Productive Spring

I suppose my theme for spring 2014 should be quality over quantity... of springer outings that is. I put the boat in the river only 3 times this spring in pursuit of the all to elusive spring Chinook. The result was 3 fish to the boat followed by some tasty grilled fillets.

Well, if we're talking serious springer fishing outings, I'd really have to call it only 2 trips that resulted in 3 fish. The first trip was a 2 hour warm-up troll on the Willamette in early April with my 5 year old as my co-captain. Great time with my son while we worked out the kinks for 2014 and as he got to witness the whole herring cutting, baiting, and rolling show for the first time.... We fished one rod and no runs, hits, or errors to speak of that day.

Let's pause for a minute... Yes, I did say a "warm-up trip in April", not February or March as I shared in a 2011 post titled Warmed Up... But Frozen!!. As an analytical person in my day job, I've carried that proficiency over to my fishing in more ways than I'll admit here on the world wide web. So, instead of me blabbing for 3 or 4 paragraphs making excuses, the picture/graph below will tell a better story why serious go time really happens starting in April.

*If you're too distracted by the blue line, see my note at bottom of post.

The next two trips both came on Columbia River season extension days. As always, the Lower Columbia season is set to close before the fish show in any numbers to allow for targeted passage (before the April / May spikes in the graph above). However, this year, they threw us a bone and we received two extension days just before the fish started crossing Bonneville dam in large numbers.

AM view of Mt. Hood that never gets old

My daughter wanting to help fillet

Day 2 on the water this spring was a solo trip out of Chinook Landing, one of my secret fishing holes. I worked the incoming tide from the PDX airport all the way back up past Chinook Landing and hooked into 2 fish, both on perfectly spinning, plain (brined but not dyed) herring. At the time, I thought this was going to be the last day of the season and after hooking into a couple fish, I really wanted more.

EP with his springer for the day

Day 3 really was a surprise, not only because it was a last minute (earlier that week) extension day provided by the government fishing powers, but my buddy Erik and I didn't make the call to head out on the river until late the night before. Good call! Erik's bonked a few spring salmon on my boat previously (lucky?) and this day was no exception. Given the tide prediction for the day, we fished further down river, out of another secret fishing hole, an area of the river that was new to Erik and one that is always an exciting experience just getting out to the fishing grounds.

*Okay, so the blue bar in the graph above sticks out like a sore thumb.  That's the fall Chinook run from last year and it might explain why my crew and I did so well at Buoy 10 last year.  What's even crazier is that the projection for 2014 is expected to be as good, if not better.