Big turnout for reopening of Marine Area 9

Published 1:30 am Wednesday, February 22, 2017

The sportfishing fleet was out in force Saturday to greet the reopening of Marine Area 9 to chinook, according to All Star Charters owner/skipper Gary Krein of Everett.

“There must have been 200 boats or more on Possession Bar alone,” he said, “and the Everett ramp parking lot was three-quarters full.”

Saturday was the first weekend day after the reopening on Thursday, and fishing was good. Krein said he didn’t talk to the state Department of Fish and Wildlife creel checker at the ramp, but radio chatter indicated a harvest of maybe 60 fish. Most were just-legals of 5 or 6 pounds, but Krein said there was a scattering of 10-pounders in the take.

“It started off, the first three or four days, like a house afire,” he said. “By early this week it had slowed some, but there are still fish around.”

Possession Bar and Double Bluff were top producers over the weekend, along with Point No Point, Krein said. He said he likes the southwest corner of Possession Bar, right on the bottom in 120 to 150 feet of water, and the hot bite was on the morning tide change to about an hour after that.

The hot setup was a green Gibbs flasher and a 31⁄2-inch Kingfisher spoon in cookies ‘n cream or herring aid patterns.

Good news, Krein said, was the small number of shakers fishermen found on the bar. Fewer sublegal fish means fewer “encounters” against the sport quota, and perhaps a longer season. There weren’t many seals or sea lions around, either, he said, but neither was there much bait.

Smelt fishery approved

The state has approved a limited — very limited, actually — sport dip net fishery for smelt on the Cowlitz River. The fishery runs from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m., Saturday only. The open section of river runs upstream from the Highway 432 bridge in Kelso to the Highway 411 bridge in Castle Rock.

The limit is 10 pounds of smelt per person — roughly one-quarter of a 5-gallon bucket. No license is required to dip smelt — more accurately eulachon, or in the vernacular, “hooligans.” Some folks find eulachon inferior on the table to surf smelt, others don’t.

This will be the fourth year the state has allowed smelt fishing since 2010, when the fish was listed as threatened along the Pacific coast under the federal Endangered Species Act. The feds agreed to limited fisheries as a research tool, said Cindy Le Fleur, the state’s regional fish manager.

“We’re expecting a modest return of about 3 million pounds of smelt to the Columbia,” Le Fleur said. “Compared to an estimated 16.6 million pounds in 2014, when the run reached a peak.”

The sport dip net fishery was limited to one day last year, when the run was estimated at 5.1 million pounds.

Le Fleur said the state announced the decision to open this year’s sport fishery after tracking catch rates in the ongoing commercial test fishery in the mainstem Columbia. Managers were looking for the weekly average landings to reach at least 150 pounds per fisher to feel confident the run was as large as anticipated. Last week’s landings averaged 281 pounds per fisher, Le Fleur said.

Springers

Joe Hymer, state biologist in Vancouver, said the Columbia remains high and dirty, along with major tributaries, discouraging spring chinook fishing, which is probably too early anyway. Only one springer has been counted over Bonneville Dam, and Hymer said, “with all the rain we’ve been having, springer fishing on the Columbia may be delayed well into March, and the lower Cowlitz might be a better bet for those who can’t wait to get started. It gets an early shot of chinook and is usually clean enough to fish.”

Razor clams

State shellfish managers have announced a schedule of proposed razor clam digs through April, including the ongoing dig today through Feb. 28. The schedule for the current dig is as follows: today, plus 0.3 feet, 4:42 p.m. at Twin Harbors beaches; Friday, minus 0.1 feet, 5:21 p.m. at Copalis, Mocrocks, Twin Harbors; Saturday, minus 0.3 feet, 5:58 p.m. at Copalis, Mocrocks, Twin Harbors; Sunday, minus 0.4 feet, 6:34 p.m. at Copalis, Mocrocks, Twin Harbors; Monday, plus 0.3 feet, 7:11 p.m. at Twin Harbors; and Tuesday, 0.0 feet, 7:48 p.m. at Twin Harbors.

Dan Ayres, coastal shellfish manager for the state, said Twin Harbors should be good (except for its south end) for a mix of larger and smaller clams. Other good choices include Copalis and the south end of Mocrocks.

If weather and surf are good, Ayres said he expects mostly limit digging on these beaches.

Hanford Reach kings

The state forecast for “upriver bright” fall chinook heading for Hanford Reach above the Tri-Cities is not a happy one. The run is expected to be the lowest since 2009 — about two-thirds of last year’s actual return, and less than half of the recent five-year average. The record for that run is the 795,700 adult upriver brights that returned in 2015.

Spring is coming

A certain harbinger of spring, along with the birds chirping and the frogs croaking, is the appearance of info on the annual kids free fishing day at Lake Tye in Monroe, sponsored by the Sky Valley Chapter of Trout Unlimited. If you have a trout fishing youngster, mark your calendar for 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. on April 23.

Event organizer Gary Bee said the club, with support from the City of Monroe and local area businesses and sportfishing clubs, is buying $6,000 worth of rainbow trout, so there should be plenty for all.

Nice walleye

Not a state record, but a good walleye anyway was the 10.6 pound-pound fish caught by Bill McNeil of Tacoma two weeks ago in Soda Lake, below Potholes Reservoir in the “seep lakes” area.

Wolf effect

Deer and elk hunters who feel wolves are bad news, may or may not come up with discussion points when a new study on the subject is finished.

The state and the University of Washington have begun a study of how eight years of growth in the state’s wolf population is affecting other wildlife species. Unfortunately, it’s expected the research will take at least five years.

It will assess the health of deer and elk herds in northeast Washington, where most of the 19 packs and 90-plus individual wolves are found. Those numbers, from June of 2016, are the result of the introduction of one pack of five animals in 2008.

“The experience in other western states shows that wolves and other predators may affect the size and behavior of deer and elk herds,” said Eric Gardner, head of the state’s Wildlife Program.