Fishing Updates

June 11 , 2006

The week started with bright sunshine and strong afternoon winds coming off the Fairweather Mountains.  By early Monday afternoon most boats were tired of the waves and were either back at the lodge or fishing up the inlet.  Few fish were caught.  The sunshine persisted through Wednesday.  The salmon fishing was slow, so slow in fact that the commercial fishing boats left the area.

Thursday the weather changed.  We were greeted by welcome rain and calm waters.  The fish also responded, particularly the halibut.  Guests caught a 96 pounder ( it had a bite taken from it's belly some time ago, probably by a shark, or it may have made the 100 pound club).  There were also several halibut taken in the 60-80 pound range.  Several boats brought in nice halibut catches on both Thursday and Friday.  The guests this week were interesting in that none of the boats brought in small fish even though they caught lots of smaller halibut.  Rather, they did lots of catch and release.  Thus, when you look at the pounds of fillets each guest brought home it is much lower than our normal average of near 80 pounds.

Salmon fishing started picking up late in the week.  We caught several kings, some chums, silvers, a pink and a red salmon.  Saturday staff caught several more kings, and by 8:00 AM on this Monday morning guests had already caught a king, a chum, and a silver.  Early reports are encouraging.

I mentioned before that water temperatures have been colder than normal and that has probably delayed the salmon runs.  The 5-6 days of sunshine last two weeks have warmed the water and we see lots of chums jumping so the migration is beginning.

The herring schools seem large and plentiful this summer which means lots of feed for the salmon and halibut.  We also have large numbers of humpback whales which is another indicator of good herring populations.

— Doc

Previous Reports:

• June 4, 2006
• May 28, 2006
• May 8, 2006
• May 4, 2006
• 2005 Fishing Season