I had an interesting conversation after my daily skunking down at Pt. Defiance this morning.

The guy working the ramp said a total of 7-8 fish came in all morning. Of these, 3 came from a single boat trolling and 2 came from a single fisherman jigging. All the other boats (I suppose aside from a few other one-off fish) were skunked. This seemed consistent with the 80/20 rule: i.e. that a small percentage of fishermen catch the vast majority of the fish.

I asked the guy at the ramp a few questions figuring if anyone could confirm the 80/20 rule he could. His responses surprised me. He said that a) he knows by face or boat all the guys who regularly fish that ramp and b) nobody consistently catches fish. He said some guys have a slightly better catch rate but for the most part it's "like the lotto." More often than not the experts are skunked and a first-timer comes in with his limit.

I've been fishing here since I got back to Seattle in January and I figure I average around 3 keeper kings for every 10 days on the water. Normally a low catch rate like this would bother me but I looked at the Pt. Defiance fish checker tallies and by my calculations, in the first two weeks of July the 594 anglers sampled caught a total of 78 Chinook. This would be an average of 1.3 fish per 10 angler days on the water, so I guess I can feel good about my catch rate if the first two weeks of July represent a normal average. Still, 7 skunkings out of 10 days fishing seems like a lot.

So after all that, here's a question to the board: Over the entire year in the sound, how many keeper size kings do you average out of 10 days fishing? (Really, no exaggerating!)

I have had five fish for six outings in the last week. Four kings (20, 15, 10, and 9#'s) and one humpie (5#'s). I don't know if the humpie counts.

Easy, seems like you do well, I've been reading your posts. 4 kings out of 6 days on the water (2/3) sounds like an excellent catch rate, esp compared to mine (1/3) and the ramp average (1/10). Roughly speaking, how many days on the water since January and how many keeper-size kings (even if C&Red) boated? Is the last week representative of your year-round averages?

Looking at my catch card, before last tuesday I had not caught a king/blackmouth since June 6th.

There has not been any fish.

My average may be a little skewed considering the endless hours of trolling I have put in since the June 1st opener. I was way overdue to have a good week.

Since January 1st, my catch rate was pretty good for blackmouth.

I might as well chime in and let you know that there is at least one guy willing to admit his skunkiness. I'm fishless in my last six trips. My faith is alive though...... my time will come..... and I sure hope it is soon!

Sideoff...

First, I really fear answering your catch ratio question...

Second, the summer fishery (returning fish) is a lot different from blackmouth fishing. (There are similarities, but still different.) So I am not sure if an equal answer on catch ratio can be compared. Several things would dictate a catch ratio on the summer fishery. First and most important would be the amount of returning fish. Also, we fishermen are at a disadvantage because returning fish do not feed. We need to find avenues to trigger instinct or anger them into hitting our offering. Just the opposite holds true for blackmouth. He generally hits our lures because of the need to eat.

Personally, I think PD is too over-rated and have stated this numerous times. I may fish here 2-3 weeks out of the year and that's it. Even then, whatever it takes, 9 out of 10 times far away from the other boats. PD is a fishery that is hit or miss day-to-day. Fish move in and out all the time. I think all the hype comes from all the great stories everyone always hears- especially summer time. True to a point, but again, day-to-day does it pump out fish? What makes PD so attractive is the fact that all returning South Sound fish tend to concentrate in the PD area before branching east or south. Even then, most of the fish only mingle in the area for a days or two max! So the adage of "fish where the fish are" is a helpful statement however, fish are scattered all over the Sound. Another area of attractiveness is the amount bait that always holds in the area. (The amount of bait has absolutely no effect on the returning fish- except Dogfish which migrate into the Sound to spawn.) Does this necessarily make this a quality fishing area? Not in my opinion. I am kind of comparing apples and oranges here, but take for instances a quality river. Folks line the hole. elbow to elbow, throwing gear at these same fish over and over. It eventually turns the fish off. So these fish move up, down or become tight lipped. The same effect happens at PD. Take any summer weekend at PD, 300-400 boats, each with two or more lines in the water trying to catch a few hundred fish. What are your odds? This one reason I encourage folks to get away from the other fishermen- eliminate your competition. I would rather fish for 10 salmon in one area by myself than have to compete with several anglers over a larger area. The odds are now in my favor.

