On April 27th, WDFW and the Governor of Washington State announced the opening of several fishing and hunting opportunities starting May 5th, 2020. And for most of us who’ve been following along here…It’s about time! What does that mean for you? Where will you be fishing on May 5th? We will share our thoughts below.
Late April, when the lowland lakes open up for trout fishing state-wide and early May has always been trout fishing time for me and my family.
There are so many lakes which have been stocked recently with rainbow trout and they are so much fun and easy to catch.
While some folks may have gotten out on the water just to cruise around, we’ve mostly been hanging around home and the neighborhood, so the whole family is itching to get out.
My wife even said the other day that she misses fishing…We’ve never had such a gap in our family fishing that she’s admitted to missing it! Running down to our favorite trout lake is in high consideration for how we spend our day on Tuesday.
But here’s another thought…A bunch of you are going to be beating on 26-36″ Lings when all this water opens back up on the 5th and I don’t want to miss out on the fun. If the weather is nice, and the wind is not really a thing, that might be the place to be.
There’s an afternoon high tide and late morning low tide. My family loves to get their beauty sleep, so late morning trout fishing would be easy to pull off, but I’m thinking of hitting the salt and aiming for that afternoon high tide.
We can take our time, get out there well before the tide slows down, and catch our sand dabs to use for bait, which is always fun. Wait for that tide to slow down. There’s going to be some decent tidal movement that day for both daytime tides, so it’s not ideal, but it may not need to be if the lings are there.
There are a ton of other warm water options for folks to consider as well. It has been over a month since many of these fish have been beat on, so the opening day should be epic!
I’ve seen a lot of folks complaining about shrimp not opening. Shrimp seasons lately have always opened later in May, so we have no evidence yet that they won’t be opening. If anything, we should be looking at the statewide “stay home” order for an indication of when things like shrimp will be open again.
Any fishery that requires WDFW personnel to monitor such as Salmon, Shrimp, and Halibut is going to wait until WDFW personnel are allowed back to work. I imagine some time in mid-late May for that, but we will see.
Good luck and stay safe.