What are your plans for January 1st?

Since blackmouth opens up on January 1st for lots of places, does anyone have anywhere they're just chomping at the bit to hit?

I'm planning to hit Golden Gardens to try to redeem myself for several trips there but no keeper fish. Last year (my first time chasing blackmouths) I hammered the "just barely too small to keep" blackmouths on multiple trips and lost a few that would have likely been big enough. This year I like to think I have a little more skill and a bit better gear. Even if I only do what I did last year, I'll still be happy to get 15+ fish to the boat per day and have my arms be seriously sore afterwards. 

I wouldn't mind a place with better odds of bigger fish, though. Does anyone have any places that they are heading out where you're more likely to catch bigger fish? If so, want some company? I'm reasonably practiced at both trolling and jigging now, including use of a downrigger. If no takers for other locations, I'm happy to pay it forward and show others how we caught a lot of fish at Golden Gardens last January, just like Trident 13 did for me.

I'm interested!  I'm still trying to catch a decent blackmouth (or any salmon for that matter) from the kayak, did well wade fishing in the Green for Chum and Coho but have only caught Sockeye from the kayak.

Kevin

12 on the flood, 9 on the ebb.


Fish hard.

I'm planning to hit Golden Gardens to try...

Unfortunately, the bag limit is now 1 fish in 10 for the winter. Just a heads up.


Fish hard.

I'm planning to hit Golden Gardens to try...

Unfortunately, the bag limit is now 1 fish in 10 for the winter. Just a heads up.


Fish hard.

That's not that big of a deal to me. I caught 60+ of them last year over a few trips and never got one over 22" so I could keep it. Keeping one, should I catch one big enough to keep, will be plenty. Two of my kids like fish, but my wife and the other kid doesn't. One salmon of that size will be enough for a meal for the three of us, and fresh is better. That will just mean that I'll need to fish more often. 

Fish hard.

The professional side of me just shuddered. 10 is the nursery for the Sound, if you're encountering sublegals at that rate you should probably change spots or explore another area. The fishery is managed with a sublegal encounter mortality rate of 20%. Not getting on you or anything, you can fish however you want within the laws, just letting you know what kind of impact that has.

Fish hard.

Now I'm worried. What would lead to such a high mortality rate? That seems really high for catch and release fish. Aren't we supposed to not take the fish out of the water if we can't keep them? I don't even touch them unless I have no choice, as hooks and handling are what I expect are the biggest causes of mortality. I use long nose pliers to turn the barbless hook out of their mouths and then lower the net so the fish can swim away, which every single one has done. I also cut a dowel to 22" long so I can stick it into the water beside them to measure them without touching them. Out of the 60+ that I caught, only one seemed to have any injury. I saw just a tiny wisp of blood in the water from its mouth as I removed the hook, but it still swam away with no signs of injury at the time.

What else can I be doing to try to harm them less? I have been more worried about the seals that frequent Golden Gardens getting them while I have them hooked than me killing them. I hope I haven't actually been killing them myself.

Fish hard.

I'm not sure that I agree with either of those points. They seem to be based on the assumption that catching a fish to keep is the only goal. That's not true for me. It's not even my primary goal. It's my secondary goal, really just a nice bonus. I checked getting a keeper chinook off my list earlier this year (largely thanks to you). Now that that's done, I'm much more into learning how to find fish and catch them than keep them.

I grew up in the Alabama, where the largemouth bass tournaments and bass boats that you refer to are very common. Most of my fishing for the first 25 years of my life was bass fishing. It's a catch-and-release world for the most part. If you find fish and catch them, you need to make sure that they live so that you can catch them again later when it counts. There's no such thing as fish that are migrating to spawn and die (which still seems weird and wasteful to me). Everyone learns not to do things like keep them out of the water for very long, put your hands around them (crushing internal organs) when you hold them, put your fingers under gill plates, and lots of other things that I've seen happen often up here in Washington. Maybe that's why I'm so surprised that there's a 20% mortality rate expected with salmon encounters. Now that I think about it, though, it makes sense that those who learned fishing by fishing for salmon that were usually already on their way to spawn and die would be less careful about catch-and-release best practices to ensure healthy release of the fish.

Your point is definitely taken about moving to find larger fish. My plan is to try the bottom edge of the marks when I see lots of fish on the fish finder, as I have heard that the smaller fish are commonly higher in the water column. I also want to try deeper water if there are lots of groups of fish in the area like there were last year.

Fish hard.

I didn't end up catching any blackmouth. I only saw a couple get caught, and both were out by the green buoy. Both were undersized, so I headed out deeper to try to find bigger fish. I found a few bait schools but never hooked up. I did catch a couple small flounders sanddabs (new species for me!), and was going to try  a couple different tactics for blackmouths when I got distracted by catching striped perch (another new species!).

When I say I caught striped perch, I mean I caught them a ton of them. I went prepared to try to catch at least one just to see one in person and check off another species. I didn't expect them to bite like they were overcrowded and starving. I think the longest that I waited for a bite was about 30 seconds. The average was less than 10 seconds. Those fish are beautiful!



I also had the pinniped punks with me most of the day. At one time, I was up near the rocks catching striped perch and the seals corralled all the baitfish around me and were none too please that the bait realized that my kayak was a safe zone. Here's the video of it.

Edit: I had a couple reports of people being unable to view the Facebook video. I'll add the YouTube video below.

Jason, aren't these fun fish to catch?  I've been targeting them for years. Same set up with a drop shot and Gulp sand worm.  Great fighting and plentiful this time of year.  Last year I had an oversized ling grab one off my line.

Jason, aren't these fun fish to catch?  I've been targeting them for years. Same set up with a drop shot and Gulp sand worm.  Great fighting and plentiful this time of year.  Last year I had an oversized ling grab one off my line.

Yep, it was a ton of fun and made me not want to go back out to chase salmon. Thanks for the tip on Facebook for using the Gulp sand worms. They worked great.

For those who were unable to view the Facebook video of me being surrounded by seals while the fish hid under my kayak, here's the YouTube video instead.