After a slow summer of fishing, the fall salmon and steelhead fishing season is under way, so time for a little salmon fishing on the Columbia River to get things going. We’ve been able to spend a couple days fishing at our favorite local spot and the fishing has been pretty good. The wind has been picking up in the afternoon, so it’s an early start and off the water by about noon when the wind picks up.
I had a great start to the season when the first fish of the year turned out to be a nice Chinook salmon. A short time later, I hooked into a steelhead that almost jumped into the boat! No video for these fish because it was before sunrise and too dark to shoot. Nice way to start the season.
The following day, we were out again before the crack of dawn. Just a little before sunrise, I hooked into what I knew was a big fish. It was still dark, but I could see with my headlamp that it was a huge Chinook salmon. After about ten minutes, I was ready to net the fish when I saw it was a wild salmon. I’m not sure of the regulations, if you can keep wild salmon or not, but I usually release the native fish, especially early in the season. When I tried to net the big salmon, it was clear that it was not going to fit into the net. One more big thrashing at the side of the kayak and the fish broke off one treble hook and straighted out the other treble hook on the lure and disappeared into the dark Columbia River. The fishing was a little slow today, but I managed to connect with another nice fish. After a worthy battle, another Chinook was in the boat. I saw a few other fishermen catch a few fish, but it was tough fishing so I was glad to come home with a nice salmon.
We are looking forward to a great salmon fishing season, but with the weather the way it’s been, you never know what’s going to happen. Another thing that is noticeable is how many more fishermen and boats there are compared to last year. The Columbia River is big, but it’s not that big and the fish are usually concentrated around the rivers that empty into the Columbia River, especially the rivers that have fish hatcheries on them. The well-known fishing spots have been packed. There are boats of all sizes and condition, kayaks, float tubers, stand up paddle boarders and fishermen wading into the river among the boats. Some of the boaters have the attitude that they “own the place” and have no problem using their larger, motorized boats to move kayakers off “their” spot. This is a dangerous precedent, somebody is going to get hurt. Salmon fishing is very competitive and it can get real nasty. The salmon season closed early downriver because all the sportfishing quotas had been quickly surpassed, that may happen here as well.
We aren’t fishing over this Labor Day weekend, the crowds are ridiculous and it’s windy, so we’ll have to be content watching football and squaring away the fishing gear. I’m hoping for a good salmon fishing season before the PacNW winter sets in.