It is that time of year where Peck’s Guide Service goes from rods and reels to decoys and dogs. With that I wanted to give a recap of our 2020 fishing season, and what we are excited about for the coming 2021 season.
The 2020 fishing season was a slow start as all of us learned how to navigate the safety of fishing with clients with the COVID Virus. Due to the Virus and restrictions put on by the state of Washington we had very limited Spring Salmon fishery on the Columbia river. Concerns with large crowds also kept us from a spring catch and keep Sturgeon season. By the end of June fishing was back to normal and we had some of best Ocean salmon fishing we have seen in a long time. With only a 13,250 Coho quota in the Ocean it was a short season. Rough Ocean conditions kept the season open through late July but it was only because we were not able to go out and fish. A long day on the Ocean this season ended around 10:30 AM and that typically included pulling crab pots and some bottom fishing.
After the closure of the Ocean, and with a delayed start in the river, we spent many days on catch and release Sturgeon. This was absolutely a blast and catching was incredible with 12 to 5 fish landed per hour on many of the days. This is a shallow water fishery and watching these fish give tale dances and the excitement seen is our clients creates one of my favorite fishery we have. One clients comments still stick with me as he said “when we anchored in 3 feet of water I assumed you were crazy, after an hour watching my Grandson, Son in Law and myself fight multiple fish at the same time all I could think was we will never last four hours out here little lone the entire day”. What a great day and sharing in this family’s celebration of the young man turning 12 years old.
The 2020 fall salmon season was way better than expected and the lower Columbia River is still producing both Chinook and Coho in good numbers. This is not shocking after what we saw in the Ocean during the month of July. The hardest part of our fall Columbia River season was staying up with the ever changing regulations of where we could fish and what the catch limits were. After final realization that the predicted counts were way off the entire river reopened and remains open through December. The changing regulations presented good opportunity as long as people remained flexible in the zone of the river they fished. We would be near the dam at rooster rock on a Friday and back to Astoria on Saturday. But with all of that came lots of fish and even more laughs and stories shared.
All of the fishing community is excited to see what 2021 will bring. Typically fish returns go through highs and lows and from the return we had this fall it would appear that we are trending upward. Proof will be in March when ODFW provides us with run size predictions. Also hopeful that we will see the return of our catch and keep Sturgeon season in late spring of 2021.
To help with the confusion we had scheduling fall Buoy 10 salmon with the change to our typical season. This year we are going to be taking reservations for a day(s) for the Buoy 10 fishery. After the season is announced you will be called and scheduled for the days requested in the order that you got on the reservation list. Not sure how to do this any other way. This season worked out for fishing opportunity for almost all of our clients, but not all of it was in the Buoy 10 area. Please get ahold of me at any time to discuss fishing opportunities. We will also be providing Kokanee fishing this year at Lake Merwin and Yale in Washington just out of the city Woodland. This will be from March through June and is a great fishery for kids, with lots of action to keep them busy.
Tight Lines
Don Peck
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