Launched out of the Ocean Shores Marina with my good buddy and host, Katosan, at about 6:30 am... effortless bar crossing even in a 16 ft skiff. A flat ocean made for a fairly quick run out to the 200 ft zone. Stopped next to a raft of birds, and Katosan dropped the first line down to 35 ft. Before I could even get my line baited and clipped to the downrigger on my side of the boat.... BOOM.... fish on! A feisty 7# silver falls victim to K's secret flasher/hootchie combo:



Damn! So much for that "secret" combo... sorry Katosan!

WOW... this is too easy... but we're both intent on bagging a nice king. He releases the inaugural coho, and drops the goods one more time. At least this time he has the courtesy of at least letting me get a plug-cut brined blue-label herring in the water (just barely) before hooking up again. Second drop, second fish for Katosan! Another 7-8# coho to the boat, a quick de-hooking, and he was off to the races We look at the water as we are releasing this fish, and the surface is just ALIVE with bait. Quick, get 'em back in!

Next, it's my turn to crank in and release another silver in that 7-8 pound range. We take turns repeating this routine almost non-stop on coho ranging from 4-8 pounds.... in two hours, two rods put 9 coho to the boat out of 11 downrigger clip releases. Yeah, a couple of those coho were probably too small to get their mouths around my big blues.... OK, I fess up, that's just a cracker excuse!

I stayed true to my "big bait = big fish" theory and drowned my 7th blue label to 55 ft. A few minutes later , the clip pops to the unmistakable deep-pumping headshakes of a nice king. My instincts are confirmed when the fish sounds on a line-peeling run straight for the bottom... YEE HAW.... king on!





After digitally documenting the battle, Katosan scooped this overfed fatty for the fishNphysician:

Just look at the girth on this pig! Didn't measure it, but I would guess this porker had nearly 3 X 4 proportions. Lucky for me that FishNg1 decided to throw this one back so I could have a chance at a keeper.


As the wind picked up, the fishing got progressively tougher. We worked our way out to about 250 of water before turning back. We threw some Apex's at 'em but never got bit. The hootchie was outfishing the plug-cut herring by about 60:40 on the silvers, but the big blue herring was the only thing that tempted a respectable king to the boat. We had two more shaker king jacks, and a sub-legal 5-6# fish that missed the cutoff by about an inch. Funny thing is the wee-bitty kings came from the deepest depths (70-80 ft) where we thought we were prospecting for a big hawg... go figure!

We ended the day at 5:00 pm with 13 fish to the boat (not counting the two shaker kings) for 20 strikes. Katosan decided to keep the last silver for his neighbor. Keeping that 3# runt was a little disappointing after having released so many that were more than twice his size earlier in the day. Oh well, that's fishing.

The run in to port was surprisingly smooth given the wind chop. It really didn't get bad until we were just outside the bar. Things were really smooth after going past the North Jetty, then we got a good pummelling rounding northbound in toward Ocean Shores. As we quartered into the final strecth toward the marina, we got absolutely drenched! Thank God for Helly's and Grunden's.

Overall a GREAT opening day. Don't forget your sunscreen and your de-hooker, folks... you'll need them to deal with the sun and the silvers!

Tight lines to all....

Well done FP, that's a beaut of a king for sure! I can't wait for ocean silvers, love the kings... but have them in my freezer, I can't wait for fresh grilled coho. Don't get me wrong, chinook's are a bonus but you won't find me throwing back too many coho over 6 lbs, although I do prefer the late season low-teen fish. Man, I'm heading out of town until July 11, then I'm hitting the Big Blue, CAN'T WAIT. Tight lines, FC.

I forgot to mention that we saw 3 commercial trollers working the area for salmon.

I thought those guys were done.

What's the scoop? Anybody out there know for sure?

Well done FP and thanks for posting

I talked to a member of the Quinault tribe at the commercial dock and he said that the Makahs were still trolling...didn't realize they came so far down the coast. The guy I was talking to was long lining for halibut out in 600-800 ft of water....he was cleaning quite a few. We watched the draggers coming in at all hours. It is amazing that there is any seafood left in our oceans with all that dragging and netting going on.

That sure is a pretty fish.

Great pictures and story to go along with them. I had my camera but kept it in the bag, all day, had pictures to take but it just seemed that we wanted to get the next bait back in the water rather than take pics. Next time I will be sure to take some pictures, can't let good memories slip away without pictures!

Wasn't Sunday a hoot, with that great weather and water and fish to boot. We had a very similar day to yours, as most seemed to have. Monday was much different, even the charters were have trouble finding fish and it was too rough to move much when you did set down..

Caught and released several fish never the less, kept a nice king and a silver before heading in (early for me) at around 1:30, because my partner was having too much fun looking at the side of my boat, didn't know what he was looking for, but he sure was making some God awful noises. LOL

Sorry Ray......you did tell me to find a gun and shoot you to put you out of your misery.

Steve

Thanks for sharing the nice pics.

Nice chromer slab! FP.
Sometime soon, I want to fish the Westport area waters for big slabs, like you did.
What kind of 16'r boat is that you have?

Not my boat... belongs to Katosan. All I can tell you is it ain't got much for freeboard, but it has a self-bailing deck and a capable automatic bilge pump. Powered with a 60HP Merc 4-stroke prop. Gets the job done out to 17 miles, weather permitting. Fishes two guys great in the salt... three would be a b it of a problem... four NO WAY!

FP,
In the future, I hope to get a small boat with similiar setup like ketosan's boat.
I already have a Lavro DB, but I also like to have a boat for Salts if you know what I mean.
Hopefully, my wife will agree with my plan.