates at one spot on the river?   I mean to say that if the salmon were swimming the river you could set up anywhere along its length, and not in just one spot.  

Is that spot a bottle neck?

[Okanagan]

Interesting read, thanks, Okanagan.  Is there a reason everyone congregates at one spot on the river?   I mean to say that if the salmon were swimming the river you could set up anywhere along its length, and not in just one spot.  

Is that spot a bottle neck?

Yes, essentially it is a bottleneck, for fishermen as well as fish.  It is an ideal fishing spot and one of very few such places fishermen can get to due to limited access.

The salmon swim the full length of the river, but 95% of the people fish them with only one technique, which works only in one combo of current and bottom conditions.  Snaggy water, slow water, drop off shoreline, deep water near shore are all no good for usual Fraser River sockeye fishing, but only swift water over gradually shelving clean cobble rock.  And that has to be a shore that the fish follow, and they don't always follow such shorelines within casting distance.

Even more of a bottleneck is that very little of the 200 miles or so of lower river shoreline are accessible by the public.  With a boat you can go anywhere, but foot fishermen are extremely limited as to where they can get to.  Add in a million plus people within a 90 minute drive and that is the recipe for what my local fishing friends call the gong show!

[KySongDog]

OK, I see now.... thanks for the explanation.   That answers my question.  I didn't think about accessibility.