August 1st column

[Pete Heley]

Except for the pinkfin run ending a month earlier than it did the last couple of seasons, fishing and crabbing opportunities at Winchester Bay could not be much better. Salmon fishing has been relatively hot, virtually every boat over the last ten days that has pursued tuna has caught them and the crabbing is much improved over a couple of weeks ago.

While some of the sportsmen and a few of the river guides have fished the Umpqua River between the ocean and Reedsport for some chinooks and a very few finclipped cohos, most of the sport anglers have been fishing fairly close to the Umpqua River Bar. Those anglers, along with some of the guides certified to fish the ocean have been catching a few chinook and a lot of mostlyl wild coho. Scott Howard of Strikezone Charters, while fishing last Friday and Saturday caught some nice chinooks in the ocean, but only six of the 50 coho salmon they landed were keepable finclipped fish. Despite having to release lots of fish, it is reasonable to assume that Scott did not have any bored anglers on board.

The salmon fishing success dropped off slightly last Sunday and the ocean coho season ended on July 31st, but one can reasonably expect the salmon fishing for ocean chinook and the river fishing for chinook and finclipped coho should steadily improve for the next several weeks. If decent numbers of the record number of salmon holding off the northern California coast move northward, the fishing could become incredibly productive.

Whether you are fishing out of Winchester Bay, Charleston or Newport, the tuna fishing has been very, very good. Many tuna anglers started encountering tuna less than 20 miles out and the best catch this scribe heard of was by Oregon Custom Charters, who fished out of Wincheter Bay last Saturday for 76 tuna. They reported that all four anglers were quite tired, but that the main reason they quit fishing at the peak of the bite was because they were running out of ice. They caught most of their fish 30 miles out from the Umpqua River Bar.

There wasn’t very much fishing pressure on the South Jetty last weekend, but one angler came within a whisker of catching a large lingcod while casting a Gibb’s metal jig. Some scuba divers fished the outermost South Jetty near the Umpqua Bar and reported large schools of rockfish at the 25 foot level. They also reported crabs were numerous to the point where they could not put their hands down on either the bottom or submerged jetty rocks. One of the divers also reported seeing a school of what appeared to be pinkfin perch swimming along the South Jetty, but it is rather doubtful that they would be late spawners - but with changing weather and water conditions the last couple of years, who knows.

Proof that the human spirit can accomplish almost anything is the short elderly gentleman who has been averaging at least eight redtailed surfperch per outing while fishing the North Beach Area at the end of Sparrow Park Road. Despite having to carry an oxygen tank with him, he covers multiple troughs until he catches as many perch as he wants to clean. I know, with complete certainty, that I can no longer admit something is too hard to do without feeling guilty - because I am now aware of what he manages to do with what he has to do it with.

Winchester Bay’s senior fish checker, Bill Gates, reported that he got a nice chinook while fishing with Dennis Sherwood of River’s End Guide Service, but the most interesting fish they caught while fishing near the Umpqua River Bar was a finclipped steelhead that weighed about ten pounds after being cleaned.,

Although the ocean coho salmon season was scheduled to close on July 31st, the most interesting data through July 22nd involves chinook salmon. The best fishing in our zone continues to be in Brookings which accounted for 60 percent of the retained chinook salmon for our zone (11 ports). The next three ports north of Brookings (Gold Beach, Port Orford and Bandon) only accounted for 36 retained chinooks - or 1.4 percent of the number of chinooks retained by anglers fishing out of Brookings. Although the chinooks have, so far, resisted moving north of Brookings, subpar results on the opening of the Sacramento River fishery might mean that decent numbers of the record number of salmon hanging off the northern California coast might be fish that will eventually swim northward. Winchester Bay continues to dominate the ocean finclipped coho salmon catch with 470 taken out of the 1,160 retained for the entire zone - or 41 percent. Less than 22 percent of the total coho catch out of Winchester Bay was retained finclipped cohos.

In case you are wondering how many crab-catching devices are allowed per person in the Pacific Coast states, here goes: In Oregon, three crab rings or traps are allowed per person and there is no limit on the rings or pots per boast (except common sense). In Alaska, the limit is five devices per person and there is a boat limit of ten crab-catching devices. In Washington, the limit is two crab-catching devices per person and in California, there is no individual limit on the number of rings, pots or traps a person can use to harvest crabs. Of course each state has a limit on the number of crabs that can be retained each day or held in possession. In Oregon, that limit is 12 male dungeness crabs per day and 24 in possession that are at least 5.75-inches across the back not counting the tiny spiny projections on each side of the shell. Crabbing in the lower river reaches and bays along the Oregon coast has improved greatly - making it more important to be aware of the daily and possession limits.

Once again, Tenmile Lakes has shown that it is the Northwest’s premier bass tournament lake. During the recent Nixon Tenmile Open, several 2-angler teams weighed in two day bass limits weighing more than 30 pounds. Because of its popularity as a tourney site, Tenmile brings in an incredible amount of money to the local economy and also causes every lake and pond and most streams in the area to be underfished.

At a meeting in Salem on August 3rd, the ODFW staff will present a proposal to increase the daily limit on smallmouth bass in the Umpqua River from the current ten bass per day to 15 bass per day. Interested parties can comment on this, or other proposals, at the meeting or they can email Rhine.T.Messmer@state.or.us.