The chums-only salmon fishery in Marine Area 10, originally scheduled to run through Jan. 31, will instead close at the end of this month. Area 10 encompasses the Seattle-Bremerton area.
The move was made “to protect any wild chinook that anglers may inadvertently hook,” according to Ryan Lothrop, Puget Sound recreational fishery manager for the state Department of Fish and Wildlife.
The chums-only fishery in Marine Area 9 will close Monday, for the same reason.
“We had hoped to open Area 9 (Admiralty Inlet) for a brief fishery around Thanksgiving for hatchery chinook,” Lothrop said. “However, we continue to see a large number of juvenile chinook, which are too small to keep under state rules.”
Although rules for the fishery would require anglers to release all wild chinook, not all of those fish survive the encounters.
“We believe we’ll be able to keep Marine Area 9 open longer (Jan. 16 through April 15 as presently scheduled) for winter chinook fishing if we wait to open until January,” Lothrop said.
Meanwhile, Marine Areas 8-1 and 8-2 (Deception Pass to Possession Point) remain open for a limited hatchery chinook fishery, which has been a little better than many anglers thought.
“Surprising,” Gary Krein, owner/skipper of All Star Charters in Everett, said of the fishery. “We fished Thursday through Monday and boated seven keepers. Granted, that’s not great fishing, but it’s certainly better than nothing.”
Krein was trolling 4-inch, green/white spoons behind Gibbs moonglow flashers. He was working over the top of dirty water from local rivers, but said the conditions should be cleared by the end of this week.
Krein has been finding fish on the “racetrack” between the north end of Hat Island and Camano Head; off the south end of Hat; and at Columbia Beach. He said shakers (sublegal chinook) are still a problem, but much improved over earlier in the fishery, and that some of the fish are very close to legal length.
State creel checks Saturday at the Camano State Park ramp showed 26 anglers with three chinook. At the Hoodsport beach fishery, 25 fishermen had 41 chums.
Steelhead
A scattering of winter steelhead was taken over the weekend at the Reiter Ponds area of the upper Skykomish, said Mike Chamberlain at Ted’s Sports Center in Lynnwood. A majority of the fishermen used float/jig rigs. The “nightmare” jigs — white head, red body and black tail — are a popular color combination, Chamberlain said, along with a range of whites, pinks and oranges.
“The float and jig setup has a lot of advantages over standard bottom-bumping, especially for beginners,” Chamberlain said. “It provides a visual strike indicator, so you don’t have to learn to react to a soft steelhead ‘take,’ you’re not losing as much tackle, and you’re not getting hung up and missing fishing time.”
Winter steelhead are showing in fair numbers on the Forks-area rivers, where the Bogachiel is almost always the best early producer. Bob Gooding at Olympic Sporting Goods in Forks said the Bogy has been borderline from a big slide above the hatchery, but fishable.
State creel checks for the first week in December last winter on the Bogachiel showed 98 bank and 86 boat fishermen with 70 hatchery steelhead. On the Calawah, it was 58 bank anglers with 32 fish. The Sol Duc didn’t come on until the first week in January, and the Hoh didn’t pick up until February, and then mostly for catch and release on wild fish.
In a move to protect a weak run of wild coho, the state closed the Hoh to all fishing until Dec. 1.
Trout
Gissberg Ponds, adjacent to the west side I-5 at Smokey Point, are putting out some pretty good rainbow fishing as a result of recent plants by the state, with the fish running 12 to 14 inches. Small inflatables are a good way to fish the ponds, trolling woolly bugger flies in black, brown or purple, on monofilament and a split shot. Shore fishermen generally stick to Power Bait, on 30 inches of leader and a slip sinker.
The north pond (juveniles only) received plants totaling 1,500 trout between Oct. 26 and Nov. 13. The south pond got 3,000 fish during the same time period.
Other good bets in the area include Lake Goodwin, where a substantial percentage of holdover rainbows in the 14- to 16-inch range are on tap, and Lake Ballinger.
Quality hunt problems
Reb Broker, president of the Northwest Chapter of the Washington Waterfowl Association, said the quality hunt program on the Skagit delta and other areas in Western Washington is being abused and the state needs help dealing with the situation.
The problem, Broker said, is that a few hunters are camping at, or occupying early, some of the hunt sites and denying others the chance to use the sites. Rules say the sites are not open until 4 a.m., period, and Broker said anyone coming across a site obviously occupied by someone camping out and holding it illegally should take a picture of the rig and its license plate, with the quality hunt sign in the background. Then e-mail it to jeff.lee@dfw.wa.gov, including details about the site and the vehicle.
For more outdoor news, read Wayne Kruse’s blog at www.heraldnet.com/huntingandfishing.
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