7/28 Golden Gardens

After planning on time on the water and some reprieve from my visiting inlaws this past weekend, I saw that tenhunter and Tomas were planning on fishing Golden Gardens on Sunday and asked to join in.  When we met up at Shilshole, we ended up finding another pair of kayak anglers--Ali and another gentleman who's name I can't recall-- and hit the water shortly after 7.

Conditions initially weren't great and there was a lot of chop.  Nonetheless, as soon as we were far enough north to legally fish I got my gear in the water.  Fishing was slow that morning, the few fish I marked were hanging out near the bottom, and the only action I saw before high tide was accidentally hooking up on a sanddab when I paused to chat with Tomas.

Around high tide, I decided to swap out the pink hoochie I had been trolling with a Strawberries 'N' Cream Hoochie Hooker behind a small dodger.  A while later, I had a hit that took and saw silver at the surface.  After a short but nonetheless exciting fight I had the fish in my net despite some mistakes on my part.  After a photograph and some assistance from Tomas I concluded that it was a blackmouth just shy of the 22" limit and let it go.  I'm not confident on my ID--the mouth was black but there were no spots whatsoever on the tail and I suspect it may actually have been a sockeye.

That was all the action I saw for the day as I had a date with the family for the Mariners game that afternoon, but I left the water with a buzz, if empty handed.  I've caught a few salmon while on charter boats before but this was my first "independent" fish.  I grew up in the midwest a long way from the salt and have been learning the details of fishing this area slowly over the past few years.  I hope this fish is the first of many to come, and wanted to thank everyone here for the info you've shared, especially Zee for hosting a few seminars I've attended--I think half the techniques I used were his.  I had a great time meeting and fishing with everyone Sunday, and hope you all had some luck after I had to go.

Great report!  Thanks for sharing!

Craig,

Definitely not a Sockeye as their scales are smaller than what your fish had. It is possible that it was a silver but the spots were darker than what I would expect and the gums were pointing toward blackmoutk. Could have been a silver that had been nipping into the fresh water but if in doulbt I feel it is best not to take a chance.

Cheers,

Tomas

Hey Craig,

The fifth one in our group that day was Pauly (Xtort). That was a fun time, thanks everyone!

I would like to get out a few more times before the hunting seasons start. Let me know when you plan on going out. I can also make it after work on most Mondays and Wednesdays.

Take care,

Ali

Hi Ali,
It was nice meeting you, Pauley Nd others at GG this Sunday. Hopefuls the Pinks will pick up here soon!

Tomas