Sports

<< Previous   of   Next >>   ADVERTISEMENT   CONTACT THE HERALD Report scores and results to 425-339-3470 or 1-866-6-SCORES (Call after 4:30 p.m.) E-mail information including items for Tuesday's Communities Sports Roundup and Thursday's Outdoor Calendar, to sports@heraldnet.com Kevin Brown, Sports Editor kbrown@heraldnet.com   Published: Thursday, May 15, 2008 Derby to benefit Goforth By Wayne Kruse, Herald Writer As far as your 'umble correspondent can remember, we've never had a sturgeon derby around here. Salmon, yes; bass, yes; trout, yes; walleye and tiger muskies, but not sturgeon. That's about to change, with the announcement of a benefit tourney being put together for June 21 by a group of local firefighters. The event is one of a series of fundraisers for Steve Goforth, Everett resident and a firefighter/paramedic in Stanwood, who has been diagnosed with congestive heart failure and placed on the heart transplant list. With a tough road ahead and mounting medical expenses, the Goforth family and fellow firefighters are hoping for help from the community. So not only is the First Ever Firefighters Sturgeon Derby a good cause, it should be a lot of fun as well. First place is worth a cool $1,000 from BMC West, not shabby for an initial outing, and it will include a free barbecue and silent auction on the beach at Priest Point. Second place will win a Brutus Ace Line Hauler, and third, $300 from Dwayne Lane's auto dealerships. Other prizes include tackle, guided fishing trips, and a lot more. Entry fee is $30, to be submitted with a completed registration form to a derby assistant, the morning of the event, starting at 8 a.m., at the Marysville, Langus Park, or Port of Everett launch ramps, or derby headquarters. The headquarters, and site of the weigh-in (4:30-5:00 p.m.), auction and barbecue, is the home of organizer and Lake Stevens firefighter Pat Cook, at 2 Priest Point Drive N.E. Boaters may anchor just offshore, pull up on the beach, or park at designated, signed areas in the vicinity of Cook's residence. Open water for the derby will be the lower Snohomish River and its sloughs. Keeping sturgeon is illegal above the Highway 2 bridge (Hewitt Trestle); limit is one fish per day between 42 and 60 inches; and only white sturgeon are legal (green sturgeon must be released). The derby Web site -- www.firefightersheart.org -- is not yet complete, but should be available early next week, Cook said. It will contain registration forms, full details, rules, and tips on how to rig for sturgeon using sand shrimp, a favorite bait. Contacts are pcook@lsfire.org, or jbilow@ci.marysville.wa.us. Cook prefers to deal over the Internet, but in a pinch you can call him at 425-308-3642. Cook said the best time to fish sturgeon on the lower Snohomish is on an outgoing tide and low slack, until the incoming tide really gets rolling. The low on derby day, he said is a minus 1.8-foot tide at 1:15 p.m., which means prime time will be from roughly 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Lots of good stuff coming up in the near future for outdoor enthusiasts here, including this: A fishing seminar of note: The new Bayside Marine and Tackle store, just south of the Port of Everett launch on 14th Street, will be the place to be this evening, as owners Jeff LaLone and Dan Hatch present their first Summer Salmon Seminar and Crab Clinic. Remember the crowds John Martinis Jr. of John's Sporting Goods once drew to his annual summer salmon clinics over by the freeway in Everett? This one is designed to be a similar event, starting at 5 p.m., with refreshments, tackle giveaways, door prizes, raffles, and more. The seminar is free, but registration is required and space is limited, so call first, 425-252-3088. TJ Nelson will talk about downriggers and downrigger fishing; outdoor talk show host Joel Shangle will discuss summer fishing opportunities on Puget Sound; Bill Herzog will give the inside scoop on herring rigging; and All Star Charters owner Gary Krein will present the basics of fishing local marine areas. All this plus the opportunity to check out the new store. Another derby: Don't forget the 8th running of the big Port Angeles Halibut Derby over the May 24-25 weekend, awarding $5,000 in first-place money and over $20,000 in total prizes. Thirtieth place is the last cash fish, earning $135, but there are a lot of merchandise prizes as well. The derby drew 786 entrants last year and was basically a one-day event, as Sunday got blown away, so the top fish weren't quite as large as usual. First place was a 78-pounder, second a 77-pounder, and third, a 67-pounder. Order tickets online at