8/1 Dash Point 5:30 - 8:00 AM - Tide was UP Dock was 1/2 full About 15 gear guys wading Really slow - 5 fish taken by gear guys over the duration of time I was there. No jumpers Might be a few more days before they arrive. NOTE - If you plan to release a fish please be kind to the fish. This morning a gear guy released a 12-15 inch pink that he didn't want to keep, but he was not too careful about it. It was really sad to see this fish flopping around for the last 10 minutes of it's life about 30 feet off the beach in front of all of us. It probably made a good snack for a sea lion..... A good, visual reminder for me ... thought I would pass it along. I keep some, and release some: For those that I release, I will be extra careful about it after seeing that.
Hey, I hooked up! Just decided to LDR. And yeah, seeing puffins was enough to make the trip worth it.
Excellent! I know some find pinks near the bottom of the salmon taste scale (they aren't quite as good as many fresh salmon species but even near the bottom are still way ahead of many other fish species in my book) and everyone's entitled to their opinion. But personally I love them when they are basically what you caught- fresh from the salt, on ice and BBQd in less than 24 hours! Not fresh coho or chinook but still not bad. The bright ones smoke up well too IMO. Maybe some of the bad rap/disdain for pinks is more tied to pinks bringing out hordes of people with very little clue about fishing or some with very little moral standard in the fishing sense (intentionally illegal snag and keep, exceed limit, etc). I know my 8 year old has little clue but am hoping for her to get her first pink this year.
we saw puffins at neah bay a few weeks ago cool birds i don't think i have ever seen them in the puget sound south of pt
Totally correct, that is extremely cool. I had not seen them in the sound, nor did I know they were from here. I thought they were a colder environment bird. Agree on the puffins. Disagree on the LDR. One in four attending claims to have seen you hook up. The other three...not so sure!
http://wdfw.wa.gov/conservation/research/projects/seabird/tufted_puffin_status/ http://www.seattleaudubon.org/birdweb/bird_details.aspx?id=233 Apparently there's a colony of Tufted Puffins on Protection Island at the mouth of Discovery bay. ..Birding, it's what I now do when I'm not catching bullheads.
thanks for the info i am better birder or "twitcher"(in england) than fisherman any day i still remember the mountain blue bird i saw at johns creek and not the stinky chum i flossed
8/2 Dash Point 5:30 - 8:00 AM - Tide was UP Dock was 1/2 full About 12 gear guys wading 9 fish taken by gear guys on the beach plus 5 on the pier over the duration of time I was there. Quite a bit of salad in the water = annoying. No jumpers Still on the slow side .... maybe a few more days.
I don't post on here very often because once you have been through a season the threads are all the same. Topwater you have it exactly right, I also agree with Ibn. Part of the fun for me is standing on the deck with my friends all casting to, lets say Tuna, fly lines all over the place, and three or four of us hook up, the chaos is so much fun. Just for the record GT you are a dick.
Adding to the puffin tangent. When I used to spend summers in the San Juans, we would see puffins frequently at Iceberg Point at the south end of Lopez Island. Rarely, you could find them in Cattle Pass. Steve
Went fishing with a friend from our kayaks around Port Townsend and down in the Canal, due to the shitty weather on the straits. Lots of guys out, not too many fish. A few pinks where rolling by the mealhole on the Canal, but no hook ups from the plethora of fisherman. We had a great time regardless, got some nice crab and oysters!
Each return year we seem to hit the Pink Salmon right about 4th of July weekend while we are out Sea Run Coastal Cutthroat Trout flyfishing, up here in the Port Townsend area, south down to the upper Hood Canal etc. And from then on it's just about every trip, every week thereafter through the run that we catch them. Not every trip, but most trips. Without doing anything extra special; nine foot six weight rods, floating lines, nine foot tapered leaders, 3X to 4X tippets, with trout flies like Muddlers, Sculpin, Miyawaki Beach Poppers, Gartside Gurglers, Stimulators, Bill McMillan's Steelhead Caddis, Baitfish Clousers, Chum Babys and Beach Babys. We catch them using our usual and unusual trout presentations; mostly an old school wet fly swing or greased line drift, but all with a little more action to the fly, especially on the retrieve. So many of these fish hit our flies on the "hang" or "dangle", at the end of a drift or swing. Pink Salmon are very fun and hard hitting, fighting fish.
Hit the water with Steve Saville this morning. Steve hooked up within a few mins of arriving, but the ldr came too soon. I hooked up as we were contemplating calling it a day. Nice, big, bright pink. Got it up to the boat, missed the net, and broke him off as he made a mad dash straight to the anchor rope.
had to make an early morning run to sea-tac this morning so i thought i would check out a couple places both north and south. i only saw a few boils in the distance and no fish hooked or landed by the few fishermen i saw before driving home. but the sunrise sure was nice.
After 3 days of skunk in MA 9, 10, and 11, this morning I caught 2, had a bigger one break off, and had a few other pecks that I missed. MA 10 this morning. I haven't seen that many yet of course, but all the ones I have seen caught are quite big, these 2 were both chunky, and the one I lost was definitely bigger. Here's to hoping that pattern holds and we have lots of 6-10 lb humpies this year.
Yup that was us. Were you in the other whaler? If so, sorry about our lack of talkativeness. Steve and I both lack hearing capabilities.
