Coastal salmon angling remains excellent

ILWACO, Wash. — Salmon angling off the southern Washington and northern Oregon coasts remains exceptional with an average catch of 1.71 fish per rod reported by the two state departments of Fish and Wildlife.

The daily bag limit is two salmon, no more than one chinook. Coho must be fin-clipped.

Last week, the Columbia River ports had 3,001 angler trips with a catch of 596 chinook and 4,530 coho. That’s 88.3 percent coho.

Through Sunday, anglers have taken 19.6 percent of the coho quota and 16.9 percent of the chinook guideline for the ocean waters between Cape Falcon, near Manzanita, Ore., and Leadbetter Point at the northern tip of Long Beach Peninsula.

At Westport, the average last week was 1.35 salmon, with 63.7 percent of the catch being coho. For waters between Cape Leadbetter and the mouth of the Queets River, 24.8 percent of the coho quota and 34.9 percent of the chinook guideline had been caught through Sunday.

Buoy 10 season inside the mouth of the Columbia River begins Saturday.