Fishing report 3/14

Spring chinook fishing should improve soon, but it’s been pretty lean so far. Washington sampled more than 1,100 anglers last week with an average of a salmon per 29 rods in the lower Columbia.

Ten drifts with tangle nets on Sunday caught only one spring chinook. The count at Bonneville Dam through Tuesday is 31.

Drano Lake opens for hatchery chinook and hatchery steelhead on Saturday. The daily limit is two chinook or steelhead or one of each. Wind River does not open until April 1.

The Columbia River opens Saturday from Bonneville Dam to the Washington-Oregon border east of McNary Dam. Boat fishing is prohibited from Bonneville Dam to the Tower Island power lines downstream of The Dalles Dam.

An estimated 24 sturgeon were kept from almost 1,700 fishing trips in the Columbia downstream of Bonneville Dam in February. Fourteen percent of the guidelines for sturgeon had been taken through February in The Dalles and John Day pools.

Friday is the last day to fish for steelhead in the Washougal, East Fork Lewis, South Fork Toutle, Grays, Elochoman and Coweeman rivers, plus Abernathy, Germany, Mill, Rock and Salmon creeks.

Walleye fishing is improving in The Dalles pool.

Battle Ground Lake has been planted with 3,000 rainbow trout. Klineline Pond received 1,500 and Lacamas Lake got 5,000 rainbow.

Angler checks from the Washington (WDFW) and Oregon (ODFW) departments of Fish and Wildlife:

Lower Columbia — Estuary, 26 boaters with one adult spring chinook kept. (WDFW)

Tongue Point to Wauna power lines, 31 boaters with one spring chinook kept. (ODFW)

Cathlamet, nine bank rods and eight boaters with no spring chinook or steelhead; two bank rod with no sturgeon. (WDFW)

Longview to Portland, 159 boaters with five spring chinook kept and one released; 110 Oregon bank rods with two spring chinook and two steelhead kept; 14 boaters with one legal sturgeon kept and nine sublegals released. (ODFW)

Longview, 62 bank rods with three steelhead kept; 77 boaters with three spring chinook kept; 14 bank rods and five boaters with no sturgeon. (WDFW)

Cowlitz River mouth, two boaters with no salmon or steelhead. (WDFW)

Kalama, 139 boaters with seven spring chinook and one steelhead kept; 19 bank rods with no salmon; 17 boaters with 14 sublegal sturgeon released; two boaters with no sturgeon. (WDFW)

Woodland, 96 boaters with two spring chinook kept and one released; 60 bank rods with one steelhead released. (WDFW)

Warrior Rock to Kelley Point, 210 boaters with three spring chinook kept and two released; 56 bank rods with no salmon. (WDFW)

Davis Bar to Portland airport tower, 318 boaters with 13 spring chinook kept and five released; two bank rods with no catch; five boaters with no sturgeon. (WDFW)

Troutdale, 31 boaters with two spring chinook kept, two boaters with no sturgeon. (ODFW)

Camas-Washougal, 25 boaters with one spring chinook kept; three boaters with one walleye. (WDFW)

North Bonneville, four bank rods with no salmon; eight bank rods with no sturgeon. (WDFW)

Mid-Columbia — The Dalles pool, 22 bank rods with four sublegal sturgeon released; 35 boaters with two legal sturgeon kept plus one oversize and 34 sublegals released; seven bank rods with one hatchery and one wild steelhead released; 52 boaters with 20 walleye kept and one released. (WDFW)

John Day pool, 20 bank rods with one sublegal sturgeon released; 66 boaters with eight legal sturgeon kept plus one legal, three oversize and 30 sublegals released; 43 boaters with six walleye kept and 10 released; 12 boaters with 10 bass released. (WDFW)

Cowlitz — Twenty-six bank rods with one steelhead released; six boaters with no catch. (WDFW)

Kalama — Four bank rods and three boaters with no steelhead. Chinook fishing is closed. (WDFW)

Washougal — Eleven boaters with three hatchery steelhead kept plus two hatchery and three wild steelhead released; 29 bank rods with two hatchery steelhead kept and three wild steelhead released. (WDFW)

Lower Willamette — Sampling of 1,252 anglers tallied 39 chinook kept and seven released. (ODFW)