The following links are for fish ladder counts on the Columbia River. At a total of 2+ million Chinook a years, has to be the largest influence on Chinook catches on the West Coast. About 20% are wild fish.
The fall run is the largest & Pacific Salmon Commission "Chinook Technical Committee" data indicates these fall fish (and probably the Summer run as well) migrate at least to SE Alaska. The Spring run is known to migrate straight out from the river far into the open Pacific & come straight back in, providing little opportunity to be caught by us, but plenty by the Asians. The Fed's down here spend lot's of time/money of these fish; ocean trawl fisheries to see what kind of plankton are around, abundance of smelt's etc. The big payoff is for the SE Alaska & BC area F troll fleets who have a quota of about 500,000 Chinook combined this year.
So have a look at the numbers & see if the returns are about what is predicted. The fleet in Westport WA are finding these fish in 300ft of water out about 15 miles further than usual below the hot water thermocline.
Albacore catches 45 miles out are already good down there.
Look at 2016 year data compared to last year then 10 year average:
http://www.fpc.org/adultsalmon/AdultCumulativeTable.asp
Roll your own data report:
http://www.fpc.org/
FYI before the bonneville dam (illegal because no fish ladders) there was a run known as the "June Hogs" that entered the river in June spawning in BC. Cannery data indicate 100lb+ fish.
We used to catch tons of Columbia River "Footballs" late May - early July" with Portland Point being an especially hot spot down deep on NG142R hoochie's. They were primarily 15- 25lb but used to be we would hear about something in the 40b range every year. Friend of mine got a 40 up by Tofino last year.That fishery seemed to go away around 1995 or so. I think fishtofino has been around that long maybe he has an opinion on this run.
The fall run is the largest & Pacific Salmon Commission "Chinook Technical Committee" data indicates these fall fish (and probably the Summer run as well) migrate at least to SE Alaska. The Spring run is known to migrate straight out from the river far into the open Pacific & come straight back in, providing little opportunity to be caught by us, but plenty by the Asians. The Fed's down here spend lot's of time/money of these fish; ocean trawl fisheries to see what kind of plankton are around, abundance of smelt's etc. The big payoff is for the SE Alaska & BC area F troll fleets who have a quota of about 500,000 Chinook combined this year.
So have a look at the numbers & see if the returns are about what is predicted. The fleet in Westport WA are finding these fish in 300ft of water out about 15 miles further than usual below the hot water thermocline.
Albacore catches 45 miles out are already good down there.
Look at 2016 year data compared to last year then 10 year average:
http://www.fpc.org/adultsalmon/AdultCumulativeTable.asp
Roll your own data report:
http://www.fpc.org/
FYI before the bonneville dam (illegal because no fish ladders) there was a run known as the "June Hogs" that entered the river in June spawning in BC. Cannery data indicate 100lb+ fish.
We used to catch tons of Columbia River "Footballs" late May - early July" with Portland Point being an especially hot spot down deep on NG142R hoochie's. They were primarily 15- 25lb but used to be we would hear about something in the 40b range every year. Friend of mine got a 40 up by Tofino last year.That fishery seemed to go away around 1995 or so. I think fishtofino has been around that long maybe he has an opinion on this run.
