Nine additional nights and five days of commercial salmon fishing in the lower Columbia River were adopted on Wednesday by Washington and Oregon officials.
The commercials will fish between Warrior Rock at the downstream end of Sauvie Island and Beacon Rock on Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday nights from Sept. 25 through Oct. 15 with 8-inch-minimum mesh nets.
Biologist John North of the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife estimated the commercial fleet will catch about 14,000 chinook and 4,000 to 5,000 coho during the nine nights.
The Columbia River Compact also adopted five days of tangle-net commercial fishing for salmon between Warrior Rock and the ocean.
About 40 vessels are expected to participate in the tangle-net season, which requires the use of nets with a maximum mesh of of 3.75-inches and can be in the Columbia for only 30 minutes at a time. Fishing hours will be 6 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Commercial fishermen in the tangle-net fishery can keep any chinook, but only fin-clipped hatchery coho.
The compact will meet again at 10 a.m. on Oct. 8 to consider adopting a full-fleet coho fishery using 6-inch-mesh nets where any coho can be retained.
Catch notes —The 47,700 fall chinook caught in the August commercial season was the second largest since at least 1985.
With the 34,600 fall chinook caught Sept. 14 and 16, and another 14,000 expected to be caught, the projected catch of 96,300 would be the largest since 1989 and the fifth highest since at least 1985. The record is 280,900 in 1987.
o By this week’s end, an estimated 239,000 fall chinook will have been harvested in the treaty Indian commercial catch, the largest since at least 1938.
o The fall chinook kept catch in the Buoy 10 sport season is estimated at 29,800 plus 56,000 coho kept or dead from handling.
The Buoy 10 chinook catch is the third largest since at least 1981. The coho catch is largest since 2001. The 99,200 angler trips are the highest since 2001.
