Fish Sniffer On Demand Digital Edition 3805 Feb 15- Mar 1 | Page 26

24 SALTWATER Feb 15 - Mar 1, 2019 Crazy for Clickers C lick ... clickclick ... CLICKCLICK- CLICKCLICKCLICK! There are few sounds in fishing that can pump more adrenalin into your body than that of a clicker going off. Whether it be from a striper picking up your soaking bullhead, a salmon ripping into your rigged anchovie, or a yellowfin tuna slamming your Tuna Clone, the creaming sound of a clicker can wake you from whatever slumber you are into heavily. Having a primarily salt water fishing background, I guess it was just natural for me to figure that every conventional reel simply had to have a clicker. In fact, it would be darn near impossible to find a reel without a clicker. So when I started going into freshwater fishing, I was intrigued that few baitcasting reels had anything resembling a clicker. Maybe the manufacturers figured since most of freshwater baitcasting reels are made for throwing lures at black bass (why are they called black bass when they are mostly green?) and lure fishermen have no use for a clicker, it would be superfluous to have a part that would never be used. Of the reels that did have a clicker, by and large they were the biggest of a series of reels, such as the Ambassadeur 6000 series of reels by ABU-Garcia. This problem was high- lighted to me when years ago, a good friend and kokanee fishing enthusiast came to me bewailing the fact that there wasn’t a clicker on his beloved Ambassadeur 4600. That little reel had everything he wanted in a “koke” reel, the right size, the right weight, the right capacity, quality construction, smooth drag, everything but a clicker. I reached for an Ambassadeur repair manual and figured from the diagrams that it might be possible to fit the side plate of a 6600 with its built in clicker onto his 4600. We ordered the complete side plate assembly and waited for its arrival. When the side plate arrived, I found that a little deft Dremel work was needed to make it fit, but fit it did! That little reel casted, retrieved, and clicked like nobody’s business. It worked so well that we ordered a second side plate to modify another reel for him. The running joke was, as he was fishing with all his kokanee fishing buddies, the reel worked so well that they all wanted the same reel, and when asked where VOL.38 • ISS. 5 FISH SNIFFER COUNTRY by Steve “Hippo”Lau he got it, made some vague reference to getting it over the mail (which he did!). I suppose the joke quit being a joke when two years later, ABU-Garcia put out, you guessed it, their own version of a 4600 “Kokanee Special”! Clickers may seem to be a small detail, but like everything else, the devil is in the details. Next time around, I’ll go over some tricks to improve your use of clickers. SALTWATER REPORTS BODEGA BAY BERKELEY Crabs, Surfperch Lead Sonoma Coast Catches Sturgeon & Perch Active, Charter Boats Remain Shut Down For Winter BODEGA BAY – The weather continues to have a say along the Sonoma BERKELEY- The East Bay charter boat season is pretty much in hibernation, with boats off line for maintenance after a robust 2018 season! They will be polished and ready for action when the halibut and salmon seasons kick off this spring. In the south bay, herring activity is prompting some sturgeon success for private boaters. The best action is taking place in the extreme south end of the bay, but fish have been caught along the channels off Alameda and San Leandro too. Top baits at this time are ghost shrimp, herring fillets and eel. Surfperch anglers are starting to see increasing numbers of shiner perch moving into the bay. Pile worms, ghost shrimp and white prawns are the favored baits for anglers fishing from Both stripers and sturgeon are on the bite for anglers fishing San Pablo Bay. This striper was caught during a late January the bank. outing aboard the Happy Hooker. Photo courtesy of HAPPY HOOKER SPORTFISHING, Martinez. Get Your Fish On! With The Bay Area’s Premier Sportfishing Family… Halibut Explore S.F. Bay & Golden Gate Coastal Waters With Stripers Captains Chris And Jonathan Smith Lingcod Salmon Sharks & More Charters & Open Loads Available Departing Daily From The Berkeley Marina Happy Hooker (510) 223-5388 Pacific Dream 3805 (510) 993-4414 Follow Us On Facebook Building On The Legacy of Capt. Jim Smith! Two Boats To Turn Your Fishing Dreams Into Reality! PACIFIC DREAM Captain Chris Smith’s 58’ Pacific Dream Captain Jonathan Smith’s 56’ Happy Hooker coastline during the long three months between the end of the rockfish season and the opening of the 2019 rockfish season along with salmon season. The weather won again over the first weekend in February, keeping boats tied up to the docks. However, when the conditions are right, limits of Dungeness crab are the rule out of Bodega Bay. Mike Aughney of USAFishing. com said, “The weather was drop dead gorgeous over during the last weekend in January, and Captain Rick Powers of the New Sea Angler made a short crab trip with 13 clients. It took them about an hour to pull through enough gear to send everyone home with limits of big crabs. For those of you who hate waking up in the middle of the night to go fishing.... these trips leave at 10:00 a.m. and return around noon. On the private boater front, a few are picking up limits working pots and hoop gear in the far Outer Bay and around Salmon Creek. Much of the commercial gear has been pulled, and you will do best with a day or Captain Steve Smith of Captain Steve’s Fishing Lodge in Alaska hit San Pablo Bay during a recent visit to two of soak time.” California. He landed and released this sturgeon while Powers is running crab-only fishing aboard the Happy Hooker. trips until the next openers, and Photo courtesy of HAPPY HOOKER SPORTFISHING, he is open to adding sanddabs Martinez. to the mix if there are enough interested fishermen. a few in the holes near the rocks with For surf perch, Willie Vogler of Lawson’s Berkley Sand Worms.” Landing at Dillon Beach said, “The perch = Dave Hurley are here, not big ones, but there are quite