Baker Lake Sockeye Fishing

We have had a number of the customers fish Baker Lake this week and all have done quite well, with limits being more of the norm than not. Generally speaking most that have been successful have been trolling the area in the upper portion of the lake around Noisy Creek. This is the area of greatest concentration of fish. If you have electronics you can locate the schools of fish on the sounder and see the depth that the fish are stratified at. Many of the fish schools are located in the middle of the lake and not always along the shoreline. The fish have been at the 15 - 25 foot level for the most part. Make sure that you are there early as the bite has turned off by 7:30 a.m.. As far as gear goes an o/o, o, or 1 sized dodger in chrome, hammered chrome or chrome siler scalite finishes have been the attractor of choice. A small pink mini squid tied with double red 1/0 2/0 hook combinations, a bare hook leader consisting of red or black 1/0 - 2/0 hooks tied back to back or this same leader with a couple of small pink beads slid down the leader and topped with a Mac's pink smile blade have all been accounting for good catches. Fish your offering around 1 1/2 times the length of the dodger behind and fish slowly 1 - 1.2 mph. This will be just enough speed to get the dodger to slide slip side to side. The one thing that you want to due is to make sure to tip the front hook of your leader with a small piece of raw shrimp / sand shrimp. This little addition has proven to be the frosting on the cake, as far as productivity goes. You can also use a little krill scent for good measure. As the fish have been fairly shallow this season make sure to troll your gear a good distance behind the downrigger release, as gear fished close has definitely been far less productive that that fished 25 - 35 feet behind the release. This fishery has so far been quite good and should continue for quite some time. If you are looking for a great place to go camping and have some good fishing Baker Lake just might be your place.

Edmonds Coho Derby Tickets

We have recieved tickets for the every popular Edmonds Coho Derby being held on Saturday, September 10, 2011. Tickets are ready to be sold and as there are a limited number it would be best to get yours early before they are sold out! Don't take a chance of being disappointed by not being able to participate. This years coho run is expected to be outstanding by the WDFW. Tickets run $30.00 - Cash Only!
I will post a little more on the derby shortly.

Lake Chelan Reports - Darrel & Dad's Family Guide Service

What continues hot for the 6th straight week is trolling for Mackinaw on the Lake Chelan “Bar”. Also heating up is trolling for Sockeye Salmon below Wells Dam on the Columbia. We are continuing to troll for those Lakers in depths of 120 to 150 feet on the Bar just out from the Mill Bay boat launch. This pattern has worked for six weeks! Considering the unusual June and July weather, that is truly amazing! We have had consistent success pulling T4 and U20 flatfish in Purple Glow at 1.2 to 1.5 mph. Mack’s Lures Cha Cha Squidders in glow colors with a purple blade also worked fine. Additionally Silver Horde’s Ace Hi Fly in glow colors baited with a strip of Northern Pikeminnow also worked great. Don’t forget that you can add an Action Disk from Wigglefin.com to give all those squid rigs a bit of a different action. Big Smile Blades from Mack’s Lures are another fine choice. Although early and late in the day continue to be best, we have caught nice numbers of fish throughout the day. Salmon fishing has begun to heat up below Wells Dam although the Brewster Pool continues to be thin. The majority of the fish being caught below are delicious Sockeye. You can catch them by pulling Mack’s mini-Cha Cha Squidders baited with Pautzke Fire Cured Shrimp behind a 0 chrome or chrome scale dodger. Your fishing tip of the week is to remember etiquette when fishing below Wells Dam. It is a dense fishery with loads of current. Playing bumper boats is considered poor manners. Keep your setbacks very short. No more than 30 feet. Usually, 15 to 20 feet will work fine. Signal you intentions clearly to boats heading your way. Try not to weave. With the incredible amount of water being pushed down the Columbia, boat control can be difficult and tempers can flare. Your kids tip of the week is to remember that the vast majority of annoying misbehaviors by school age children are attention getting mechanisms. Try to use redirection instead of correction whenever possible to steer behavior in the correct direction. More importantly give those kids legitimate avenues for attention. I know, we are all busy. That undivided attention (right, without texting or reading emails) is an important investment. Your safety tip of the week is to pay close attention to fire safety now. Even though it’s been wet, we are moving into that late summer window where the fire danger becomes the greatest.

Anton Jones of Darrell & Dad's Family Guide Service (http://www.darrellanddads.com/ or (1-866-360-1523)

Pictured: 7/19/11 - The Evans and Ferguson parties with their pile of 32 Mackinaw from a two boat morning half day trip.

Also Pictured: 7/23/11 Keith Sims of Kirkland, WA with son Max (11) of Berlin, Germany and their mornings catch of Mackinaw. Max was getting ready to go back to Germany. They fished with friend Bob Uptagrafft of Everett (not pictured). Deckhand Jaime Abaraca helped them hold the fish up.

Whidbey Island Beach Fishing

The salmon fishing off the western beaches of Whidbey Island have started with a mix of resident coho, pinks and an occasional king salmon being caught. The beach fishermen that I have spoke with the past few days have all said that they have been seeing fish caught though nothing really outstanding at the present time. They have mentioned that the fishing has steadily improved since the July 16th opener. By this weekend we should be seeing good numbers of pinks hitting the beaches as there are lots of pink salmon in the Straits at the present time with Port Angeles being the eastern most area of prolific numbers. For the most part anglers are tossing pink Wannabees or #2 or 2 1/2 inch pink Buzz Bombs for the pinks and resident coho. The few kings that have been caught have been on Luhr Jensen 1 oz Krockodile spoons in chrome colors or pearl white (which they no longer manufacture).

