Sea-Run Cutthroat in January?

Does anybody know when sea-runs usually spawn? The reason I ask is that I recently went to fish a Puget Sound beach that used to be a consistent producer of some dandy fish every time I went down there. This time, however, despite the tide and other conditions being what I have found to be ideal in the past, I didn't so much as see a fish, let alone catch one. Figuring it simply couldn't be anything I was doing wrong, I decided that, for whatever reason, there just weren't any fish around. My next thought was that it was mid-January, which is a time of year I had never tried before. Since many of the fish I had caught there in November and December had been starting to show color, I reasoned that the absence of fish might be explained by the fact that they are in the rivers and creeks spawning at this time of year.

Anyone know if I might be on to something?

They start up the rivers in late summer and early fall... I believe that is how they got the name harvest trout.

I do not know the exact time of spawning but I remember catching some real snakes in hood canal back in the good old days when you could crab in march...

Here in the Puget Sound area most of the sea-run cutthroat spawn between early Janaury and the end of May. Typically the peak spawning activity would be in mid to late March. Depending on conditions there can be a shift of a week or two in the "spawning curve".

As an side the spawning usually takes place in small low land streams. Those streams are typically low-gradient and on many a man can step or jump across the stream.

Tight lines
Curt

As Curt mentioned, they are spring spawners. However, you encounter with here today, gone the next is very typical of SRC. Not unlike blackmouth, there will always be some around in the salt but there are times when they are more plentiful than others.

Found some in the lower Calawah on Tuesday, looked like spawners to me, they were skinny & hungry.


c/22

Curt,

I'm not doubting what you're saying here.

I heard that in late summer early fall they're in the river systems and by the first big rain they hit the creeks. Do they hang out in the creeks until later in the winter and early spring before they spawn? Or are they just following the salmon and feed on the eggs? Or is my understanding wrong???

Unlike steelhead and salmon, sea-run cutthroat continue to feed during their freshwater residence and, thus, are able to retain their physical condition for extended periods in the rivers. While they will certainly eat salmon eggs when they are available, the common explanation that they are "following" the salmon doesn't begin to explain the timing of their migration. In the Stillaguamish system, for instance, there are usually fishable numbers of cutthroat in the river by the middle of August, long before there are significant numbers of salmon and none which have yet begun to spawn. Before construction of the dams on the Cowlitz, locals expected the first runs of "harvest trout" by the Fourth of July.

Back in the day when I still killed a cutthroat or two on occasion, I found their stomach contents to be more likely to consist of October caddis pupae and other insect foods, sculpins and other baitfish, even when salmon were present and their eggs were available.

Sam -
As Preston mentioned in my home area (north Puget Sound) the sea-runs do in fact enter the rivers in summer (as early late June or early July) and on into the late fall. In the south Sound where most of the fish use those smaller independent streams for rearing and spawning the fish tend to hang out in the salt until ready to spawn and then make the mad dash to the spawning areas. REgardless fish of either strategy spawn from early January through May with a normal peak sometime in mid-March with considerable year to year variation depending on stream flows and temperatures.

However back to the fish of the larger rivers in North Sound. While the timing of the cutthroat's return to the river is similar I like Preston find little evidence that they do so fed on salmon eggs. While it is not all that uncommon to see some cutthroat behind spawning salmon most do not do so. A well fished fly or nightcrawler will out fish salmon eggs by a wide margin in most cases.

While it is commonly believed by many anglers that the sea-run cutthroat run up into the smaller creeks with the fall/winter rains it has been my experience that many do not do so. Certainly there is some movement upstream towards spawning tributaries with the fall rains and even into some the larger tributaries. However I find that many do remain in mainstem areas until they are actually ready to spawn. However with the higher winter flows it is very difficult to get at the fish. Whenever I have found winter flows at levels similar to what I fish in the fall I can catch reasonable numbers of sea-runs (at least through February).

Tight lines
Curt

Preston and Curt,

Thanks for your observations. I haven't had the experience fishing for them in the rivers, just in the salt around Central Puget Sound.