BY DAVE HURLEY
SAN FRANCISCO – California’s two-day ocean salmon on June 7/ 8 was the first opportunity for fishermen and women to target salmon since 2022, bringing 10,505 anglers to land an estimated 9,165 Chinook salmon based on the recent press release from the Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW). This total eclipsed the summer harvest guideline of 7000 Chinooks. As a result, the remaining summer dates of July 5/6, July 31 – August 3, and August 25-31 were closed by the National Marine Fisheries Service based upon the recommendation from the CDFW and industry representatives. Party boats and six-packs who were previously booked for those desiring salmon are in the process of switching over to coastal rockfishing or San Francisco Bay striped bass/halibut/coastal rockfish combination trips.
Despite these closures, there will be one more opportunity to target salmon as the recreational ocean salmon fishery is set to reopen September 4-7 under a separate fall harvest guideline of 7,500 Chinook in waters between Point Reyes and Point Sur. If the harvest guideline isn’t reached, the season will continue September 29-30. If any fish remain after this date, the fishery will continue in waters between Pt. Reyes to Pigeon Point on October 1-5 and October 27-31.
To provide as accurate information as possible during the two-day June season, the department brought in nearly 100 staff along with partner-agency staff for dockside data collection weekend at major boat launches and sport fishing centers statewide, counting anglers and their fish and collecting heads of hatchery-origin fish to recover coded wire tags containing life history information.
Most of the action during the opening weekend took place south of Point Reyes with the best fishing south of the Farallon Islands to the Deep Reef, but surprisingly, salmon were taken in numbers as far south as the San Luis Obispo County ports of Port San Luis and Morro Bay.
Most party boats and six-packs operating in San Francisco Bay, Half Moon Bay, and Monterey are already filled for the four days in September, but with few boats still available, interested anglers must commit sooner than later. Captain Ron Koyasako has been booked up for these dates for months, and he said, “The salmon will be found much closer to the coast as they will be starting to enter the Bay/Delta system, and I hope we are able to find some of the big four-year-olds.”
The success of the two-day season demonstrates the intrinsic value of salmon to the coastal communities. There have been some major adaptations in the attempt to restore the Sacramento River fall-run including increase numbers of hatchery-fish released and improvements in release practices both at locations closer to the ocean and at night during an outgoing tide to deter predation. According to the CDFW press release, “The use of harvest guidelines and in-season management in California’s ocean sport fishery management is new this year. The guidelines were developed as part of the Pacific Fishery Management Council’s pre-season process using catch and effort information from prior years along with expected performance this year. The guidelines serve to ensure that impacts from the fishery to stocks of particular concern – namely Klamath River fall Chinook and Central Valley Spring and Sacramento River Winter Chinook, are minimized. In-season management, including use of in-season monitoring and harvest guidelines, is a new objective that was identified in California’s Salmon Strategy for a Hotter, Drier Future (PDF)(opens in new tab) released in January 2024.”