Sky Chums

Never targeted them before, and looking for a little advice.

I have a couple close relatives visiting from out of state (one in early November, one over Thanksgiving) who haven't done much salmon fishing before. They probably don't have time for more than half a day of fishing, but I think they'd have a blast hooking up with chums.

I know runs have been down on the Sky, but any advice on good gravel bars to target them? I have a couple spots in mind, but would appreciate some advice here (or in a PM).

Best lures? I was planning on throwing spoons for some active fishing, but also taking spinning rods set up with bobber/jig/shrimp. Color?

Thanks in advance.

Agree on the float and jig set-up tipped with a piece of prawn.
Besides purple, cerise or black jigs work well.

The river is closed for chums and the run will be very small.

Sad state of affairs. Used to be a good fishery and provide lots of nutrients for future generations.

Its happening everywhere. No clue why though. ........... .

But open for coho.

Are you sure it's closed this year? I just looked at the regs, and see nothing about closed to Chums?

Yes
From the regs

SALMON Sept. 1-Dec. 31 Min. size 12". Daily limit 3 COHO only.

As per regs it is closed unless specifically mentioned in the regs that it is open, another little gem brought to us by our illustrious Dept!

Fishy

Hmmm, I'll have to double check on that? Usually the regs will spell out "closed to Chums" I've seen Chums harvested in the Snohomish this year.

This doesn't surprise me, there are many jerks that keep fish no matter what the regs say.

Yes it is closed, I have been pushing for the closure for the last several years, I discuss it with the group that manages the run both before and after the NOF meetings.

Or, it's open for chums and there is no limit because it doesn't say what the limit is. Your choice.

I hope this doesn't cause this thread to go off the rails, but here goes...

So, I've never seen anything in the regs that would prohibit an angler from fishing for a particular species, as long as the angler doesn't retain that species.

In other words, if the Sky is closed to chum retention, that doesn't necessarily mean it's closed to fishing for chum, just closed to harvesting chum. I've heard people talk about "targeting" a species as some sort of no-no, but I haven't seen anything in the regs about that.

Am I off base as far as the regs go?

Yes you are...this is the part that they use to prohibit fishing for a salmon when the season is closed for them:

****************

For all Game Fish and salmon, the Special
Rules show all of the fishing opportunities
for each freshwater area listed.

****************

It's on page 16 of the regulations.

If it doesn't list a salmon species as being "open", then it is closed...and there are no fishing opportunities for those species. The opportunity to purposely catch and release isn't there unless it is specifically listed.

Not only do those that are incidentally caught...like chums on the Snohomish system this year...have to be released, you can't intentionally fish for them, either.

Fish on...

Todd

P.S. Cue the same crowd as the flossers that will do it anyway because it can't be "proven" that you are fishing for chums...it doesn't really matter, that doesn't make it legal.

Maybe the regs should just say closed for chum and leave the ambiguity behind?

It's easier to say in the General Rules that if it's not specifically listed as open, then it's closed...otherwise they'd have to list every piece of water and every species of fish and say if it's open or closed for them.

Fish on...

Todd

I don't know, Todd, that's pretty vague language if they want to prohibit something. I mean, it makes sense as far as dates go, but the only reference to species in the special rules is in relation to a "limit." I'd say rule of leniency requires a strict interpretation against that.

Are you aware of any official agency interpretations of that language?

Not long ago they did, wording has changed though.

If legal to target....they would list it as "catch and release only"

okay thanks ondarvr. I haven't lived/fished in Washington in over 10 years and I didn't realize the regs read differently.

I guess what I'm saying is this: The only fishing opportunity for salmon is listed in the special rules. The special rules say salmon is open Sept 1 through Dec 1. It also says the daily limit is 3 Coho only. That can easily be interpreted as saying that "salmon" is open for fishing that entire time, but you can only retain 3 coho per day, even with the general language saying the only opportunity is listed in the special rules.

I think I just missed the point - or was there one?

Why are you promoting commercial fisheries only on the Snohomish Chum?

Some of these Chums could be targeted further out in the salt, but the tribes and local NI netting has been closed, and is supposed to be closed this year too.