Although there is a lot of skill in catching returning fish, there is also luck involved. Fish have to be there and willing to hit. Here are three tips to put more fish in your boat. (1) Fish away from the crowds. It is easier to put a fish in the boat if you are not competing with a metric **** ton of fishermen. (2) Fish just the opposite of every fishermen on the water. E.g., Nearly every swinging **** is out there fishing suspended. Fish like you are fishing for blackmouth. Remember, Chinook by nature, are deep water fish that like structure. They will be more apt to be deeper than shallower. This is especially true in periods of light- regardless of cloudy dark days or full sunshine! It is instinctual to be deep. Putting this together, by fishing deeper than most, you are further eliminating your competion and increasing your odds- especially if you are in areas of a lot of fishermen. (3) Use gear that makes lots of noise, i.e., flashers and or lake trolls, larger lures like spoons, Apex, hotchies with a Spin N' Glo or Cheater up front or rattle plugs. Make dang sure if your fishing below 40/50 feet that your lures glow. You only get one opportunity at a fish as he is passing. Make it loud and interesting!

OK I'll fess up.Between me and the wife we average one keeper every time out in the salt year round.Sometimes none sometimes four Point wake is WAAAy overrated but I say stay there :p You need to explore and experiment.Like DR said I have caught 90% of my Kings within 5 feet of the bottom.There's more between Point A and Point B than Point D(efience)

Downriggin,

Great stuff. Some very useful tips. I recognize the catch rates should improve significantly when the runs arrive (although so do the number of fishermen!). So winter vs summer should really be looked at separately.

One thing you mention that I wondered about was whether the catch rate declines on busy days. Does it matter how much competition is out there?

I looked back at the creel surveys again for the Pt Defiance boathouse & ramp. For all of July through the 20th, ie all three weeks, there were 769 anglers sampled and 98 fish. This supports the average of 1.3 fish per 10 angler days.

However--in this very rough analysis--I separated the days into two categories: those when more than 50 anglers were surveyed and those when less than 50 anglers were surveyed. This assumes the days with more surveys are because there are more fishermen and not just more surveyors, not that this would necessarily change anything. If anything, they probably have more surveyors on busier days so the two are related.

On those days with more than 50 anglers surveyed the catch rate actually averaged less than 1 fish per 10 angler days (.9). On those days when less than 50 anglers were surveyed, the catch rate was much higher: 2 fish per 10 angler days. On the extreme days, with more than 100 anglers surveyed, the catch rate declines to .7 fish per 10 angler days.

I think this supports your theory about avoiding competition. If the 80/20 rule does not hold (i.e. it is not true that some guys always catch fish and some guys never do), then your odds of catching a fish are nearly 3 times higher on the light angler days than on the busy ones. Wow!

Re: Pt. Defiance, it seems likely that this area's popularity is self-fulfilling. More anglers on the water = more fish caught = more popularity = more anglers on the water, etc. The real test would be the number of fish per angler days, which--based only on this limited sample--seems to decline on busy days even though the total number of fish caught is higher.

A lot can be said for being at the right place at the right time too.

Also, if you learn and know a stretch of water, like I have with Redondo, your catch rates will increase over time.

Sideoff,

I have never really looked at creel counts as an effective means of telling if fish are in the area or not. Couple reason for this... Just because 100 anglers caught 44 fish doesn't mean the fish are in. Could have been coincidence. On the contrary, 600 anglers with 18 fish doesn't mean fish aren't there either. They might be in the vicinity and just not triggered to hit or they came in and moved on... (One of the reason why the mouth of the PEW is closed until August.) This is why PD is so hit and miss. With the majority of returning being "westsiders," they could have easliy cut the corner at Dalco and headed east or they may still be in that area. Heck of one the better spots to fish for returning Kings is Gig Harbor or QM Harbor. So they are there.. just gotta find them. I think folks are just too pent up fishing PD- it's the lore! Yes, too many boats put returning fish down and off. But that's not to say a great bite could happen at anytime either... It is a double edge sword.

I forgot to mention some additional information in my previous post about why I fish deep (on the bottom) for Kings. With all the current hype about catching these monster hogs, folks are forgetting that blackmouth are still available. There are plenty of nice 3 year fish to be caught in the 7-10# range. So, with that, might as well target two types of fish (resident and returners) in the same stroke. Who knows, might nail that 40#'r !

My catch rate??!!! .

Ken

You just brought me good luck Kennyray.

This summer I started slow but I pick one up every oyhter time out. Lately it's been in 190ft.or more and hug the bottem.