The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife this week approved a temporary rule increasing the combined steelhead/salmon bag limit to total of three fish a day on the Willamette, Clackamas and Sandy rivers, effective June 18 through Oct. 31.
The 2010 upriver spring chinook salmon return to the Columbia River is unlikely to set a modern-day record as was forecast in preseason, but a companion run -- hatchery fish that left lower river estuary "select areas" two or more years ago -- looks like it's already the best ever.
It's time to get hooked on the Northern Pikeminnow Sport Reward Fishery Program, which kicks off Saturday, May 1, in the lower Columbia and Snake rivers, say promoters of the annual effort to catch predatory fish that zero in on juvenile salmon and steelhead.
Already this year, the sport fishing effort aimed at spring chinook salmon in the lower Columbia River -- 166,027 angler trips -- is the highest since 2002.
Anglers will get another weekend of fishing on the lower Columbia River despite bumping up against an early-season spring chinook salmon catch "guideline" due to a high level of effort and high catch rates.
Despite stormy weather that has roiled the lower Columbia River over the past week or so, anglers continue to haul in large numbers of fish from what is expected to be a record run of upriver spring chinook salmon.
The Confederated Salish-Kootenai Tribes are launching a public review process for a controversial lake trout netting proposal for Montana's Flathead Lake, starting with upcoming meetings in Polson, Kalispell and Missoula.
A burst of rainbow trout productivity in the South Fork of the Snake River has prompted state officials to set a cash bounty on the non-native fish species with the aim of reducing the number that interbreed with treasured native Yellowstone cutthroat trout populations.
Wan Teece of Enterprise caught a kokanee weighing 8.23 pounds, measuring 26.25 inches in length with a girth of 16 inches at Wallowa Lake on March 24, breaking the Oregon state record for kokanee and possibly a national record, too.
Spring chinook salmon fishing is starting to pick up on the lower Columbia River, as are counts of upriver fish crossing over Bonneville Dam, in what is expected to be the tip of the iceberg -- an overall return of 559,900 to the Columbia-Snake River basin.
The record 2009 summer steelhead return to Idaho and northeast Oregon streams has continued unabated into a new year that also may see the biggest upriver spring chinook salmon run in modern times.
Oregon's recreational and commercial ocean salmon seasons scheduled to open from March 15 through April 30 have been closed due, in part, to a low projected run of fall chinook to the Sacramento River.
The prospect of a huge spring chinook return to the Columbia River basin already has anglers in a fever.
With a record upriver spring chinook salmon return expected, anglers should be able to land catch and keep as many as 17,200 hatchery salmon during an early fishing season mapped this week for the lower Columbia River by Oregon and Washington fishery managers.
Despite estimates of a 2010 upriver spring chinook salmon run that will be the best ever, non-tribal anglers and gill-netters in the lower Columbia River will be held in check to some degree until managers know that that dream run is indeed building.
High catch rates and angler effort have made short work of the 2010 white sturgeon sport season in the Bonneville Dam pool despite a doubling of the allowed harvest in the Columbia River reservoir.
It is expected that the states of Oregon and Washington will decide next week on a white sturgeon harvest reduction on the lower Columbia River mainstem of 35 to 45 percent over recent years' allocations.
The first known spring chinook salmon catch of the year was reported Feb. 1 in the Columbia River off Davis Bar, west of Vancouver, Wash., according to the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife's "Weekender Report."
The Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission will consider adopting a new package of sportfishing rules for 2010-12, as well as updates to the Columbia River sturgeon management policy, during a public meeting Feb. 4-6 in Olympia.
Last summer, the Idaho Fish and Game Commission opened 130 miles of the Salmon River from Island Park in Salmon City upstream to the Sawtooth Fish Hatchery for chinook salmon fishing.
Biologists working to recover the kokanee population in Lake Pend Oreille are encouraged by progress seen in 2009.
With another poor run of smelt expected to return to the Columbia River and its tributaries, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife this week announced it would limit sport fishing on the Cowlitz River sport fishery to only four days this winter.
Fishing seasons that begin in the new year on the lower Columbia River mainstem are designed to keep the eulachon (smelt) harvest to a minimum, and the allowable white sturgeon catch in 2010 will be less than in recent years, though it is yet to be determined how much less.
Adult salmon returns to the Columbia-Snake river basin should be improved almost across the board, according to a Dec. 17 preliminary draft "2009 Adult Returns and 2010 Expectations" produced by fishery officials.
With the 2010 coho salmon return the Willamette River basin on track to break existing records, Oregon fishery managers decided late last month to increase the bag limit for anglers.
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