ReelNorthwestAnglers.Com

This is almost unbelievable 6 salmon a day in select Washington tribs!!!! Make sure to read this carefully and fully understand the regs fellas…. ONLY TWO OF THE SIX CAN BE CHINOOK.  Here is the good news and you know where you will find me on the birthday Aug 1st. if I’m not chasing Tuna on the ocean…

WDFW NEWS RELEASE
Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife
600 Capitol Way North, Olympia, WA 98501-1091
http://wdfw.wa.gov/
July 27, 2009
Contact: Pat Frazier, (360) 906-6711

VANCOUVER, Wash. – Anglers planning to fish for salmon on any of the eight tributaries that flow into the Columbia River below Bonneville Dam can expect good fishing for hatchery coho.
Starting Aug. 1, when fall salmon fishing opens in the Columbia River Basin, anglers fishing those rivers will be allowed to catch and keep up to six adult salmon per day, provided that at least four of them are hatchery-reared coho. No wild coho may be retained.
The six-fish daily limit – up from two salmon in recent years – may also include up to two chinook salmon, subject to rules in effect on each river.
The increased daily limit was prompted largely by a projected return of 700,000 coho salmon to the Columbia River Basin this year, said Pat Frazier, regional fish manager for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW). The impending run of coho, the majority of which were reared in hatcheries, promises to be the largest since 2001.
“The main reason for producing salmon in hatcheries is to give people a chance to catch them,” Frazier said. “Beyond that, we want anglers to help remove those hatchery fish to prevent them from interfering with wild salmon on the spawning grounds.”
The six-fish limit will be in effect on the Cowlitz, Elochoman, Grays (including the West Fork), Kalama, Lewis (including the North Fork), Toutle (including the Green and North Fork) and Washougal rivers, plus the Klickitat River which spills into the Columbia above Bonneville Dam. Last year, only the Cowlitz River had a six-salmon daily limit.
The daily limit on the mainstem Columbia River, which opens for salmon fishing Aug. 1 upstream to Pasco, remains the same – two adult salmon (but only one chinook), or two steelhead, or one of each – to conserve fish listed for protection under the federal Endangered Species Act.
As in past years, anglers must release any wild coho they intercept in all waters up to the Hood River Bridge. Hatchery fish can be identified by a clipped adipose or ventral fin and a healed scar.
Similar rules will require the release of wild chinook salmon returning to a number of Columbia River tributaries, where WDFW is engaged in a multi-year effort to mass-mark all hatchery fish.
For example, anglers fishing the Elochoman and Kalama rivers will be required for the first time to release any wild chinook – adults or jacks – they intercept. In addition, unmarked jack salmon must be released on the Cowlitz, Toutle (including the North Fork and Green River), Washougal, Wind and White Salmon rivers, plus Drano Lake.
The retention rules adopted for those rivers reflect staggered implementation of mass-marking hatchery chinook salmon in the lower Columbia River Basin, said Heather Bartlett, WDFW salmon and steelhead division manager. All hatchery salmon reared in state-operated facilities in the region were marked this year, she said.
“Our objective for these fisheries is to provide protection for wild salmon, while maximizing fishing opportunities for hatchery fish wherever possible,” Bartlett said. “The new rules in effect for Columbia River tributaries this year are a clear example of our efforts to achieve our conservation goals while still providing great fishing opportunities.”
Earlier this year, WDFW also took action to realign hatchery production on the lower Columbia River to reduce risks posed by hatchery fish to the recovery of wild salmon and steelhead populations. Those actions, which included closing the Elochoman Hatchery, were designed to meet recovery goals established by Lower Columbia Basin Salmon Recovery Plan and standards set by the Hatchery Scientific Review Group.
But maintaining viable fisheries in the region was also a major consideration in that initiative, Bartlett said. Under the department’s Conservation and Sustainable Fisheries Plan, 95 percent of fall chinook production, 91 percent of early-returning coho production and 94 percent of late-returning coho production will be maintained.
“Of course, it will take a few years before we see the effect of the changes in production, and returns will always be affected by ocean and fresh-water conditions,” Bartlett said. “For now, anglers can help us meet recovery goals for wild salmon by taking home a bunch of hatchery coho and releasing all wild coho.”
This year’s fishing rules for the Columbia River, its tributaries and other waters in Washington state are described in WDFW’s Fishing in Washington rule pamphlet (http://wdfw.wa.gov/fish/regs/fishregs.htm ).

