Kenai Reds are in!

[fivebucks]

The 2nd run of the Kenai Reds have hit the river in full force. It is potentially a record one day push past the sonar on Tuesday of 246,000 fish, preceded by 92,000 the day before. It's looking like another record run. I hope it doesn't peter out in the next week too much but I don't think so. I will be on the river in one week, next Thursday the 25th for a week in the great land. Tic toc tic toc - gosh the clock is going slow

[fishkid]

ya you will be good. me and a buddy went down monday night and stopped off at a spot in soldotna got our 9 fish and then hit the mouth to dip net. we hit it absolutly perfectly on that 246,000 fish day and got 110 reds in 4 hourse of fishing. pretty awesome stuff. no more dealing with reds now on to the trout fishing. i will put up some photos later of the chaos down there

[fivebucks]

That's a good day dipping. Not looking forward to the crowds on the river but I can always fish at 4 am or after midnight. I was spoiled last year by having a private dock to fish from. Have you heard anything on the Kasilof king run? Thinking of taking a break from reds and shore fish on the Kasilof for a bit. It's been 20 years so my favorite hole might have filled in but if there's a decent chance of a hookup I might give it a go.

[live4chrome]

Its been insane. We have been catching reds till our arms are sore the last 4 days.

[mwal]

I have a friend up there now and the reds are insane. Fivebucks there is basically no King run again this year. I believe it may even be closed to King fishing it will be catch and release only for sure. Kings in the Cook inlet maybe a thing of the past. Will have to go to Bristol bay streams or Kodiak for them. For some reason the Reds are alive and well.

Mwal

[fishkid]

fivebucks pm sent

[fivebucks]

Thanks Fishkid. I saw 214,000 fish passed on Wed. This is looking like one huge run. Just bought a new reel for my 9 wt. I picked up a Lamson Guru 3.5 - can't wait to break her in.

[fivebucks]

Board the plane at 6pm today. Looks like the run has slowed a bit but rumor has it another big push is coming just in time for me. Nice thing is if not many fish in lower river I can always head up by Bings or towards the Russian as a ton of fish have come into the river already and should be thru Skilak Lake pretty soon. Fish ON!

[Xplorer]

My father-in-law has been up there since the 13th and has been just slaying them. Limit was raised to 6. He has his camper right on the river at a campground in Soldotna. Today he is flying some ungodly amount of reds overnight to me to keep frozen til they return in early Sept. I know what's for dinner tomorrow night!!!

[fivebucks]

Enjoy you meals of fish!

[Xplorer]

Oh Yeah. I have a nice digital Smoker so when they get back I smoke as much of it as they want Its a good trade off for both of us. I will be getting another shipment of reds and then he's hoping for a load of halibut and some silvers.

Have a blast while your up there. Jealous!!!

[traveler]

Sounds like fishhouse snacking to me Xplorer:)

I hope fivebucks hits 'em...the run started out red hot but has fizzled out for now...lots of griping that the counters are way off base. I canned most of my reds...love those salmon patties:)

[Xplorer]

He said yesterday that things had really slowed up. He is out of Homer today for halibut, hope he can get his 2.

Sounds like he decided not to stick around for silver season after all. Looks like they will pull the pin in another week or so and head back.

Grilled a nice piece last night, wow it was great. I think I've got about 30 pounds in the freezer now. Yum!!

[traveler]

Yeah...good stuff. It'll be interesting to hear how fivebucks does. All the talk on the AK forums right now is how the ADF&G is screwing the sportfishers/dipnetters by letting the commercial fleet have way too big a share of the available reds. Lots of Alaskans aren't even getting thier dipnet quota, and that doesn't sit too well with them.

[Xplorer]

I bet. The FIL sent 3 boxes of salmon to 3 of us. So I would guess he shipped about 75 pounds home Still waiting f for a Butt report!

[live4chrome]

Had a blast with the red run and still am even though its died alot now...the amount of gillnets in front of the rivers are insane, and block the entire river channels. The fish have to swim a maze of gill nets, and slip past the dip netters before the spot fisher have a chance.

[traveler]

good looking fish there liveforchrome! Those big kenai reds are sure a blast in that Kenai current, eh?

have you been useing a spinner or flyrod? Or baitcaster, actually, I've used all 3.

Did you and fivebucks manage to hook up? I assume he might be fishing upriver as it sounds like the big slug is by the Russian now.

[live4chrome]

Haven't heard from him yet. I have used all three, but my go to is a baitcaster, or a fly rod. Not a fan of spinning because the reel handle just seems to get in the way of everything

[traveler]

Yeah, I hear ya on the spinners...although i do like to fight fish best on them. Can't beat a flyrod for all day drifting though. I've used a baitcaster as well, I guess I had all 3 along last trip.

Are you still hitting the river? Sounds like they pulled pretty much all the netters in hopes of making the king escapement...hope it works out. Still, theres a lot of talk about the unfairness of how the reds were allocated, and talk of forming some sort of coailtion to promote dippers/sportfishers rights at the BOF meetings this winter. It'll be interesting to see if it happens.

[fivebucks]

Sorry I did not call you Live4chrome - just always seemed to be busy fishing with the guys I went up with or visiting friends down from Eagle River and spending a few days in Seward. Fishing was slow for us and I seemed to be snake-bit most of the time. I was second guessing my fishing skills every step of the way. I used to be very good at flossing these Reds but this trip beat me up pretty bad. It is frustrating when the guys on either side of you catch a couple and you get none. I managed to get some fish but not like I should have. It was still a great trip though - heck I was in Alaska. I fished one day on the Russian, one day at Bings and the rest on the lower river (minus a couple of days in Seward). The amount of new fish hitting the river was dreadful. Too bad the nets closed off the mouth for 4 days prior to me getting there but not much a guy can do. If I had been smart I would have hit the Russian right away as the big push of fish had just made it there. Of course I did not know that but I should have tried it out. Guess I gotta go back next year to redeem myself

[traveler]

hey fivebucks; yeah, I knew you were getting there just after the big push, too bad it didn't continue. I did expect you'd be slaying 'em up at the Russian, but it sure can be tough to know where to be when, even with all the info on the web now. Glad you had a good time anyway...like you say, still in Alaska!

I'm booking today for next June...

[live4chrome]

Heard the. Fish are pretty nasty up there already. Is that normal on the Russian this time of year.

[traveler]

reading the AK forums pretty steadily this year, It seemed like a lot of people expected the "big push" to get to the russian sooner than it did, which would have resulted in fresher fish. Seems like they hung up in skilak lake longer than usual maybe.

When I've fished 2nd run reds at the russian in July it's always been a mixed bag...you had to pick your way thru a lot of "turned" fish to get a limit of nice ones, but we always managed to do that without much problem. But those years it was a steadier stream of fish moving upstream each day, not a big crazy push over a short time, followed by pretty slow days, which is pretty much what happened this year it seems.

[fivebucks]

I took one from the Russian on my way to Seward and it was not a bright chrome fish. We did not notice any taste difference on the grill that night. Now I gotta talk the wife into letting me go up 4 years in a row

[traveler]

we already have an RV booked for next June 7-16. GAH is running a full 50% off off deal right now, couldn't pass it up:)