Went out to Neah Bay on Fri. AM - first ferry out of Edmonds and arrived at about 10:15. By the time the boat was in the water and we were out fishing it was 11. Fished immediately north of Waddah in about 150-180' of water. Green flashers with green hootchies and a herring strip. 35-60' down. Also tried a spoon that Sark gave me. I had few hits on the spoon but no hookups. My buddy hooked up a small 7# king and about 45min later, I released about a 6# wild silver. Fishing wasn't as hot as last year at this ime for silvers but there were more kings. I decided to run out and look for schools of black rock cod south of Tatoosh and try a few other spots for kings/silvers.
Ran down to some of my favorite rises 3-4 miles S. of Tatoosh to scout for schools. Last year, I was always able to find some large schools but not this year. Small schools here and there. We picked up a few fish but no black rod cod. Gave up on that after a couple of hours and ran down to Limp Spot (a little NE of Umatilla reef). Not much happening there, so I ran up to table top (8miles WSW of Tatoosh. Caught one nice hatchery silver and then ran in for dinner. The wind kicked up a little and I was tired so we called it a day for fishing. Had a nice dinner, drank a good bit, my friend's son showup, drank a bit more and hit the hay.
Sat AM - up at 4, boat ready to leave when my friend and son hit the dock at 4:30. He wanted to make coffee and I said, not until the lines are in - a little whining and we're off. Fished just N of Waddah and hooked up with two kings in the low teens by 6:30 AM the first one hit before 5AM. Bonked both - one wild, one hatchery - wild retention is allowed in the area. Released another about 7:30 - smaller wild, maybe 7#. High the low tide was early and high was around 11:30 so we decided to run in, eat breakfast and relax for a few.
Back out by about 9:30 - nailed a 25# king 30 mins later. With our limits of kings in the box, we fished for silvers at about 30-35' depth. Not much happeninng on silvers near Waddah so ran west a bit and out to deeper water still not much. Picked up around 10:30 and ran out to table top. Got there at 11:00, limits of hatchery silvers (1 each, three fish) by noon. Fished 30-35' down with green flashers and hootchies with herring strips. Ran a cut plug out the back on a 6 oz bananna weight and caught one on that. Ran in a bit to scout for schools of black rock cod with no luck again. Fished for another 2 hours or so and picked up a 8# cabezon, 4-5 china rock cod and a few kelp greenling. Released on under sized ling and saw a whale. All-in-all a good day. Got home about 10:30, clean and packaged fish until 11:30AM.
Pictures are below. The first one doesn't show the 25# king's size as well as it could, it was bent a little from being in a my fish box which was too small to hold it flat. Also, we could have cleaned it up a bit. The second one shows it in the wheel barrow and I think gives a better sense of scale. The mark rate on the silvers was good - we kept a total of 5 silvers and I don't think we caught more than 3 wilds. Last year early in the season the mark rate was about 1 hatchery to 3 or 4 wilds. Now (with my very limited data), it's about 1 or 2 hatchery to 1 wild. Also, the silvers are bigger this year - 5-6# was the norm this weekend compared to 3-4# at a similar time last year. My largest was about 8#. For early July, that's nice size. There will be some monsters later in the year (they gain about 1lb per week). Also, the king limit in area 4 won't last long. With the ability to keep wilds throughout most of the area (due to a rule change that allows wild retention inside of the Bonilla-Tatoosh line all the way to Sail Rock), almost everyone who knew how to fish, got their king limits. My guess is that Kings will close down in 1-2 weeks but it's just a guess.
Too much work, family issues and other stuff to take care of. So now, I'm getting stir crazy and SeaDNA beckons too me each morning saying "get me wet, put me in the water....". So Fri. AM or late Thurs, I'm on my way. I have at least one bud going with me. Anyone else planning on hitting the opener out there?