Last Two Days At Strawberry

[lifeshort]

Tuesday am on the water at daylight fished until noon. Several small 10-12" Kokanee, several slot cuts (real nice fish), several nice Kokanee lost before we were able to net them. We had a lot of single hits, one strike and nothing all morning. Not one keeper Koke landed. Tuesday evening a repeat of the morning.
Wednesday picked up a guy from work and his 14 year old son that have never Kokanee fished. Hit the water at first light put down 3 rods on the riggers and the fish were ready to play. Ended up with 5 Keeper Kokes in the boat twice that many lost on the way in. About 5 small ones let go and who knows how many nice cuts released. Same thing with the single hits as the day before a lot of single bumps and nothing. I am wondering if the Kokes are just swatting at the lures and that is why we are not hooking up so many hits and getting so many on and then losing them?

Wednesday is the best day we have had in 2 1/2 weeks.
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[fish_hntr]

[quote lifeshort]Tuesday am on the water at daylight fished until noon. Several small 10-12" Kokanee, several slot cuts (real nice fish), several nice Kokanee lost before we were able to net them. We had a lot of single hits, one strike and nothing all morning. Not one keeper Koke landed. Tuesday evening a repeat of the morning.
Wednesday picked up a guy from work and his 14 year old son that have never Kokanee fished. Hit the water at first light put down 3 rods on the riggers and the fish were ready to play. Ended up with 5 Keeper Kokes in the boat twice that many lost on the way in. About 5 small ones let go and who knows how many nice cuts released. Same thing with the single hits as the day before a lot of single bumps and nothing. I am wondering if the Kokes are just swatting at the lures and that is why we are not hooking up so many hits and getting so many on and then losing them?

Wednesday is the best day we have had in 2 1/2 weeks.[/quote]

What hook/lure setup are you using and how are you baiting them? I learned a lot reading this, make sure you read parts 1 [url "http://www.fishwithgary.com/kokanee_university_part1.html"]http://www.fishwithgary.com/kokanee_university_part1.html[/url] and 2 [url "http://www.fishwithgary.com/kokanee_university_part2.html"]http://www.fishwithgary.com/kokanee_university_part2.html[/url]
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[lifeshort]

Dodgers are Dakota style with silver holographic stickers closest commercial ones are Kokanee creek tackles, Lures pink beads with silver spinner blades, and small pink squids with spinner blades. I make my own but if I was buying Kokanee Creeks again.

We use pro cure scents and Berkely maggots.
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[fish_hntr]

[quote lifeshort]Dodgers are Dakota style with silver holographic stickers closest commercial ones are Kokanee creek tackles, Lures pink beads with silver spinner blades, and small pink squids with spinner blades. I make my own but if I was buying Kokanee Creeks again.

We use pro cure scents and Berkely maggots.[/quote]

What size hooks and are they single or double, offset to opposite sides? If double I was reading that you should bait the forward/leading hook, that way when they come up to slap it they will typically target the baited hook, and the rear hook will have a better chance of contact. Seems to make sense to me.
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[lifeshort]

Double hooks I will have to try baiting the forward hook.
Here's a pic at the cleaning station
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[rbrtwjns]

How are you releasing those "non-keepers" ? Are you making sure they are revived and swimming away? Kokanee have a very high mortality rate when released, like somewhere in the 70-80% range!!

Just saying as I hate to see numerous Kokes Die.

Regards
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[lifeshort]

Do you keep 10" Kokanee?

Just Saying you can't fish for this years fish without catching next years fish
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[remo_5_0]

[quote rbrtwjns]How are you releasing those "non-keepers" ? Are you making sure they are revived and swimming away? Kokanee have a very high mortality rate when released, like somewhere in the 70-80% range!!

Just saying as I hate to see numerous Kokes Die.

Regards[/quote]

By your math if all the Kokes would have been kept, they would be 100% dead, at least Lifeshort gave them a 20-30% of making it. []
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[catfishbait]

Nice report and thanks for sharing.....

great job on the Kokes.
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[rbrtwjns]

I keep a 10" Koke if it won't revive .. what do you do just chuck them back?
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[rbrtwjns]

[quote remo_5_0][quote rbrtwjns]How are you releasing those "non-keepers" ? Are you making sure they are revived and swimming away? Kokanee have a very high mortality rate when released, like somewhere in the 70-80% range!!

Just saying as I hate to see numerous Kokes Die.

Regards[/quote]

By your math if all the Kokes would have been kept, they would be 100% dead, at least Lifeshort gave them a 20-30% of making it. [][/quote]

Only 4 Kokes would be dead if he didn't release all those 10" juveniles.

So which of us is correct? In a perfect world all the ones we catch would be 4 pounders.
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[lifeshort]

I guess we should all just do the best we can.

Good Fishing
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[remo_5_0]

[quote rbrtwjns][quote remo_5_0][quote rbrtwjns]How are you releasing those "non-keepers" ? Are you making sure they are revived and swimming away? Kokanee have a very high mortality rate when released, like somewhere in the 70-80% range!!

Just saying as I hate to see numerous Kokes Die.

Regards[/quote]

By your math if all the Kokes would have been kept, they would be 100% dead, at least Lifeshort gave them a 20-30% of making it. [][/quote]

Only 4 Kokes would be dead if he didn't release all those 10" juveniles.

So which of us is correct? In a perfect world all the ones we catch would be 4 pounders.[/quote]

Says they kept 5, so right off the bat there's that many, "released several 10-12" Kokes", there would be several more dead if kept, "released another 5 small ones" another 5 dead if kept. How do you figure only 4 would be dead? At least 10 is kept and whatever number several is. Like the OP said, try and do your best.
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[rbrtwjns]

4 dead per person as that is each persons limit. I do my best by not killing numerous kokes while trying to reach my limit of this years fish. My math is fuzzy as I have gotten too old to count correctly anymore.

Tight lines Remo
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[lifeshort]

[quote rbrtwjns][quote remo_5_0][quote rbrtwjns]How are you releasing those "non-keepers" ? Are you making sure they are revived and swimming away? Kokanee have a very high mortality rate when released, like somewhere in the 70-80% range!!

Just saying as I hate to see numerous Kokes Die.

Regards[/quote]

By your math if all the Kokes would have been kept, they would be 100% dead, at least Lifeshort gave them a 20-30% of making it. [][/quote]

Only 4 Kokes would be dead if he didn't release all those 10" juveniles.

So which of us is correct? In a perfect world all the ones we catch would be 4 pounders.[/quote]

rbtwjns it is good you are concerned about how fish are released. The way you posted that concern seemed like an accusation that we are not trying to release correctly. I do not know how you came to that decision. If the point of our fishing was to kill fish we legally could have killed 24 there were six of us in the boat that day but 5 was perfect for dinner. You are correct about the Kokanee being touchy when brought up from the cooler water into the warmer water at the surface but the way I learned was right was to bring the small ones to the boat as fast as you could, keep them in the water and unhook them without touching them with a net or your hands. If you know a better way to deal with them let us know I am open to learning if there is a better way.
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[Lunder]

I generally use the method Lifeshort uses on the release. I keep the fish in the water, what for the calm moment where I can grab the hook and release it. Haven't had any that didn't quickly swim away. I have broken the line on the hook a few times in my haste but to replace the hook is cheap.
The high mortality rate is probably from those who net the Kokanee, hold it while removing the hook and then admiring the catch before throwing it back in the water.
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