One feature of this fishery is that because we are in pursuit of actively feeding fish, the trolling speed is generally faster than during the summer, enabling the angler to cover more territory. The hunt for feeder Chinook can be framed as “the what and the where”-what they are eating or expect to be eating, and where their food source is or is expected to be.
This also means that the average size of the Chinook salmon encountered in the winter are smaller than in the summer, although anglers should always be prepared to deal with the occasional larger-than-usual fish. One important aspect of this seasonal fishery is that the target fish are almost all immature, the search for food dictating their movements rather than migration towards their home rivers driven by the onset of maturity. While all the usual techniques employed in the summer Chinook fishery will work in the winter, often there are small differences in both tactics and locations that can increase success between November and April. Thanks to the multi-year coastal rearing life history of many Chinook stocks, productive fishing for them can be had right through the winter months. Of course, this opportunity only applies to Chinook salmon, as the other species are either still way out in the open ocean or too small to be legal quarry outside the traditional summer season. One of the great features of salmon fishing on the BC coast is that anglers fish for them 365 days a year, subject to local time and area restrictions.
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