2010
APRIL
Sitka had a mild winter and a flash of spring in February. My thoughts turned to an early season. Jumping the gun, I went up to Sitka in early April and put the boat in the water. The evening I arrived, the herring spawned the entire length of HPR road, from SeaMart, all the way to the Cove. It was quite a sight. On the 6th, Jim and I went and got some crab in a whiteout wet snow storm, which made the whole adventure quite memorable. Several inches of snow fell that night and then it froze solid. They were plowing and sanding the streets in the morning. So much for thoughts of an early spring!. Sloppy ocean conditions resulted in our salmon adventures coming up empty.
I arrived back in Sitka on April 25th and we started poking around. The commercial troll fleet was doing well out in deep water, but we had a hard time finding fish closer to shore. We caught a fish each day and the last day finally hit several on the ocean. I headed home at the end of the week with some fresh fish to eat and feeling better about the prospects for the coming season.
MAY
I returned to Sitka in mid May and fished with Jim and my friend Tom. We had slow but steady action, with several fish each day. The fish were about 3-5 pounds larger than last year and extremely healthy looking. Great eating early season fish! The weather was pretty iffy a couple times outside, but overall it was a decent May.
JUNE
I came back in early June for a couple days with Jim and then a family trip with my sister and brother in-law from Montana. Good to great king fishing, with beautiful, fat, Sitka king salmon. My sister yanked and cranked on several nice fish and contributed to a 40 pounder hitting the deck. My charters started on the 11th and the first day we boated 20 plus fish. Unfortunately, the weather then kicked us off the ocean for the next two days and we worked hard to put some fish in the boat, in wind and driving rain. A tough go at times, having to anchor on the inside, just to be able to fish. The weather calmed down by the next group and Ken with the Cochran Electric group, had another excellent trip. Tom and Matt rounded out my June with several more days of good fishing. Overall we had a decent, average June, with quality fish. Unlike some years the coho did not make an early showing.
JULY-AUG
After my break, I went back on July 22nd. The July and August fishing was pretty abnormal. The fish would show up and we would get limits, then the next couple of days we would really have to scratch. Dennis and his group at the end of July, proved why those are such prized dates. We had grease calm weather and good catches of both coho’s and kings. One day we were treated to an epic whale show, for hours, all around the boat, with ten or more actively feeding and swimming, within rod length while we drifted. Tougher than expected fishing, but we managed decent catches through the first week of August. Overall the coho fishing was way below average.
I went back on Aug 14th to fish a day or two and put the boat away. The coastal area was amazingly dead. The second day I chased some boats about 6 miles offshore and ended up drifting in 400 feet of water, dangling 200ft of line. Jim and I eventually caught 5 nice kings and lost several more. Weird fishing in the middle of nowhere and again there were few coho. My luck with good weather finally ran out. I got blown off the ocean the last day I fished and it rained relentlessly while we moved stuff from the boat to the store room. It was time to call it a season!
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