Puget Sound

Fished the outgoing for three hours today. Not a single grab, or even a pluck. I guess this is my regression to the mean. 😏

Beautiful weather with a little drizzle at times, and a little chop came up about an hour after tide change. Not much current at all though.

One gent landed a 16 in rezzie(no fin), at tide change. Other than that just dead for the four of us fishing.

Still, better than doing chores the entire day! 🙂
 
Creatch’r said:
Beware of wader swamping rollers tomorrow morning between sunrise and 9am coming off the bow of a big, shiny new blue and white vessel as we pass through the sound on our way back to Seattle.
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You'll be bucktailing off the back?
 
Creatch’r said:
We’ve been averaging about 18 knots since we left Panama. Just a touch too fast but was still tempting some days along the way. Maybe we will have to back off the throttle in the sound to humpy speeds.
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I bet a wahoo or mackerel or mako could hit that.
 
Nick Clayton said:
Absolutely perfect fishing conditions out there today.

@jasmillo and I spent a full, action packed day out there. On the water at 5am and reeled in just after 530 pm. Clouds and zero wind all day. Dreamy

Started off super foggy and our first two or three hours we had solid coho fishing with a few pinks mixed in. Didn't take many fish pics today but we each released some nice coho, lost some nice coho, and missed plenty of grabs. Fog finally burned off so we headed out in search of humpy mania and boy did we find it. From when we got to our destination and doubled on basically our first casts until we reeled in at the end of the day it was pretty much consistent action. Just school after school of pinks moving through. My wrist is legitimately sore. I don't care what anyone says, I love chasing those things!

As has been the trend lately there was just non stop herring everywhere we went.


Plenty of fish were caught, plenty were lost. Just a great example of Puget Sound being Puget Sound.

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For some reason every fish I hooked in the morning wanted to run towards the trolling motor and make me run around the console and end up with line all over the damn boat.

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Only fish pic I snapped today. One of many doubles


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Rods were bent all day long
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Beautiful evening on the run in

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Does anyone know what this setup is? Never seen this before. Just north of the bridge on the north side of the canal

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we've walked by it a few times and it is an oyster farm ...
 
Had a blast fishing SRC today, fished the last 90 minutes of uptide, right on top of a large school that fed the entire time. The fish were varied in size, 14-18 inch. Lots of site targeting boils but it didn't really matter, you could see packs of fish following. I tested the missed strike options of letting it drop, varying the retrieve and changing absolutely nothing- none made any difference, though the letting it drop is probably the most fun. What clearly made a difference was the hand-over-hand retrieve, to think of the years I wasted with one hand strips

At one point just about 30 minutes before the tide changed, multiple fish were jumping out of the water at the same time. Definitely got my fix today!
 
Wadin' Boot said:
Had a blast fishing SRC today, fished the last 90 minutes of uptide, right on top of a large school that fed the entire time. The fish were varied in size, 14-18 inch. Lots of site targeting boils but it didn't really matter, you could see packs of fish following. I tested the missed strike options of letting it drop, varying the retrieve and changing absolutely nothing- none made any difference, though the letting it drop is probably the most fun. What clearly made a difference was the hand-over-hand retrieve, to think of the years I wasted with one hand strips

At one point just about 30 minutes before the tide changed, multiple fish were jumping out of the water at the same time. Definitely got my fix today!
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Wait, there are still searun cutts in the Sound right now? And you can fish for them? Who knew?
If this was North Sound I wonder if they were staging for river entry or something. Sounds like a blast.
 
Spent 13 hours today out in the Tiderunner. I'm currently in a Humpy induced coma. Got a little later start than I normally do. Went 0-2 at the first spot, didn't stay pinned long enough to know if they were coho or pinks.

Navigating around Puget Sound in a 15ft center console is not the most fun in this. Just hug the shoreline.IMG_20230807_090318.jpg

The fog did eventually clear and I picked up a couple pinks out in the open water while I waited for my friend that I was picking up for the afternoon.

After I picked my buddy up off the beach we made the long run to another spot. Upon arrival it appeared devoid of life. After about 30-40 minutes I was ready to move on when we spotted a fish jump down the beach. Then another, and another, and another. Pretty soon we were into some of the best Pink fishing I've experienced. Pretty much non stop action for about 4 hours. Doubles galore. Whole packs of Pinks chasing down our flies. My fish finder was marking what at first glance looked like giant bait balls, but was actually huge schools of pinks. Once the sun came out you could see the schools swim by under the boat.

One of many doubles.
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Yours truly enjoying the nice weather and getting pink slimed.
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My friend is relatively new to fly fishing and has been skeptical about salmon on a fly rod but after today he told me this was the best day he's ever had on the water. He even landed what I believe was an ocean coho that was swimming with the pinks. I netted the fish which was probably 8lbs at least and then it flipped out of my net and broke off before we could get a closer look. I felt pretty bad about that one.

We finally called it quits after a long day of fish and laughs. Totaled up around 50 miles in my little center console. It's the Puget Sound equivalent of a "beater with a heater". It's not pretty but it goes pretty much wherever I want depending on conditions.

Breeze and current combining to provide some additional excitement on the ride back to the ramp.
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Headed for the smoker.IMG_20230807_181300.jpg
 
Porter2 said:
More importantly where and how did you catch those two hearted IPA’s. That is supposedly one of the higher rated top notch IPA’s being made.
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It's a great classic IPA! They just started distribution to WA a few months ago. I can get it at Fred Meyer now.
 
We past port Angeles at about 6:30am and from there all the way to possession there were visible schools of pinks finning and splashing almost everywhere I seemed to look including one school that looked to be 50 yards across and all noses and fins. Water was absolute glass and from 60’ above waterline I could see a damn long way. Cool to experience. Saw zero humpies unfortunately, so that’s a bad omen. Also wasn’t close enough to the popular FF beaches to see if our wake sunk any stripping baskets. But I did see what looked to be some beach fishermen enjoying a beautiful morning. I hope the salad was low, the loops tight, and the perfection loops strong.
 
If I’m reading this correctly, MA 11 is open to shore fishing only in August.
SF

wdfw.wa.gov

Marine Area 11 salmon season update

Action: Reopens salmon angling. Species affected: Salmon. Location: Marine Area 11. Effective Dates and Rules:
wdfw.wa.gov wdfw.wa.gov
 
I could maybe fish a few hours in the morning tomorrow, but it’ll be through the bottom of the tide. I know the answer but still, think it’s worth a shot? Guess I shouldn’t have to worry about the current pulling the canoe around and dealing with the periodic paddles back up current.
 
Slack low can be good at times, especially if your target is humpies.
SF
 
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