Fisheries managers have announced that the popular spring chinook fishery on central Oregon’s Deschutes River will not open in 2013 due to anticipated low returns of both hatchery produced and wild fish.
The Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission will next week ponder nearly 70 proposed sportfishing rule changes, including one that is intended to boost the harvest of walleye, smallmouth bass and channel catfish in the mid and upper Columbia and lower Snake rivers and thus reduce predation on protected salmon and steelhead.
The Idaho Department of Fish and Game is set to launch a comprehensive study of the lake trout population in the northern panhandle’s Priest Lake as the first step toward a better understanding of how and why the big, non-native “mackinaw” thrive.
Oregon and Washington fishery managers on Wednesday established new rules for the white sturgeon fishery that will reduce harvest rates for the fourth straight year for the lower Columbia River (146 river miles from Bonneville Dam to the river mouth).
It is expected to be slim pickings this year for lower Columbia River fishers who like to pursue white sturgeon.
And there will be no pickings at all for eulachon, commonly known as smelt.
Starting New Year’s Day, anglers will be required to use barbless hooks until further notice when fishing for salmon, steelhead and cutthroat on a large section of the Columbia River.
“Preliminary” results released this week by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife indicate that lower Columbia River anglers did well this year despite 2012 salmon and steelhead runs that, for the most part, returned in fewer numbers than had been expected.
Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire signed an executive order this week noting recommendations from her Blue Ribbon Panel on Ocean Acidification to address the growing problem of ocean acidification in Washington, which threatens the state’s shellfish resources and its $270 million shellfish industry.
Anglers on north Idaho’s vast Lake Pend Oreille will next year likely get to target kokanee for the first time since 2000 when fisheries for the land-locked sockeye salmon were closed because of plummeting populations.
Idaho Fish and Game planned to stock more than 250 steelhead in the Boise River Thursday, Nov. 1 -- the first of two planned releases during the next few weeks.
New data collected by Columbia Riverkeeper reveal high levels of toxic pollution in fish caught by an angler in the Portland area’s Columbia Slough as well in resident fish caught upstream and downstream.
Oregon and Washington fishery managers decided Tuesday that the white sturgeon retention season for anglers on the lower Columbia River upstream of the Wauna powerlines will not open Oct. 20 as planned.
Anglers will be allowed to retain adult hatchery chinook salmon along the 70-mile stretch of the lower Columbia River during a weeklong pilot fishery that started Monday and runs through Sunday, Sept. 16.
The total “kept” sport catch for adult fall chinook salmon from the lower Columbia River (from Bonneville Dam downstream nearly 130 river miles to Oregon’s Tongue Point) during August 2012 was 7,584 fish, which is the highest catch for the month on a record dating back to at least 1969.
Record sockeye salmon returns flooding the upper Columbia River region this year have allowed Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife fishery managers to extend fishing opportunity in Lake Wenatchee sockeye through Labor Day and increase the daily bag limit.
Fisheries officials say that the estimated total recreational fishing “handle” of 20,451 steelhead trout during July on the lower Columbia River mainstem from Bonneville Dam down to the mouth is the highest on a record dating back to at least 1969.
The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife this week adopted temporary rules closing the upper reaches of the Sandy River to the harvest of summer steelhead through Aug. 31 largely as a means of protecting threatened chinook salmon that ply the waters.
Anglers and sport-fishing charters off the California coast are returning to the docks with full boats and happy customers as the strong ocean salmon bite continues, making 2012 one of the best salmon seasons in years.
Sturgeon anglers fishing in the Columbia and Snake river reservoirs above McNary Dam are asked to watch for and return special tags found in some of the fish.
Anglers got a holiday treat this week with the approval of a Saturday-Sunday reopening of the lower Columbia River spring chinook salmon fishery, which had been closed since April 13.
Anglers will have at least four more days to fish for hatchery-reared spring chinook salmon on a section of the Columbia River stretching 163 miles upstream from Bonneville Dam.
Catch rates have improved for both sport and commercial fisheries but apprehension over what appears to be a late arriving, or light, spring chinook salmon run to the Columbia-Snake river system has forced state managers to pause at least until a run-size estimate can be recalculated in early May.
Both sport and commercial fishermen continue to get a bite at the apple as fishery managers await what they still believe will be a relatively high return of upriver spring chinook salmon to the Columbia-Snake river system.
With the lower Columbia River running high, cold and murky and filled with debris, anglers have had little success so far this spring – a fact that prompted state managers on Thursday to allow an extra week of early-season salmon fishing.
Idaho Power’s trout-stocking program can bring some thrills to a lot of anglers, and none bigger than the one Marvin Channer of Boise got when he recently won $1,000 in the twice-annual jaw-tag drawing.
An Earthwise Knowledge Initiative Publication
