Fishing question about Long lining -- Alaska

I edited your title so that Alaska folks can maybe help.

You might amplify what you mean by long-lining. In the Gulf of Mexico, it's commonly a 200-mile loop for swordfish, with baits down at 600 to 1,000 feet.

Basically, the effort and cost of long lining makes it strictly a commercial endeavor. You need a boat, fuel, gear, bait, etc. And need people to drive the boat, rig the gear, and gut the fish. ...and you have to be fishing in the right place.

A freezer full of fish can be bought for less than it would cost to get all these elements in place.

Art, are you sure about Swordfish in the Gulf? All the ones i encountered on the Grand Banks didn't like water near as warm as the water down there....

I just know you will need a Really Big reel to wind it all up and go home.

rc

Art's not wrong... long-lining in the Gulf is expensive... it's a fishing trip a guy can afford every couple years if his buddies all chip in and go with. If you OWN your boat (long-range diesel), you could do it... otherwise, the rest of us have to save our pennies for those blue-water fishing expeds. FWIW, if i could afford that, i'd have more guns instead.

ETA: Sport fishing magazines write articles about this every other month... it's bread-and-butter for fish writers like custom 1911s are for gun writers. check out your local wally world magazine rack.

I'd just pop a moose or so every year.. that might "sustain" a couple souls or so.

I'm out of date on a lot of GOM stuff. It was part of my job-deal from 1975-1979, and I haven't really kept up since then, other than casually and sporadically.

The Japanese long-liners worked from off Key West and made a clockwise loop generally toward the west. The baits had those luminescent glow-lights attached.

Most sport fishing off the Texas coast in the GOM is to go out to a rig or to the blue-water line. Ling, king, shark, small tuna, amberjack, mainly. There are snapper banks out from Port Aransas, maybe 30 miles.

In general, an offshore oil rig creates an acre of habitat per 100 feet of water depth. An entire food chain develops, which is why fishing around a rig is such a common practice. Same for the sunken Liberty Ships we put down in 1979 as artificial reefs.

The type of fishing you are asking about for subsistence/personal use isn't longlining. It also depends on the type/species of fish you are after as to the type of gear you use. What you are asking about is known as a skate.

Subsistence caught ground/bottom fish such as halibut, cod, flounder etc are caught on a skate basically made from longline gear.

My halibut skate is made from a length of commercial longline with a loop and shackle on the end for the base anchor. I measured off approximately 25 fathoms of line and tied a second loop for a shackle and anchor. The length of line between the two anchors is what is known as the ground line.

To the groundline I attach stainless wire safety pin looking clips (commercial halibut&cod gangions) that have 24" leaders with pre-baited, self-setting circle hooks tied to them. They are set about 2 1/2 feet apart so they won't tangle in the current while on the bottom.

From the second anchor to the end of the line measures about 30 fathoms and a marker bouy with my NOAA issued Subsistence Halibut Registration Card (SHARC) number is attached to it.

Anchors are made from 3# cement filled coffee cans that have about four links of heavy galvanized chain in it for hooking to the shackles. All the gear is stored in a commercial longline tub for deployment.

The way it works, is we attach the first anchor and as we feed line over the side of the boat we clip the pre-baited gangions on, then attach the second anchor and feed it over. When the second anchor hits bottom, we power up the boat and drag the anchor a few yards to make sure the groundline is streched out and the whole mess lying across the tidal current and the remaining line with the bouy attached is pitched overboard.

We come back and check it after a few hours and hopefully it'll be loaded with halibut, rather than cod, sculpins, irish lords or bullheads. My fishing spot is only about 5 minutes out of the harbor in the cove.

For salmon, you'll need a set net and either fish along a beach or a freshwater river or creek during the runs.

A bud with a commercial fishing boat will do too.

Gear can be picked up from the commercial fishing suppliers and there are quite a few commercial fishermen you can scavenge gear from. I got mine from a pile that had been discarded.

I couple of things. As a Fairbanks boy I do not like, nor do I recommend anywhere along the coast of AK as a place to live. It's wet, windy, damp and makes my bones hurt. I prefer the woods and rivers of the dry interior, particularly the Yukon and Tanana River Valleys, to anywhere along the coast.

Furthermore, you'll need to buy or have access to a boat or skiff to be able to engage in this method of fishing. There is a rather large initial investment when getting started into this lifestyle and the best way to learn is participation with the local folks who've been doing it for the last 30,000 years or so.