HElp! When is a Chinook too dark?

You got lucky. I call that coloration "nickle" and sometimes "burnished nickle."  It is getting late in the year to find a fresh King in most places, although I know of some rivers here in WA with a small wild Nov King run. The Queets gets some.

Is this too dark?
To be fair, this is a friend of mine and he was doing carcass surveys down in California for fish and game.

I was wondering where Naoaki's been hiding.

Hi Ya Tote, glad ta see ya here

Hey I recognize that DFG guy. looks like a sac river fish. Not really too dark just too mouldy. I have see guys keeping dark fish on the sac to smoke but they dont look very tasty to me.

When it looks like footwear. Actually color can be deceiving. You can actually feel how good the fish is. I like to give it the Charmin test. I squeeze top of the fish just under the dorsal fin. If it's firm then ok but if there's some give and feels a little Jello-ish it goes back.

Z

Zee,
Learnin all kinds of stuff around here - Thanks!

When I see black on the belly/throat
or white on the tips of fins
or even just dark fins
or any amount of green tinge to the head

... then for sure it's too dark and the meat wont cut.

Obviously this one is too dark, and it shows all the features I just outlined.  But even just one of those features probably means I'll release it.



This one is borderline, and I probably would have released it under normal circumstances, but there were darker fish kept that weekend, all of which cut up really nice, so I decided to take this one and see for myself.  Good thing I did, as it cut up nicely.



-Allen