Area 9 & 10 Salmon Reports

The salmon reports that we had out of Marine Areas 9 & 10 where in fact all accross the board this past weekend. We had reports of outstanding fishing from some of the customers and reports which brought the question, "Are there any salmon in the sound". Some of the best reports that we had came from the SE section of Jefferson Head. There were good numbers of kings caught here in the 90 - 180 foot depths. There were also a good number of resident coho caught incidental to the kings, these fish have been quite good size with a many of them around the 5 pound mark. The Richmond Beach area king fishing dropped off substaintially with even the good fishermen scratching perhaps a single fish for the mornings effort. Possession and Satchet Head likewise did not produre outstanding reports over the weekend. Most fishermen have been disappointed with the quality of fishing so far this season trying to compare it with the fantastic king salmon fishing which we had last year. There were a few pinks mixed in with the catches over the weekend but I would still have to say that we are perhaps a week to ten days off before we really have the herds of pinks in our area.

Pink Salmon - What's Happening

For those of you that are anticipating this years record pink salmon run, I am please to tell you that they are on the way. Though we have seen the first of the vanguard fish poking their way into our local waters over the past ten days or so, the bulk of the fish are still out in the Straits to the ocean. The boys at Port Angeles said that the numbers that they are catching off the PA spit has ramped up big time this week to a point that those who are targeting Chinook have found them to be a sore point of contention with the pinks grabbing just about anything that is presented in front of them. We have heard the beach fishermen off the west side of Whidbey have been getting greater number of pinks virtually every day. I would have to say by this next weekend we should be seeing good numbers of pinks in our local fishing area. Just a note - Remember that Areas 8-1 & 8-2 do not open up until August 1.

Baker Lake - Sockeye Reports

We have been receiving a number of Baker Lake Sockeye reports this AM, and it has been everything from skunked to limits depending upon whom you have spoke with. There were approximately 140 - 150 boats on the lake this mornings opener. I was not amazed with this number as I think we had half of them in the shop the past few days gearing up. The Noisy Creek area of the upper lake seemed to produce the best, with good numbers of fish schooled up here. The guys that caught good numbers of these 6 -7 pound fish did best first thing in the morning fishing down at the 25 foot depth range with pink mini squid behind a dodger. This fishery should continue to get better with the number of sockeye being trucked to the lake from the Baker River fish trap.

Sitka, Alaska - Kings and Silvers

For those of you that might be going to Sitka shortly here's a little report. Both the king and silver salmon fishing has been quite good the past few days. Even with the commercial salmon trolling season just finishing up there are still good numbers of fish around. The silver salmon fishing has been quite good in most of SE Alaska recently, everyone to whom we have spoken with the past week all report decent fishing. Though most sport fishermen do not really target the pinks of chums both species are quite numerous at the present time and do contribute to the action.

Here's a nice average Sitka king caught by Dave Hardy.

Kings To Close In Skykomish -Effective July 23

July 19, 2011
Skykomish River closes to chinook retention
Action: Close chinook salmon retention on the Skykomish River.
Effective date: July 23 through July 31, 2011.
Species affected: Chinook salmon
Location: Skykomish River from the mouth upstream to the Wallace River.
Reason for action: Chinook brood stock collection at the Wallace River Hatchery is well behind the goal of 3,200 fish. As of July 18, only 597 chinook brood stock have been trapped at the hatchery. The closure of the selective chinook sport fishery on the Skykomish River is necessary in order to fulfill brood stock collection requirements. If the brood stock collection goal is met prior to July 31, the Skykomish River selective chinook sport fishery may resume.
Other information: The Skykomish River from the mouth upstream to the Wallace River will still remain open for hatchery summer steelhead and all other game fish.
Information contact: Jennifer Whitney, District 13 Fish Biologist, (425) 775-1311, ext. 107.

Baker Lake Sockeye Season

For the second straight year, anglers will be able to fish for sockeye salmon in Baker Lake, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) announced today.
From July 23 until further notice, anglers can retain up to three adult sockeye salmon that exceed 18 inches in length from the log boom barrier at Baker Dam upstream to the mouth of the upper Baker River. All other salmon, as well as bull trout, must be released.
Brett Barkdull, a fish biologist for WDFW, said this year’s return is expected to meet spawning production goals. As of today, 8,285 sockeye had returned to hatchery facilities at Baker Lake.
“About 3,600 of those sockeye salmon have been released into Baker Lake,” said Barkdull. “We expect that number to continue to increase as we approach Saturday’s opener.”
Barkdull reminds anglers that the Baker and Skagit rivers remain closed to salmon fishing.
For more information on the Baker Lake sockeye fishery, check the fishing rule change at https://fortress.wa.gov/dfw/erules/efishrules/erule.jsp?id=1073. Additional information on Baker Lake sockeye is available on WDFW’s website at http://wdfw.wa.gov/fishing/salmon/sockeye/baker_river.html.