Sometimes in this biz, you get to wondering if there’s anybody out there. Or maybe not so much if there’s anybody out there, but if there are enough folks in the area interested in the traditional outdoor sports these days to warrant the effort.
Sometimes it gets discouraging.
Then you see John Martinis fill 400 chairs Friday evening for a coho fishing seminar prior to the Everett Derby, and leave another 100 standing around the edges. You see the ticket sales for the derby and know that Saturday morning there were somewhere between 1,600 and 2,000 folks out there in boats, on the briny, spending considerable effort and not a little money to chase silver salmon.
Those numbers, as Martinis said to me, are significant. Particularly from a metro area the size of Everett.
So a big hats off to the folks from the Snohomish Sportsmen’s Club and the Everett Steelhead and Salmon Club, and a lot of others, who ran a great event. They proved once again that sportfishing is still an important and very integral part of the Northwest lifestyle.
So it’s too bad that, as they say, the fishing was excellent but the catching was lousy.
“We thought we did a good job with those factors over which we had some control,” said derby coordinator Mark Spada of Snohomish. “Obviously, we could have used a few more cooperative coho.”
The economy, an unexciting weather forecast, and poor results from the Edmonds derby the weekend before, conspired to hold ticket sales (about 1,600) a little below previous years, Spada said. But the total of 225 fish weighed by adult anglers was the lowest in seven years, under the previous futility record of 356 coho in 2008 and shamefully below the 1,167 silvers weighed for the 2007 event. This year’s winning fish, at 15.68 pounds, was also the smallest winner of the past seven years, even though the average weight of all coho weighed in was right in the middle of the pack.
The heartbreaker, though, was the disparity between the number of youth tickets given away, 270, and the number of youth coho weighed in for prizes, only 13.
“That was really disappointing to us,” Spada said.
Kids’ Division winner was Sean McCauley at 12.16 pounds; second was Jarett Waldemer at 9.10 pounds; and third, Floyd Clark at 6.83 pounds.
The winner of the $3,000 check for top adult division fish was Randy Warren, who reportedly trolled a Silver Horde spoon down in Area 10, not far north of the Shilshole Marina in Seattle.Some of the better coho checks by WDFW personnel over the weekend came from the Shilshole ramp.
Second place and $2,000 went to Doug Smith at 15.61 pounds, for a coho taken in the Skykomish River, and the only river-caught fish in the top 13. Third, at 15.18 pounds went to Michael Blankenship, and fourth, at 15.04 pounds went to Charles Blankenship.
Nate Perkl was the winner of the 10 hp Suzuki outboard, and Mike Hillman won the 15-foot boat with 50 hp Mercury and EZ Loader trailer.
The drawing for the fifty-grand, 20-foot StabiCraft, came up roses for Gary Curtis, whose winning derby stub was purchased for the Edmonds event, the previous week. Curtis was not present, because (a friend said) he was fishing in Canada.
Spada said the majority of the derby fish came from Marine Area 9, and that all the rivers eligible for the event were eminently fishable on Saturday, but showing some color by Sunday.
Scott McCauley, production manager for ZF Marine Electronics in Mukilteo, chauffeured his family to a great showing in the derby, hooking a double Saturday morning in a nice rip off Scatchet Head. Son Sean played one fish and wife Sheila the other, and Scott netted cookie-cutter 12-pounders after a chaotic “full-fledged fire drill,” in his words.
Sean’s fish took first in the youth division, to repeat his win in the 2009 derby, while Sheila’s nailed the $500 prize for top fish by a woman angler.
Scott McCauley said they were fishing about halfway to the yellow buoy, over 400 feet of water with 50 feet of cable out.
Hanford Reach
The Columbia “upriver bright” fall chinook fishery on the Hanford Reach, above the Tri-Cities, is off to a strong start, according to WDFW biologist Joe Hymer in Vancouver. Agency personnel contacted 347 boats with 807 anglers last week, counting 322 chinook, 1 coho and 17 steelhead. The White Bluffs and Vernita ramps showed the highest catch rates, but the Ringold area was productive as well. Both catch and effort are up from last year, Hymer said, with only 183 kings boated during the same week in 2009.
New derby
A new salmon derby, pointed toward highliners, is on tap for Dec. 3-4, out of Friday Harbor on San Juan Island. The winter blackmouth derby is sponsored by the San Juan Islands Chapter, Puget Sound Anglers, and will be on the list of derbies comprising the Northwest Marine Trade Association’s Northwest Salmon Dereby Series. Participants will thus be eligible for the mega-bucks boat drawing at the end of the 2011 season.
The event is limited to 100 teams of up to four anglers each, and will pay a first-place prize of $10,000; second place, $2,500; and third, $1,000. Entry fee is $400 per team. All proceeds, according to coordinator Bobby Wilson, go to salmon enhancement projects.
“I envision a serious winter derby for serious salmon anglers — an event similar to the old Rosario Derby,” said club president Jimmy Lawson.
Tickets for the Resurrection Derby will go on sale in late September.For more information go to www.resurrectionderby.com.
RAZOR CLAM DIG
The first razor clam dig of the season is tentatively scheduled to begin early next month on five ocean beaches, with additional digs planned through the New Year’s Holiday weekend. All digs depend on results of marine toxin tests and approval by state health authorities.
State Fish and Wildlife Department clam manager Dan Ayres said clam numbers should again be very good, but that there will be a higher percentage of smaller clams in the 3-inch range this winter.
For the first opening, Twin Harbors is scheduled for four days of digging, Oct. 7-10, with additional opportunity planned Oct. 8-9 at Long Beach, Copalis, Mocrocks and Kalaloch.
Tides are as follows: Oct. 7, minus 1.0 feet at 6:55 p.m.; Oct. 8, minus 1.4 feet at 7:42 p.m.; Oct. 9, minus 1.5 feet at 8:28 p.m.; and Oct. 10, minus 1.3 feet at 9:15 p.m.
Ayres also warned diggers heading to Copalis and Mocrocks of a traffic revision on eastbound U.S. 101 in Hoquiam due to emergency work on the Simpson Avenue Bridge — the only route to those beaches.
Baker Lake sockeye closed
The first-ever, and very successful, Baker Lake sockeye fishery closed Sunday, since most of the fish have now migrated through the fishing area.
Important commission meeting
The nine-member citizen Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission will meet Oct. 1-2 in Olympia, to deal with two matters of importance: new dungeness crab management guidelines, and possible restrictions on lead fishing weights in 13 state lakes home to breeding populations of loons.
The commission will likely adopt one of three crab management options which, sport crabbers hope, increase the percentage of Puget Sound crab allowed recreation crabbers. All three options are consistent with findings by the state Auditor’s Office earlier this year that the current policy for allocating the catch between non-tribal commercials and recreation crabbers will not accommodate the continuing growth in the number of Puget Sound sport crabbers.
New lead sinker regulations may be in the future for lakes home to depressed populations of loons, to prevent lead poisoning of a troubled species. The lakes under consideration include 10 in the northeast corner of the state, Calligan and Hancock in King County, and Hozomeen in Whatcom County.
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