Fishing | Anglers' salmon yield is spotty

The local marine salmon fisheries keep grinding along with some glory moments followed by a day or two of lackluster fishing.

"It is pretty much the same story this week with a few chinook and silvers [coho] caught, and about the only place they're consistently catching fish is Midchannel Bank [off Port Townsend]," said Mark Baltzell, a state Fish and Wildlife biologist. "Our test fishing boat got two chinook [Wednesday] around Lip Lip Point south of Marrowstone."

A Tuesday check at the Port Townsend boat ramp showed 21 anglers caught 18 chinook.

"We think the fish are late this year because they're just now hitting them pretty hard at Neah Bay, and the trollers there are seeing lots of fish," Baltzell said. "You never know, there could be a great wall of chinook making their way through."

Through Saturday, 2,587 hatchery chinook have been caught in Areas 9 and 10 under a combined quota of 10,000. The mark rate for hatchery chinook with a missing adipose fin is 60 to 65 percent.

Charter captains like Keith Robbins, owner of A Spot Tail Salmon Guide in Seattle, were picking up fish here and there each day this week until Wednesday when it was one of the best of the season so far.

"We had an awesome day [Wednesday] and got five kings and lost three others at Possession and Point No Point, and the good news is the dogfish aren't too bad for the bait moochers," Robbins said.

In south central Puget Sound (Area 11) anglers were finding some fair fishing around the Tacoma and Gig Harbor areas.

"It is right around 0.1 fish per rod, but the mark rate is close to 86 percent," Baltzell said. "We had another big week in the Tacoma area with 106 fish for 1,500 anglers."

Other places giving up some fish are Richmond Beach, Jefferson Head, Double Bluff off Whidbey Island, Gig Harbor, Point Monroe, West Point off Shilshole Bay and Southworth. Kingston, the hot spot last summer, is worth avoiding.

The Elliott Bay chinook fishery (open Fridays to Mondays) ended up being rather slow, though Monday anglers saw a fairly good bite.

"I checked 30 boats with 20 kings with the biggest being 28 pounds, and four of those fish came from Dolphin Point," said Pete Sergeef, a state Fish and Wildlife checker at the Armeni boat ramp in West Seattle.

At the Elliott Bay Derby on Saturday, more than 240 tickets were sold with 17 fish weighed in. The results: Michael J. Heier, 20 pound-13 ounce chinook, $1,650 in cash and prizes; Jack Lawless, 18-10 chinook, $750; John Barker, 15-11, $500.

Next up: the Des Moines Salmon Derby is Saturday, and the Gig Harbor Salmon Derby is Aug. 9. Details: www.northwestsalmonderbyseries.com.

Fishing off Neah Bay, La Push, Westport and Ilwaco has been good one day and bad the next as small waves of kings and coho migrate down the coast.

"I fished with my dad at Westport last week and we got four chinook in about 180 feet of water, but then he fished the same spot on Thursday and Sunday and picked up only one each day," said Erica Crust, a state Fish and Wildlife scientific technician.

At Ilwaco it was close to a fish per rod average and mostly coho. At Westport it was 0.6 fish per rod and mostly chinook. At La Push it was 0.4 fish per rod and slightly more coho in catches than chinook. At Neah Bay it was close to half a fish per rod and a third of those were coho.

The highlight off Westport is anglers are still targeting tuna, and finding good batches of them about 55 miles offshore.

In the Strait of Juan de Fuca, places like Sekiu, Freshwater Bay and Port Angeles are finding slow to fair king fishing.

Fishing reports

• Clams and oysters on open beaches of Puget Sound and Hood Canal: The last minus-low tides series of the summer should expose beaches for shellfish gatherers. Low tides: Today, minus-2.9 feet at 10:25 a.m.; Friday, -2.8 at 11:13 a.m.; Saturday, -2.3 at 11:58 a.m.; Sunday, -1.3 at 12:41 p.m.

• Chinook, steelhead or trout in local rivers: There are 300 broodstock steelhead collected from the Reiter hatchery and the Wallace fish trap, said Chad Jackson, a state Fish and Wildlife biologist.

The goal at the hatchery is to collect 350 adult steelhead to meet spawning escapement.

Jackson said the state is confident it can get the rest for spawning purposes without delaying Friday's steelhead opener at Reiter Ponds.

"There should be some fish there to catch on the opener," Jackson said.

Jackson added, "Water flows spiked up [Tuesday] from around 2,300 [cubic feet per second] to 3,100, and fishing has tapered off a little bit [in the Skykomish River]."

From July 21 to Sunday, 114 anglers kept three chinook and six steelhead, and released 11 chinook. Chinook fishing closes after today. For steelhead try from Sultan up to Reiter Ponds.

The Skokomish River opens Friday for chinook and coho fishing. Fishing has been slow on the Green, Stillaguamish North Fork, Snoqualmie and Samish.

• Trout and other game fish in lakes: Slowed down for kokanee in Lake Stevens. Fair to good for cutthroat and perch in Lake Washington, but the hydroplanes could spook them away from the hot spots around Interstate 90 and the shoreline from Mount Baker to Seward Park. Good alternate non-hydro spots include Madison Park and Leschi for perch, and the Highway 520 bridge or east channel for cutthroat. Look for some decent bass fishing around the lily pads near Foster Island.

• Crab in Puget Sound: "Crabbing has been holding up fairly good in South Sound, and we got 20 crabs on Tuesday," said Tony Floor, director of fishing affairs for the Northwest Marine Trade Association.

Open daily in southern Puget Sound, and the rest of Puget Sound and Hood Canal are open Wednesdays through Saturdays only. Some areas north of Anacortes won't open until later this summer.

• Salmon at Buoy 10 near the Columbia River mouth: Typically the chinook fishery at Buoy 10 doesn't get amped up until around late August, but there should be a few around when it opens Friday.

"The Youngs Bay stock of fall chinook come in bright and the commercial catches in Youngs Bay are off to a fairly good start," said Joe Hymer, a state Fish and Wildlife biologist.

This year's fishery should also benefit from an estimated return of 86,200 chinook — up from 14,600 last year — bound for the Spring Creek Hatchery above Bonneville Dam.

Anglers are required to release any chinook they catch from Tongue Point to Bonneville Dam until Sept. 1.

• Fish in the Columbia River and its tributaries: "Steelhead fishing is hanging in there in recent days at Drano Lake," Hymer said. "There are also good steelhead catches just below Bonneville, and daily fish counts at the dam have gone up to almost 6,000 steelhead" on Monday and Tuesday.

Sturgeon fishing from the Wauna power lines up to Bonneville Dam opens Friday and is allowed Thursdays to Sundays only. The Cowlitz, Lewis and White Salmon rivers are worth a try for steelhead.

Mark Yuasa: 206-464-8780 or myuasa@seattletimes.com