The snow, rain, more snow, more rain pattern has dampened many a fisherman’s spirit this week, and with another 10 days or so of this blustery, cold weather forecast, the river fishing — including the upcoming spring chinook run — is a bit on hold.
Charles McElroy, a sporting goods clerk at Sunbird Shopping Center in Chehalis, said all is not lost as the new dose of water likely has the steelhead and a few early springers heading upriver. The problem is the high water flow is making for ugly fishing conditions. McElroy said some lumberjack friends said there’s about 14 inches of snow in the Morton area. That means the Cowlitz River will run heavy, resulting in more water being spilled out of Riffe and Mayfield lakes. Imagine, McElroy said, the level of snow in the Packwood area.
“They’re going to lower the lakes like a son of a gun,” McElroy said.
McElroy reports the Peninsula rivers were mostly blown out Sunday afternoon, the Chehalis River is “real dirty,” and water is high at Barrier Dam and Blue Creek. Those areas might produce steelhead for bank plunkers using a bobber, jig and shrimp, and it appears a few steelhead escaped through the nets on the Chehalis up into the Skookumchuck River.
Still, with fish coming up, there are some opportunities. Try the west side of the Cowlitz River from Vader down to Longview. McElroy said there are plenty of spots for bank anglers along that stretch, and there definitely are fish in the water. However, if the Toutle River muddies the waters, forget fishing below where it enters the Cowlitz.
“It’s a real guessing game when the weather is like this,” McElroy said.
Another area worth a trip is the Columbia River. McElroy said counts at Bonneville are looking decent, and there is hope the upcoming springers in “The Big C” might be as good as it was three years ago.
The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife reports “spring chinook fever is beginning to take hold on the Columbia river.” WDFW counted 50 boats on the lower river in mid-February at Bonneville Dam. That number will rise to almost 2,000 boats per day by the end of this month. Just as where there’s smoke, there’s fire, where there’s boats, there’s fish.
“At first, the fish usually arrive in fits and starts, then eventually start moving upriver in a steady flow,” said Joe Hymer, a fish biologist for WDFW. “Through March, we expect to see the number of boat and bank anglers on the river to increase week by week.”
The forecast calls for 198,400 upriver spring Chinook to return to the Columbia River this year, which is about average, but well below last year’s bumper crop of 315,345 fish. Also, the number of more mature, five-year-old Chinook is forecast to be up by a factor of four compared to last year. Yee-ha!
“We’re already seeing a high number of large fish in the early catch,” Hymer said. “Those five-year-olds generally run 18 to 30 pounds apiece.”
Starting today through April 4, the fishing on the Columbia River expands 22 miles upriver to Rooster Rock.
For those ready to try something besides the rivers, now might be a good time to head for salt water. Try serf perch at Grayland. Forget the lakes for now. Riffe is too cold, as is Mayfield. Carlisle Lake and Fort Borst Pond both closed yesterday.
