9 Pinks for me in 7 and a half hours fishing the past 2 days. 6/9 males and all mostly fresh surprisingly. I figured out how to get the males to taste better too. If you bake them, just cut off their fatty humps prior to putting them in the oven and from time to time drain the fatty juices that bubble off from the fish. When they hit, they hit hard. Paint is starting to chip off my Pimples and I probably should start sharpening the hooks. Here's what the females are looking like now. Fish On. View attachment 226538
Did a rogue trip last minute to the soo yesterday to fish the evening and morning. Got my limit in an hour yesterday evening, didn't end up fishing in the morning cause I woke up with a terrible sinus headache. The powerhouse is crap for fishing cause they've had it off all day and only turn it on in the evenings around 6pm. Theres spot where these pinks are holding right now and its not at the powerhouse.
Loads of new fish as well as the old. Caught a fresh chrome male and about 45 minutes later landed a mud brown dark male day(s) away from unloading. Really doesn't matter if it's raining/not. Some lures/variations work better in bright and others in low light more than others. Just experiment and be observant and it shouldn't take long to hook up.
Here is my 2016 pink salmon fishing experience on the St. Marys.
Started first week in sept. Slow migration not really started yet. caught 14 in 2 days of hard fishing.
Just came back and the run was on. Lots of fish, many schools around almost constant action. About 20 percent relatively fresh, 80 percent just about done. Landed about 10 fish per hour, lost many more per hour. Best run was 4 consecutive casts and 4 fish landed. Visited the Edison and the valley camp and would consider the action slow compared to Canada. If you want to CATCH fish you need to go to Canada. Many, many more fish on that side. The fish were significantly much smaller this year. I've been up there for 18 consecutive years and I know what I see. Fish are skinny, no meat on the backbone, looks like they had nothing to eat. I'm sure this is the result of the poor food base in Huron. Seen 0 kings and coho's, nobody fishing. Ben's powder puff fishing derby caught 0 fish. Nobody fishing the garden even at the mouth. Superior coho action not started yet although a few rainbows are around. First week in Oct is my guess for the coho's to start up. My fishing gear is packed and ready to go.
With the powerhouses off (soo and gov't powerhouse) you can still catch them in american waters, will need a boat though. Guys were catching 5 man limits in just a couple hours, still in american waters.
We just got back from a Sunday evening through Thursday morning trip. We didn't fish the Sault but hit a couple of other streams.
The pinks were in in huge numbers. Most were caught on thundersticks, but I did experiment with the fly rod and caught some with pink clousers.
Kings were just starting to move up. Our group caught 3 Monday, 3 Wednesday and 1 Thursday morning. Most were in great shape yet, with one having solid orange fillets, something I have never seen in the river.
The pinks were mostly silver, but small and skinny, with many males having no hump. We usually enjoy grilling a few, but the ones we tried were not fit for dog food.
The best catch for me was a 19 1/4" rainbow.
Well there's a first for everything and today was a first for me. Can't say I've ever caught a perch on a Swedish Pimple before. A size 7 for that matter. He came out at 10.4 inches long and .52 lb View attachment 227320
Unfortunately, that guy weighs about as much as some of this year's pinks! They're pretty anemic looking. Cool catch though. Two weeks ago my buddy and I were up and he caught about a 3" darter on a #7 pink pimple same as yours. Lure was longer than the fish.....
Not all have been mush, but quite a few have been. What's been a good rule of thumb for me is when cleaning them if the meat is orangish than it is fresh and will taste great, but if it shows a dominant white coloring or is pasty white, then you're better off just throwing it in the dumpster. I've noticed the females tend to be more likely to have the good orange meat than the males, but even then it's maybe 1 every 3.
. Having read all of the threads regarding fish quality I need to put my 2 cents in AGAIN. The fish this year are unusually different than in past years. They are small, skinny, no meat on the bones and yes, they are mushy when they are white. Some of the fish I cleaned that had white meat could not be skinned and deboned without falling apart. Never seen that before. I'm not a fussy eater and when I tried to eat one of the higher quality, white meat fish they were poor tasting and we threw them out. Something wrong is going on----no food base??? some kind of disease???? I have been fishing for pinks for over 20 years and have never seen anything like this.
Pretty much just roll the dice and hope you get orange meat haha. It seems there's no rhyme or reason because some of the moderately aged ones had orange meat and some silvery ones had white meat and vice-versa. Just an odd year for sure.
One of my friends came up with a theory.
He surmised that the lack of proper nutrition is causing the spawning fish to deteriorate faster than normal when they get in the river. The analogy he used was that a small ice cube melts faster than a large one.
I don't know if he is right, but it makes some sense to me.
I bet some of these pinks didnt/wont spawn this year because of poor nutrition. Either they didnt run or they are going to try but be unsuccessful because of poor nutrition. Some of the eggs I saw were tiny, but the fish was fully colored. Definitely wouldnt have produced any offspring from those eggs.
Been numerous pinks in Petoskey the last week or so. Saw a nice sized, fresh male gigged this morning between the bridges. Silvery, but had the hump forming.
I don't fish for the pinks but my guess is that you will find healthier and larger pinks coming out of Lake Superior. The smaller skinny pinks are probably coming out of Lake Michigan and there probably are some big healthy pinks finding their way into gill nets that you will never see. The skinny ones won't get caught in the nets. Lack of food would produce some sickly pink salmon. I think that shiners and sticklebacks make up the food base for pinks and there are plenty of them out there.
My daughter went last Saturday and did pretty good
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