They have over estimated the return on this run for the last 7 years, this year they say it will be down.


Last year they said there would be 10,000 extra paper fish, Without looking at my notes I think they said 37 to 38,000 would return and 28,000 were needed for escapement. They said it could be opened because the tribes possibly wanted their 5,000 share, which meant sportsman could have 5,000 also. I asked them to keep it closed for both.

It stayed closed for both and maybe around 12,000 came back.

FYI -
The 2014 forecast for the Snohomish is 26,000 with an additional 25,000 forecasted to return to Tulalip.

The Snohomish forecast is based on fry abundance on the near shore salt beaches. The fact that the returns have consistently been below forecasts is an indication that marine survivals have been below recent averages. I suppose that would be expect as things move forward from record returns decade or so ago.

Curt

"The fact that the returns have consistently been below forecasts is an indication that marine survivals have been below recent averages. "

Or...that method of netting smolts and playing a guessing game is bogus...not saying I have the answers...just pointing out that this method has failed us many many times and has costed us our chum run in my opinion...

Part of the problem is they have no clue as to how many fish returned during the peak because they count fish in only a small section of the river, they had no idea the area the counts were done in represented only about 1/3 of the run. This is what lead them to believe the numbers were either increasing or at least staying level when they were actually declining rapidly.

The area where they count in the river is the only area with any chums left, the rest of the river is now barren, this lead them to believe the run was doing OK when 2/3 of the run was gone. They didn't know this (or at least pay any attention to it) until I was looking through the data and brought it up a few years ago. The response was, "well the in river count method was established 30+ years ago and was poorly thought out, but that's how its done" .

If the beach counting of smolts was used to develop a method of predicting runs for the Snohomish system, then the method is flawed, and not in a small way. If 2/3 of the run is gone and you can't identify it in the beach counts then the method is worthless. Again, they only do counts on some beaches, and when the Bio's were at my house and were asked if they could identify which river system the smolts counted came from, they said no.

If you pick a beach to count that has ideal conditions to hold smolts, then even when there are very few in the salt they will congregate in that location, there may be millions elsewhere, or none, you have no idea. This is the same scenario as in the river. How can you base estimated returns on such incomplete and faulty data.

RottenChum/Ondarvr -

I was merely reporting on what the current forecasts were (it actually supports the notion that the return is not expected to be large) and further how that forecast is generated.

The fry abundance method was adopted in the mid-1990s after comparing how that accuracy of that method compared to other methods using a 30 year data base and comparing side by side forecasts using alternate methods. It generally preformed better than other methods because it included a look one step closer to the adult returns than other methods.

I'm curious given your extensive knowledge of Snohomish chums what would be a more valid method of forecasting the basin chum runs and how that would improve the management of the population and the fisheries it supports.

Curt

There will be commercial take on the Snohomish chum stock this year with a twist.

In some recent past years, only the tribe has fished the salt for the most part for chums. The commercial fishing schedule will double down this year with the non tribal commercials fishing as well --not only in 8D but 8A as well.

You can have a sure winning bet placed that the return of chum to the Snohomish River system will be low this year but within the realm of escapement needs only.

Commission policy provides for some fishing for chum for sport if it is open to commercials. We are shooting ourselves in the foot if we don’t take advantage of it in NOF. Either we get our share or the commercials take our share.

It is a fallacy to believe that more chums will be coming back to the Snohomish if sport fishers do not claim our share.

Curt

I have only the observations of how accurate and efficient the run estimates have been over the last 50+ years that I have lived on Lake Washington, on the water on Camano Isl, and now on the Sky. I have witnessed tremendous increases and decreases in run sizes and only after the fact did the professional managers create theories as to what happened and why. Most of these ups and downs caught those that are paid to study and manage these things by complete surprise, then when the exact same scenario plays out again they are surprised once more.

Frequently a tremendous amount of the information can only be acquired by actually being on location and observing what actually transpires before during and after the fishery, looking at numbers and statistics only helps if you have a good knowledge base to work with.

I am not a paid professional in this field, nor do I claim to know more than those that are, only that I have some pieces of the puzzle that seem to be unknown or have been overlooked in the past.

