Les Davis Fishing Pier

[Toni]

Does any one ever fish off the Les Davis pier in Tacoma? If yes, how was the fishing for 2007? Many years ago I did very well for salmon there.

[Jake Dogfish]

Back before the Hake/Whiting collapse about 10-15 years ago, my younger cousin used to go down there and catch lots of them on hand lines.
The best part is he would arrive with NO gear. He would find pieces of line and hooks on the dock, find an old chunk of herring and drop it over the side at 2am... After he caught the first one he would tear off chunks for bait if needed. Some days he caught several.

[spokey9]

i grew up fishing that dock, the last time i was out there was about 4 years ago and spent alot of that year on it. didn't catch much but bullhead, dogfish, ratfish, and baby flounder. although i used to do well catching redrock crab during the summer off the dock close to shore by the third light pole or so

[Anonymous]

It has been about 18 years since I fished it. We used to catch tom cod, pollock, and other bottom fish at night or before the the tide was right for salmon. I like hake. We only caught a few of those but it would be one of my target fish. I looked at the regs and now there are more restrictions than there use to be but I am not surprised I would see people with buckets full of tom cod (upwards of forty) when the limits was 15. No one checked for limits at night.
I am mainly interested in salmon now. I caught a 19.5 lbs. King off that dock. My daughter was 6 months old and we had her there in a playpen. So it had to be in Sept. I caught several others between 2-6 lbs plus jacks and shakers.
Since the bottom fishing was worse I wondered about the salmon fishing? I was also wondering where to get fresh herring around there?

[spokey9]

salmon fishing used to run hot & cold depending on run sizes and time of year. i caught most of mine running a big slip bobber and a 2 oz banana weight with a cutplug of herring (fresh or frozen) when fishing kings i'd start at about 40 ft. deep and keep running a little deeper if i didn't get any hits, for silvers i never went more than 25 ft. deep. i had some success with a buzz bomb, but not much. seemed to me like the right side of the the "T" produced more fish. also when a really high tide comes up try fishing the shallows with a trout rod and for silvers that school up there from time to time chasing baitfish

[Toni]

So spokey9 are you saying that you think it might be a place to try for salmon? I have been fishing the river this past year but I was thinking I might try saltwater this year. It will cost more for the license, bait, and gas to get there so I will have to see if I can make it.
I use to filet the herring (didn't use big ones) and put it on a small hook but it had to spin just right! I think I used 1/2 to 1 oz weight-12-15 lb. line and 6 1/2 ft. pole (I still have it). Let it go to bottom and start reeling up until I found the fish but I don't know what depth they were.
My brother favored Pt. Def. dock but I had better catches off Les Davis to the left of the T. My brother caught a 7 lb. King off the dock at Pt. Def. this year. His biggest salmon ever.

[spokey9]

i've mooched like that off les davis and it worked pretty good. i caught mostly silvers cuz i usually counted down til i hit bottom so i could keep my bait away from flounders. if there's fish being caught by point d and the slag pile there's usuallly some fish coming by the dock, another good pier is dash point i've caught some nice fish there running a setup similar to that, especially around august and september when the silvers run thru. when the early king run comes through though i found a big cutplug under a bobber near the bottom the best bet for bigger kings of les davis

[Anonymous]

i grew up fishing that dock, the last time i was out there was about 4 years ago and spent alot of that year on it. didn't catch much but bullhead, dogfish, ratfish, and baby flounder. although i used to do well catching redrock crab during the summer off the dock close to shore by the third light pole or so

I can't stand ratfish. We used to catch them all the time off the Telegraph Cove, BC marina dock. They are worse than a dogfish...I'd take a nice flounder any day...lol