With a busy summer cutting into fishing time I've been spending my spare time gearing up for Coho. This will be my 1st season fishing the salt in my boat for them so when I found I had a day free I jumped on it. Still a little early and not expecting much but I wanted to at least get out, troll through the motions and shake the bugs out. I had seen reports for Quadfather so I gave him a call to see if he wanted to join me and my cousin had been wanting to get out for a little crabbing and fishing as well.
We launched out of Shilshole about 6am and headed north. Dropped the pots off Boeing Creek just south of the Oil Refinery and started trolling north. Trolled our way up to the Edmonds ferry terminal only picking up a couple shakers so pulled up and bombed up to shipwreck. Dropped the lines and started trolling back down south. A few more shakers on the line and finally a good fish on the line (80' down in 500' of water). My Cuz played it into the net and a nice little coho about 5# is in the box. We doubled back for another pass in the area with no luck so we continued out southward troll. Soon after Quad got a good hit grabbed his rod and there was nothing there, his line broke and everything was gone from the flasher down. About 1/4 mile north of the Edmonds ferry another popped clip (80' down in 300' of water) on my Cuz's rod. We knew right away this was no little Coho as it was taking nice strong and long runs. Pulled up the other lines and enjoyed the action while my cousin played the fish. Sure enough a nice hatchery King about 15#finally came to the boat for a safe release to continue on his journey.
We continued on down to the Oil refinery with nothing more than the constant shaker action before packing it up about noon to go pull pots and head home.
By the time we got to the pots the wind was picking up. Between 5 pots we were able to wade through a ton of females, undersized & a couple soft shells to scratch out three limits. Got them recorded and everything secured and headed for the marina. With the wind in our face and creating a little bit of chop it was a slightly damp ride back but not too bad.
All in all I was not expecting to hook up at all let alone get one in the box. Talking to the fish checker he had 25 boats come in by the time we got back (about 2) and only 5 fish come in, so I was feeling pretty good about out our outing in general.

End of the fishing report - now for "The Rest of the Story"..

Saw tons of Porpoises out there, they were a constant the entire day - never seen so many in PS, but maybe it is normal?

When we went back to pull the pots there was a commercial vessel in that bay that looked to be netting, made me wonder what would they be netting at this time of year in that area (or were they just prepping)?

We got back to the ramp and both Quad & Cuz's cars who were parked on the street had been towed along with several others including (we can only assume) 1 truck & trailer that was parked in the same line of vehicles. Talking to the fish checker apparently there was No Parking signs stashed in the bushes on the side of the road. At some point in the morning after we had launched they put the signs out on the street, had every vehicle towed, had some kind of marathon race, then pulled the signs. For Quad and Cuz this meant towing and impound charges and parking tickets on top of it. BS if you ask me and I hope they both fight it along with the other victims. I mean, can you imagine docking, going to get your trailer and it's gone - what they hell would you/could you do?! If anyone else on here got stung also you might PM Quad and combine forces.

After taking Quad and Cuz to the impound lot to pick up their cars I headed down to the Kenmore launch on Lake Washington where I launched, beached, flushed the motors & washed the salt off everything. When I finished I loaded the boat up again. When I pulled it out of the water I moved off to the side to pull the plug and strap down but immediately there was a rig behind me with pleasure boat on the back, with one of those big chrome wakeboard towers on top and 3 or 4 people sitting in the boat. He was right on my butt and looking annoyed so I went ahead and pulled around and under the overpass where I pulled off to the side to strap down out of the way of everyone. I stopped, walked to the back of my boat to see this guy still following me! I watched in disbelief as he ran that boatload of people, in the boat with the 11' high wakeboard tower into that 9'6" high overpass. WHAM! Boat riders on the deck with bits of speakers falling down on them and the driver slack jawed and wide eyed. He hit hard enough to push the boat back off the trailer about 6". I have no idea where he was planning to go or what his goal was with the people in the back. But I watched long enough to be sure no one was physically hurt, strapped my boat down and was on my way. Last I saw of them they were backing the trailer down the ramp I am assuming to get it back on the trailer.

Until next time..

MotoBoat

8/17/2014 4:14:00 PM

Wow! this trip was action packed from beginning to end. Reminds me of Nate Treats early reports.

The Quadfather

8/17/2014 7:10:00 PM

Thanks so much for a nice time on the water, Gringo!
Like he said, 25 boats returned, and only 5 fish. And considering we brought one home, and released a King, and had some other action.. I call it a pretty good time.
What Gringo doesn't mention is that he delivered both me and, da Cuz, directly to Lincoln Towing, as well as returning my backpack.
I had a lot of fun. What I really enjoy about getting out on other people's rides, is seeing their little ways of McGuyvering things. I learned some things about herring strips as well.
Hopefully we all can find a great Coho experience in PS in just a few weeks.

BentRod

8/17/2014 7:28:00 PM

What a day! What a story! Holy cow! Just wow!

riverhunter

8/18/2014 5:04:00 AM

Great job but remember only 4 crab pots allowed in a vessel

LastCast

8/18/2014 6:20:00 AM

Statewide Gear Rules - Crab, Shrimp & Crawfish

One star trap, one ring net, or one pot is considered one unit of gear. The maximum number of units of gear that may be fished per person is:

Puget Sound: (Marine Area 4, east of the Bonilla-Tatoosh line, and in Marine Areas 5-13).

Shrimp: Two pots per person, and no more than 4 shrimp pots may be onboard or fished by any one boat at a time.
Crab: Two units of crab gear per person, and no limit on the number of units of crab gear per boat.

Gringo Pescador

8/18/2014 7:27:00 AM

Right - 3 licensed crab fishermen in the boat & 5 pots, we were well within the regs..

Gringo Pescador

8/18/2014 10:11:00 AM

No need to start slamming, riverhunter missunderstood the regs (haven't we all at one point or another) and was corrected, moving on...

N E 1 FISSION

8/18/2014 10:44:00 AM

Great report, begining to end,..incredible about getting towed, as for the other boat following you,..not good,...

BARCHASER10

8/18/2014 12:41:00 PM

I live about 2 miles from the Kenmore launch, I use it all the time. Some guy running his boat into the bridge, far out!! That bridge is low. Too bad you didn't get pics. That would make the top ten idiot list for morons at the boat ramp.

Gringo Pescador

8/18/2014 1:33:00 PM

BARCHASER - Since you commented I wanted to say a public Thank You for the Coho Trolling Article you wrote! I got a lot of help from that! If anyone else want to chase Coho in the Sound I highly reccomend it (you can find it in the "Articles" section of this site).

You know I have to admit the dry humor / smart aleck side of me was screeming to be set free with camera in hand when he hit the bridge but the day had been wayy longer than planned by that point (4pm, told my wife I'd try to be home by 1 - but she's used to that), I still had crab to clean and had to be ready for dinner at a friends by 6:30 that I decided just go on about my day and leave them to thier misery :P

BARCHASER10

8/19/2014 12:42:00 PM

Thank you. Hopefully we can start nailing the Silvers pretty soon!

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