With the Coho season almost here keep an eye out for the shady element. Do your part to turn in those that are exploiting the resources. I have added a link to this hotline over on the right. Even easier the number is on your Oregon fishing License. Rewards are offered or you can remain anonymous!

With the Albicore now consistently within 30 miles of the coast line its time to get out and fill the freezer up! If you have never experienced this fishery you owe it to yourself to get out there and enjoy it. Not only is Albicore fantastic table fare, it is an exciting reel fryin angling opportunity. Once you’ve done it you will be a Tuna Junkie for sure. Weather pending I will be heading out with Rich and Keith aboard his 27ft Wellcraft. I have never fished with these gentlemen but have worked with Keith for almost 2 years. I will make sure to get plenty of pictures and video of the carnage..So last night I spent a few hour rigging some new spreader bars and re-tying some clones. Here is the custom spreaders I like to run. Hit me up if you need some help building your own. We all know these are bank account busters but I have the cost down to about $6 if made in the garage. These are my little 20″ spreaders (shown on the right) that troll really nice off the back corners of the transom.

This one above is a 30″ bar using 4 1/2 holographic squid. I’m really excited to see how it performs out there. We will most likely be running a spread similar to this below.

This is the set up for a great time catching the hell out of frisky Coho. Leave the divers, flashers, and all the fangled tackle at home…..This is much better for sure. Hit the Big Blue Thursday morning with Double D, Mark and Bob with his killer 23ft North River. We crossed the Columbia bar and headed out to the Red Can of death and immediately started havin fun. The rod of choice was a light weight spinning outfit similar to what you would use for float fishing Steelhead. Hook on a fresh herring to a sliding moohing rig and cast it 50ft behind the boat. Clip the line to a downrigger and run it to 20ft. What a minute and you will have a strike like this in the video! Take a look…  I had one large silver beat me up! Hooked him jigging a small Coyote spoon on a light weight steelhead rod with 6lb test! What a blast feeling that take and battling him on such a noodle. All in all we had a great day hooking 30 plus fish and taking  8 of these tasty silvers home. This is going to be a great crew for some serious Albicore hunting in the next few weeks. We will keep you posted and keep those lines tight…..

Meet Mark! Finally got to fish with him today!You ready to hunt some Tuna?

As you can see the Silver’s are really large for this early in the season. While cleaning them we noticed they have bellies choked full of herring and anchovies…By fall they are gonna be huge and offer a terrific angling opportunity in the tribs, and Columbia.

With a less than steller summer Chinook season (all 2 weeks of it) I wanted to share a few pictures. The long weekend was as we all know was extremely warm and busy on most of the water that we would normally fish this run. So this weekend Todd and I bounced around to a few different spots and managed to come up with a fish here and there. Over all it was slow fishing but as always we have a great time getting a line wet. I even caught one of those crazy little sockeye on Sunday morning around Catapillar island. After getting this 31lb pig on Saturday I opted to cut loose the 3lb Sockeye to do his thing upstream….

Todd brought along Paul to fish with us on Saturday so it was very neat to meet him. Paul has a long history of fishing with the Peterson family as well as fishing all around the world for billfish including Mexico, New Zealand, and aboard the “Red Rooster” for long range cow’s, about every  place we all dream of. Meeting Paul and enjoying his stories was a great time and I look forward to fishing with him again very soon. I also got to share my Jamacian Jerk Albacore Kabobs with the boy’s for a boat BBQ lunch.

I will put the recipe up on that page when I get a chance. We also ran up to Bonneville to give the shad rack a try finding it to be very slow also. None the less we gave it a real effort and have the sunburn to prove it!!! Thats the nice thing about the Gorge wind…You don’t feel yourself burning up until your well done. So with the reports of Tuna being caught in very good numbers, its time to dig out the offshore tackle and start building the spreader bars for some serious freezer stuffing. Can’t wait to get the wolf pack together!!!!

Also got the sled wet this Sunday…She is starting to look pretty good and will be getting a tiller very soon. With Tuna season here it will be a great time to rip out the console and finally convert the long awaited tiller arm….