It didn’t quite match Ringling Brothers last summer, but it was successful enough, and enough people have been looking forward to it this year, that the adult hatchery chinook fishery on Possession Bar will almost certainly attract boats and fishermen this weekend in circus proportions.
There’s other stuff going on for the outdoor aficionado in the area, of course, but everything else pales in comparison with the increasingly rare chance to boat a big king salmon right in our own back yard.
The “mark-selective” fishery for fin-clipped chinook opened Wednesday morning and, while it was too early at the time of writing to get solid results, sketchy reports indicated an opener less than hot at Possession.
“It’s been a little slow on the bar from what I hear,” said Nick Kester of All Star Charters in Everett (425-252-4188), who elected to fish the Port Townsend area on opening morning.
At 9:30 a.m., Kester’s party had hooked four kings and landed two, and he said there were other fish being taken around his boat. He opted for Port Townsend and Midchannel Bank, he said, for three reasons. First, the water is clearer out there, with no trace of algae; second, he did very well there last year on the opener; and third, word was circulating that the run was apparently a little later this year, and so the area farther up-Strait sounded logical.
Down at Jefferson Head, working on chinook headed for south Sound rivers, Gary Krein had hooked four kings by 10 a.m., released one wild fish and kept three of hatchery origin — one about 18 pounds and two in the 12- to 14-pound range. Krein is the owner of All Star Charters and had been fishing Area 10 during an earlier catch and release season, and seeing fair numbers of chinook showing early this week. He said calls to friends fishing Possession Bar Wednesday morning elicited the same results Kester reported — no bait showing, and few chinook (at least early).
“That could have changed, however,” Krein said. “We hit all our fish during the last hour, the prime hour before the tide change, and the same thing could have happened at Possession as well. I haven’t talked to anyone there that recently.”
It could well happen that a couple of additional days will result in a fine fishery this weekend on the bar. Either way, it’s a certainty that you won’t be lonesome there. Area 9 is open for two salmon, and both coho and chinook must be clipped to retain. Area 10 is also open for two salmon, hatchery chinook only, but coho may be either wild or hatchery fish.
Krein said his hot lure Wednesday morning was a green/white Coyote spoon, fished right on bottom in 100 to 140 feet of water. Along with the hour before and the hour after the tide change, he said early morning and late afternoon can also be good, and less crowded. The system on Possession Bar this weekend, he said, might be to try to find bait somewhere in the 100 to 200-foot depth, and then change ‘rigger depths from 80 to about 250 feet until you hit fish, on the shallow end of that scale early and late in the day.
Krein likes the relatively new UV gear: Ace-Hi 5-inch UV plugs in green or blue; UV squids in green spatterback behind a flasher; Coyote or the new Sonic Edge UV spoons, 4-inch, in green or white, or a flasher and Ace-Hi UV fly.
A definite drawing point this year is that a much higher percentage of the run should be larger, four-year old chinook in the 14 or 15-pound range up to 20-plus, instead of the preponderance of 8- to 12-pound 3-year olds which showed up last summer. The fishery lasted 13 days last year in Area 9, and 10 days in Area 10, and Krein said roughly the same scenario is likely this season.
Sockeye: A recreational season for Lake Wenatchee sockeye continues to look promising, according to Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife biologist Kirk Truscott in the agency’s Wenatchee office, but until counts at Tumwater Dam reach a certain number, no one wants to chance a solid prediction.
“Sockeye just recently started passing Tumwater,” Truscott said, “and it appears that high river levels and the fact that sockeye are not the strongest of swimmers may have the bulk of the run showing up a little later than usual.”
Subtracting counts over Rocky Reach Dam on the Columbia (above the Wenatchee mouth) from those at Rock Island (below the Wenatchee) gives you a rough idea of how many sockeye may have turned up the river. As of Sunday, that number stood at about 33,000 fish, well above the rule of thumb 23,000 needed for spawning escapement plus 4,000 or 5,000 additional to provide a recreational catch (the take was about 5,500 salmon during the last recreational fishery, in 2004). About 5,000 to 6,000 fish per day were being counted over the ladders at Rock Island Dam, Truscott said, and if this best-case situation plays out, an open season on Lake Wenatchee could well be possible.
“About all I’m willing to say at this point (Monday),” Truscott said, “is that it’s looking like we may have a pretty healthy run showing up.”
Follow the numbers on the agency’s Web site at http://wdfw.wa.gov/fish/sockeye/Columbia.htm.
If this fishery does take place, it’s likely to be the only such show in town. The Lake Washington season isn’t going to happen, and the interesting possibility of a first-ever fishery on Baker Lake is also fading.
Coastal salmon: A combination of windy weather and high gas prices have apparently kept charter anglers away from the coastal salmon ports in droves. State creel check coordinator Wendy Beeghley said very low fishing pressure has been the norm the past couple of weeks at Ilwaco and Westport, even though fishing has been pretty fair.
“We’ve only had maybe four flat days total so far since the south coast opener on June 29,” Beeghley said, “and the fishing effort has been as low as I’ve ever seen it for this point in the season.”
Westport was best last week, both for effort and results, at about a fish per person. The catch was split almost exactly half and half between chinook, going 15 or 16 pounds up to 30 pounds, and coho, Beeghley said.
Action at Neah Bay was very slow, she said, at somewhere around a fish for every 5 to 10 anglers. Almost all of those salmon were chinook, however.
Washington outdoor women: The popular fall outdoor skills workshop for women, sponsored by the Washington Wildlife Federation, is now accepting registrations for the 2008 camp. Scheduled for Sept. 12-14 at Camp River Ranch in Carnation, on the Tolt River and Lake Langlois, the workshop offers a 20-choice list of four-hour classes which include fly fishing; Dutch oven, campfire and plank cooking; backpacking 101; wildlife identification; wilderness first aid; outdoor photography; basic freshwater fishing; and a lot more. The $225 fee includes room and meals, a choice of three courses, expert instructors, equipment, take-home resources and a wealth of networking opportunities.
The WOW workshop is usually a sellout, and the deadline for registration is Aug. 15, so move on it if you’re interested. For information go to www.washingtonoutdoorwomen.org; write WOW, P.O. Box 1656, Bellevue, 98009; or call 425-455-1986.
Other stuff: Enough quota is left to reopen some spot halibut seasons — July 26 in nearshore areas off LaPush and Neah Bay, and at all depths in Area 4B (Cape Flattery to the Sekiu River; and Aug. 1-2 off Ilwaco.
Good summer steelheading remains on tap in the Cowlitz, generally in the area of the trout hatchery.
The Tulalip Bubble is very slow, with checks at the Port of Everett ramp showing only one chinook and one coho for 96 boats on Saturday. One local angler beat the odds on the Fourth of July, however, when Malcolm Nelson boated a beautiful 31-pound king to thunderous applause and fireworks (well, the latter might be an exaggeration, but the jumbo chinook was for real).
The Skykomish has been in decent fishing shape and, while no one is filling the boat, chinook and summer steelhead are there. Keep pounding.
Fair to good action in the San Juans for chinook in the 12- to 18-pound range, at many of the usually productive places: Tide Point/Eagle Bluff, Point Lawrence, Obstruction Pass, Thatcher Pass, and Lopez Flats, among others. Lots of bait being reported.
Crabbing has generally been good in a lot of places, including the Whidbey and Camano shorelines in areas 8-1 and 8-2. Limits have been the rule rather than the exception in much of Marine Area 7-South, and the popular areas of Bellingham and Samish bays opened yesterday in Marine Area 7-East.
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