Sport-fishing quotas for coho will be higher this summer

By Mark Yuasa | Seattle Times • Published March 13, 2009

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The sport salmon fishing seasons off the Washington coast are expected to be very robust this summer.

At a meeting Thursday in Sea-Tac, the Pacific Fishery Management Council came up with three options to consider for coastal sport salmon fisheries.

“The coho numbers look very good, and the fish will definitely be there in the ocean when it opens up,” said Doug Milward, a state Fish and Wildlife salmon resource manager.

The option one sport quota is 189,000 hatchery coho and 38,000 chinook. Ilwaco and Westport anglers will be allowed to keep only hatchery-marked chinook (those with a missing adipose fin), while anglers off La Push and Neah Bay can keep marked and unmarked chinook.

Option two would be 189,000 hatchery coho and 22,500 chinook. Anglers coast wide would be allowed to keep marked and unmarked chinook.

Option three is the lower end of the spectrum where 168,000 hatchery coho and 10,000 marked or unmarked chinook would be up for grabs by fishermen.

The quotas for last season were 20,000 for hatchery coho and 20,000 for chinook.

The huge jump in the coho catch quota is due to a huge forecast Columbia River hatchery coho return of more than 1.2 million fish, the largest since 2001. Compare that to last year when 736,300 coho returned (276,100 were predicted).

The reason for this resurgence of coho is very good upwelling and ocean conditions. Plus, when these young coho arrived in the ocean from their natal rivers they found lots of feed and survived well.

“I heard the opening date for the ocean will be June 28, and in option one, fishing would be open seven days a week, and in options two and three it would start off as five days a week until the latter part of July, and then go to seven days a week,” said Larry Giese, owner of Deep Sea Charters in Westport.

Final seasons and quotas will be adopted April 4-9 in Millbrae, Calif.