Accidental Coho Salmon Fishing

When we launched on Saturday it was overcast but still tee shirt weather. As soon as we got into the channel we were putting on our parkas. By the time we got to the Navy base a few minutes later, we were in a full-fledged rain squall. As we cleared the jetty I hit the throttle and put it on plane, but soon rain was running off my glasses and my wet, ungloved hands were getting very cold. “Summer is over” I thought. We had been headed for Possession Point at the south tip of Whidbey Island, but we got as far as Mukilteo and gave up on driving into the rain for the time being. We dropped our crab pots and fished there for a while, but it was fairly unproductive other than one Dungeness and a couple of red rocks. By the time we finished our first pot pull, the rain had stopped and sunbreaks were starting to appear. We decided to dock at Mukilteo for a quick break. The dock there is in a very exposed location and has no breakwater to protect it, so it was really a rough and exciting mooring.

When we got back into the boat, we decided the weather was good enough to press on to Possession Point. We had never been there before; it was a completely new area for us. When we got there we found many boats and many people fishing from shore, because it’s a well-known salmon fishing spot. Even though the coho season is beginning, we hadn’t brought any gear for salmon and hadn’t read up on them at all. We just dropped our pots and decided to bottom fish again while they soaked. The sun had come out again, and soon we were back to tee shirts. Summer wasn’t over after all.

We found no Dungeness there, just a few more red rocks. In addition to the usual various sizes of sand dabs and one rockfish which we released, we were shocked when my girlfriend unexpectedly pulled up a small kokanee-sized salmon! I had never heard of anybody catching salmon with bottom fishing gear, without flashers or anything. We were unprepared and hadn’t done our research. We didn’t know what the size limit was, how many we were allowed, how to tell wild vs. hatchery, or even what kind of salmon it was. It wasn’t that big anyway, so I persuaded her that we should throw it back. By then we started to see fish jumping out of the water all around us, some within a few feet of the boat. Then, she actually caught two more salmon the exact same way. The first two had been hooked on the outside of their body, like they had collided with our hooks instead of swallowing them. The third was the largest and had actually swallowed the hook like you would expect. We took photos and all three got thrown back.

The opposite of the last two weekends, the sea had been rough in the morning and smooth and calm in the afternoon. It had been a long day by then, and it was a joy to cross Possession Sound for the 40-minute cruise back home on such a lovely evening. We didn’t catch as many crabs as in our usual spot, but we had explored two new places and had learned a lot. We put 5.6 hours on the engine that day, a new one-day record for us. The next morning we studied the photos and the rules, and the awful news sank in: we had thrown back three perfectly legal coho salmon! Now my girlfriend wants her fish back, and she’ll never trust Mr. Dudley Do-Right again. Fortunately, coho season will run for a few more weeks. We only have one more weekend though before my boat goes into the shop to hopefully have that squeaky engine issue dealt with for good.

Today is the last day of summer crabbing for this year. We had hoped to go out and catch some more today, but I finally decided I needed a day to rest, sleep in, and catch up on “real life” chores. We’ve had a pretty good run of it though! We have fished literally every weekend this summer except one, and it’s exhausting to maintain that pace given how much work it is. We’ve gained a lot of experience in a short time. We’ve put 35 hours on the engine since June 1st, and caught 35 Dungeness crabs. Winter crabbing starts in October for hardy souls. I think I’ll consider buying some high-quality cold weather fishing outfits to try to extend our season. There are still many adventures yet to be had this year.

[Prologue January 2025] now that I have more experience, I understand that the way we were catching salmon was by “snagging”, which is illegal in some fisheries but probably legal in saltwater. I also understand that you should keep the fish in the water while you’re sorting out whether you should keep it or not, instead of dangling it on a line in the air.