I don’t usually like to be the guy who sounds the alarm on a fishery to give it even more attention but…if you are thinking you can wait to get in on the incredible chinook fishing going on in Marine Area 11 right now, you may be disappointed
Update: MA11 closed as of 6/3 now!
Wow, did I call this one…
Original post:
By emergency regulation and according to the agreed upon Puget Sound Fisheries this year, Marine Area 11 opened up to Chinook salmon retention on June 1st – June 30th…Here’s an excerpt from the emergency regulations email WDFW sent out:
The first part is open daily from June 1-30 with an allowable catch quota of 580 hatchery-marked Chinook. The total encounter limit is 432 wild Chinook and 752 sublegal fish (Chinook under the 22-inch minimum size limit). The second half is open daily from July 1 through Sept. 30 with an allowable catch quota of 2,816 and a total sublegal encounter limit of 3,373 during this timeframe.
WDFW email on May 25, 2022
We often deal with fisheries being closed due to exceeding limits of sublegal or wild chinook encounters, but I think this time we are going to get shut down due to pure numbers of legal salmon being caught and kept.
Let’s look at some data:
Take a look at the creel check on opening day…that’s around 100 chinook reported caught and kept! That’s on a Wednesday. The creel sample on Thursday shows smaller numbers but I can tell you they will be extrapolating the data as the catch rate was as good and there were easily 100 boats on the water on 6/2…
- Wed: 100 fish
- Thr: 100 fish
- Fri: ?
- Sat: ?
- Sun? ?
Do you see where this is going? It’s not hard to imagine 580 legal chinook being caught in those 5 days…
If this catch rate and participation continue, I’m not sure this fishery will be around after this weekend.
However, it’s not all bad news. First of all, get your butt out on the water this weekend and catch some chinook. We saw everything working, jigging, mooching and we got a double within a few minutes of trolling with just your typical salmon spoons through passing through bait balls.
We saw a boat of moochers with a triple!
We cut open the stomach of one of our fish and it was empty…these chinook salmon are numerous and hungry…but that’s not all.
Okay, now for the not-so-bad news…so WDFW may close this fishery soon, but Marine Area 13 is still a great option, and many of these salmon being caught in Marine Area 11 are actually headed down there. Check out this next graph:
That catch rate is even better than the Marine Area 11 catch rate in the past few days! Marine Area 13 is going to stay open because it doesn’t have a quota. As soon as these fish travel south of the Narrows Bridge, it’s game on.
So if you have time off or you are planning on getting on the water next week, don’t be deterred by an early closure in Marine Area 11, just go around the corner to 13 and fish Point Evans, Post Fosdick, Fox Island and further south until you’ve had your fill of salmon fishing.