www.swainsinc.com; call Swains at 360-452-2357; call the Port Angeles Chamber of Commerce at 360-452-2363; or go to the Web site of the sponsoring group, www.portangelessalmonclub.com. Still another derby: Combine a low-key fishing derby with a great day on the beach during the annual Westport Perch Derby, scheduled this year for May 31, sunup to the 4 p.m. weigh-in. Bring the kids, the dog, a picnic lunch, and try to catch a few redtail surf perch. Sponsor Jim Jackson of Angler Charters in Westport said he expects 120-plus entrants this time around, and his prize list has been substantially expanded. Tickets are $20 each, and while the limit is 15 perch per person per day, a derby entry will consist of the heaviest five fish. There is a separate under-14 category for the kids, with guaranteed prizes for all. Visit Jackson's Web site, www.anglercharters.net, for full rules and a good rundown on how to fish surf perch, or call 1-800-422-0425. It's a cheap day's entertainment, he said. The Icicle, the Yakima, and Ringold: A smaller-than-anticipated run of spring chinook up the Columbia (why aren't we surprised) has resulted in the early closure of upriver springer fisheries on the middle river and on the Snake. The main Columbia recreational fishery affected by the closure is at Ringold, 17 miles upriver from the Tri-Cities, a state hatchery and rearing pond complex offering good boat and bank fishing for kings and steelhead. Fisheries on Columbia tributaries are not affected, since anglers there harvest mostly hatchery fish in what amounts to a "terminal" fishery and do not impact passing, endangered, wild stocks. So the Yakima chinook season, which opened May 1, continues, as do fisheries above Bonneville Dam at Drano Lake and the mouth of the Wind River. The Icicle opens today, also as scheduled, for two chinook daily, from the deadline below the hatchery rack, downstream to a point 800 feet above its confluence with the Wenatchee at Leavenworth. Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife biologist Art Viola in the Wenatchee district office expects about 7,000 fish to return to the federal hatchery on the Icicle, and that only about 1,000 will be needed for brood stock. Most fishing is either by bank anglers just below the hatchery, or by boaters on down river. Be aware that there is little public access by foot, except at the hatchery, and that landowners along the river tend to be a little hostile to trespassing. Drano Lake and the mouth of the Wind have been inconsistent, with good days producing about one chinook for every 4 to 6 rods at Drano, and one for every 8 to 12 rods at the Wind. Razor clams: The coastal razor clam season was expected to be over by now, but WDFW shellfish biolgist Dan Ayres at Montesano said there are enough clams left to offer one more day (with health department go-ahead), May 24, on Twin Harbors, Copalis and Mocrocks beaches only. The quota on Long Beach has been reached, and Kalaloch remains closed. Low tide that morning is a minus 0.5 feet at 9:58 a.m. Ayres said the reason there are clams left in the three-beach quota is that digger turnout was lower than expected for the dig early this month. He also said that while there are good populations of large clams available, this is the time of year when small ones start showing. Some diggers are always tempted to keep only the large clams, but the law requires retention of the first 15, regardless of size, and he said enforcement will be aware of the situation. Silver Lake launch: Reader Mike Vincent wonders why there is no public boat launch on Silver Lake, and said it has been difficult for him to get information from Everett Parks and Recreation. John Petersen, assistant director for planning and maintenance at EvParks, said it's simply a matter of time and money. The parks Board of Commissioners is putting together a priority list of projects, he said, and if Silver Lake is high enough on the list, the lake's trail and boardwalk plan could be implemented there within four or five years. The plan incorporates a new launch and parking area, he said, and the preferred location, set with the help of public input, is between the old launch and the "silverdome." The old launch belonged to a private property owner south and east of the city's bathing beach/fishing pier complex. When that property was purchased by the city, some anglers and boaters assumed the old launch would be made available for public use. Petersen said that, for several reasons, that wasn't a great idea, the major problem being a lack of parking space and resulting impacts on nearby residences.

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