September-Dec. 1 Blackmouth opener

Great to be back in Bellingham! Time for mild fall weather and some crabbing. What a year to be a recreational crabber. With such a huge run of sockeye this fall, there is

no pressure on the crabs. That just means you need to call some friends with licenses before you go check your pots!

We were averaging 15 keepers per pot (4 pots), that were an average of 7 inches and up to 9 inches. We ate it every which way and lots of it. We had so much left over that we cracked 9 pounds of fresh meat and made crab cakes, my favorite! Ready for blackmouth!

Late July-August

The remaining trips in July and August continued to produce consistent results

for both salmon and halibut catches. Weather was often good, giving access to the rich banks out of Port Renfrew and Barkley Sound, with out too much motion sickness from the crew. Lynn Bell and Mike Mc Callum came for a few days in late July and had some good fishing. Gotta late start due to weather on the first day, but made up for it on the second. We managed 12 chrome chinook in about 4 hours fishing to help fill the freezers.

As we got into late August, it was time to head home for the year and wait for blackmouth season. Good bye to Port Renfrew and a summer filled with good times with good friends! Learned alot.

July 7-8, 2010

What amazing weather on this last trip out! In all of my years fishing the Vancouver Island coast, I have never seen such clear, warm and calm conditions. You could see all the way to Cape Flattery, WA from the La Perouse bank out from Barkley sound. Our crew of Leif Desler, Jim "James" Fowler, and myself took advantage of the great conditions and got after the chinook, halibut, dungeness crab and even a few tasty spot prawns. Leif managed his first ever spring chinook on this trip, a 21 pound chromer! Jimmy added to the load with 3 of his own, with his largest coming in at just over 20 pounds. Overall the salmon fishing was a little spotty, although the average size was much better and the fighting ability of these fish was incredible! We managed to scratch out 8 really nice chinook and only had about 45 minutes on our second day to Halibut fish before it was time to head home. We made good use of those 45 minutes with a quick hali double, both nice eating size. The fresh dungeness crab and spotted prawns were as always, a great bonus. Looking forward to the next trip, as fishing should really heat up from mid-July to mid-August when the runs of large chinook converge with the coho!

A special thanks to our friends from the north, Cory and Johnny!

June 23-24, 2010

Another productive trip to Port Renfrew. This crew consisted of Eric Pedersen, Ryan Johnson and myself. The weather was great and the seas were calm. Eric had the biggest spring with a 32 pound beauty, which also happened to come on a doubleheader where a 15 pounder was landed as well. We worked some inshore areas with hootchies and herring strip, but found most action offshore on the banks. The Tomic plugs were the ticket offshore, however the largest spring was landed using a #5 Superior spoon in chrome. Halibut fishing was a little on the slow side due to some large tides. Once again, the crabbing was excellent. See you on our next adventure!

June 16, 2010

The Shamahawk crew consisting of myself and longtime fishing buddy Terry Seim spent a few days fishing out of Port Renfrew, BC. The weather was perfect on our last day as the wind let up and the sun came out. We had great success with halibut up to 42 pounds and springs up to 18 pounds. Halibut were taken using salmon bellies while anchored. Springs were picked up on herring strip, spoons, and needlefish hootchies in the white glow and army truck patterns. Almost all of the chinook hitting the docks are marked hatchery fish, sure to be Columbia river system fish. As a nice bonus, we had our limit of dungeness crab from 7.5-9 inches!

May 15, 2010

Ran from Bellingham to Port Renfrew in some pretty rough waters. Secured summer moorage at the marina and are just trying to line up some days off with some good weather. I hear the fishing has been picking up.