Outdoor Report 3/22

It is now that time of year, you can go spring chinook fishing or winter steelhead fishing and catch chrome fish wherever you go. Fresh steelhead are still entering most of the north coast streams as well as the valley rivers. The broodstock steelhead programs that are being run on multiple river systems have created a unique fishery where chrome bright hatchery winter steelhead are available for harvest all the way through the beginning of April. This time of year can be very fun with a good mixture of hatchery and wild fish to keep you busy, accompanied by weather that, typically, is warmer than the last few months and longer days. Early spring steelhead fishing can be very productive. Bobber and jig, pink worm or bait are great options for those wanting to float fish. For the “old school” drift angler, bait, yarn, corkies, cheaters or spin-n-glos are all productive options to try. Spoons and spinners are also fun techniques to use, with warming water temps the hardware bites can be vicious. Spring chinook fishing is getting better by the day on the Columbia and Willamette. The Columbia has been the best from the woodland area down stream, with a large portion of the fish being caught trolling herring and a flasher. The other portion of the fish are being caught by those that are anchor fishing plugs, prawn spinners or even herring. As we progress towards April the airport area will start to produce good numbers of fish as well as the Camas to Beacon Rock section. There are spring chinook being caught in the Portland Harbor area as well as the Multnomah Channel. These fisheries are trolling dominant with most anglers fishing herring or prawns, although some people prefer to troll spinners and do quite well. Most of these Willamette fish will be suspended up off the bottom, so trusting your electronics will help you dial in where the fish are that day. Catch and release sturgeon fishing has been extremely good lately. Lots of large shaker size and all the way up to small oversized sturgeon are in the mix. If you’re looking for something to do with your extra herring after a morning of springer fishing, anchoring up and sturgeon fishing is a great way to spend an afternoon. Herring, squid, sand shrimp and anchovies have all been producing well recently. Trout stocking has been underway for several weeks now and over 25 local lakes have been stocked in March alone. Henry Hagg Lake has received over 16,000 trout this month with most being legal size, although they did also plant several hundred Trophy size trout. Those fishing from a boat will do well trolling small flatfish, wedding rings or small spinners. If you are going to be fishing from the bank use powerbait, worms or salmon eggs on the bottom as well as under a bobber. Smallmouth bass fishing is just getting started in the Columbia and Willamette. The fish are still deep, so fishing extra deep diving crankbaits and soft plastics will be your best bet. This is also a great time of year to target walleye in the Columbia and Willamette. Most folks will be trolling worm harnesses with smile blades or small spinner blades to cover the most ground effectively. FMO employees that have headed west have had success fishing the ocean already this spring. The surf perch fishing is starting to warm up. The go to bait recently for the redtails, has been the Berkley Gulp Sandworms. Fish your bait of choice on 2 size 6 snelled hooks run dropper or drop shot style on your mainline above a 3 to 4 oz pyramid sinker. If you are looking for the right rod for this type of fishing, Fisherman’s has a good stock of the new Okuma Rockaway Surf Rods that were especially designed for this type of fishing. Those that are making it offshore are doing ok on the sea bass and very well on lingcod. Jigs, shrimp flies and large curly tail grubs have all been producing well. Remember that when you are bottom fishing from a boat you need to have a “descender” apparatus on board. Our most popular is the Shelton Fish Descender. This apparatus allows the safe release of any fish that you bring up from the depth and is now required to be used by ODFW. As always be sure to check local regulations before heading out. Tight lines, shoot straight and most of all be safe out there.