Bear Valley Fishing Techniques

Salmon Fishing

While fishing, your experienced guide exposes you to a variety of fishing opportunities and methods. Salmon fishing typically involves trolling using downriggers, however, lead weights or deep divers are often employed to reach fish just below the surface. We troll with herring and artificial lures- we have a full arsenal of tools and tactics. Whatever it takes to make'em bite!

Sometimes, mooching or even jigging will be the method of the day for catching salmon. Typically, we use light trolling or level wind reels coupled with long (10’6) medium weight rods or, for even more excitement, salt water fly reels.

Nothing compares to the fight of a big king salmon on fly gear and light line! Be prepared for a 30 to 45 minute battle. When fish are actively feeding on the surface, casting with light tackle can be an exciting alternative. We use only high quality light tackle to keep the SPORT in your sport fishing!

Halibut Fishing

Jigging for Halibut has proven so successful we seldom do anything else. We dont use 5 pounds of lead, a winch and a broom stick to fish like most places in Alaska. Whenever possible, we fish shallow water for these pacific monsters making the fight even more exhilarating!

When jigging, we use comparatively “light” halibut gear, but for the real “sport fishing enthusiast” we use "ultra light weight” 10-20 lb class bait casting and spinning gear. Our guides do thier best to stay on the "cutting" edge of angling techniques. Our favorite method for bottom fishing incorporates the use of high quality metal butterfly and knife jigs, coupled with highly responsive light weight jigging rods and no stretch micro fiber lines. Using this system will give you the “fight of your life”, even with 20 to 30 lb fish. Occasionally we land fish in excess of 100 lbs on these light rigs. A - line class world record- fishing experience!

Imagine landing a Halibut like Ron Jone's 195 pounder on Ultra-light tackle! What a fight!

Lingcod and Rockfish

If you’re after more action and sport, fishing for rockfish and lingcod can be some of best ever. Jigging, casting or even fly fishing for these sporty fish is fast and fun. Often times we hook a big halibut using ultra-light spinning or casting gear while targeting rockfish.

Wow! What a fight!