Here is the problem, if you open the Sky to Chums the onslaught of snagging them right off the redds is in full force. The only area with any Chum spawning now is right where most of the bank access is located, and we all know how that plays out. The only chance the fish have is to let them spawn in peace.

If they open it for netting (by anyone) where this run can be targeted, then the managers are the problem and there is very little that can be done about it, and whether it's open for sportsman in the river or not the same number of chums will be netted and killed, getting every bit of their allocation and more has never been a problem for commercial and tribal netters. On small runs they tend to get almost everything that returns, even if that means more than their quota.

Right now the cookie jar is empty, we would be grabbing for the last few crumbs, we would be destroying the cook, cookie sheet, oven and recipe. Which means no cookies in the future.


PS. These are not the last few remaining unharvested hatchery fish that "must die", these are the last few remaining unharvested wild fish that "must survive".

That is an interesting concept.

Let the commercials catch 100% of the available chum in the salt leaving 0% for the sport fishers to catch.

Commission policy does not exclude sport fishermen from the PS chum fishery nor gives 100% of the chum to the commercials even though that is happening now.

http://wdfw.wa.gov/commission/policies/c3608.html

So because we have the "right" to harvest more of an undesirable fish that is in a downturn and needs some assistance should we compound the problem by hammering them in the river on their spawning beds too. Yes it can be fun to catch a few, but keeping them....I'll pass.

I tried to download the commercial fishing seasons in the salt and couldn't, so I can't check to see if area 8A is open for Chums or not, I was told it would be closed at NOF, and tribes wouldn't be fishing it. I don't care about 8D.

Actually, I was thinking along the lines of an Tulalip bubble(8D) opening for sport fishing for chum to correspond with any commercial fishery in that area.

I don’t know about anybody else, but this topic has raised a list of questions for me that I’m just curious enough to look into when I get back home to WA.

BTW, if I remember correctly, Area 8A and 8 to the north is contingent to open if run size permits for the NT.

Here's kind of an offshoot topic, but what about a move to cut off the need for commercial chum fishing.... aka... distribution of salmon roe to foreign food markets.

I've always thought that if someone made a push to change the laws regarding egg sales, we might be able to indirectly solve a few problems. From what I gather, the vast majority of chum fisheries are specifically aimed at selling the roe overseas. $16/lb MINIMUM for egg roe these days when sold as caviar.

If you cut or limit the demand, I can't really see a great reason for a commercial chum harvest. People can only eat so much smoked keta in the stores.

As the chums are reduced in numbers the pinks will be targeted for roe next, so we could be saying goodbye to those too if something like a roe ban isn't passed.

Roe ban sounds like a good idea.

eating fish roe shrinks the testicles...

done

Let people who want to eat roe go catch their own fish. Stop subsidizing an economically untenable industry...it makes no sense for anyone, but most of all is completely nonsensical for sportsmen to willingly do it.

Fish on...

Todd

Nothing will ever change until we as a society start viewing natural resources as having some value other than something to be exploited to the max for conversion into digits in a bank account. It will be a painful transition.

Hi all...thanks for the great info. I now recall hearing about a chum closure a year or two ago, but had forgotten about it when I posted the original question.

Regardless, good info and interesting to read.

We'll likely just throw spinners for coho.

I moved to the Pac-NW in fall 2008. Seems like that first fall, when I was stumbling around on the Sky, chums were everywhere and the general opinion was they were a great fish (for release), good biters and abundant.

Dam* shame. Only been here 5 or 6 years and seem like some fisheries have dwindled in that short amount of time.

I do think an egg export limit or something of similar nature would help now and with Pink's who are up next on the chopping block.

HOWEVER, as I'm sure many of you know, the 'surplus' eggs from over 80 Washington State Hatcheries ultimately end up going overseas to be sold as caviar. So if our own state is indirectly involved in supporting this overseas caviar market, how the hell do we get ball rolling on and Egg Roe Ban???

So reading between the lines and putting the pieces together, all our tax dollars are actually subsidizing the overseas roe market. How a$$ backwards and criminal does that seem?

Just fish for coho till Thanksgiving. Then switch to the winter runs.