Northwest Sportsman Mag Sept 2019

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Sportsman Northwest

Your LOCAL Hunting & Fishing Resource

Volume 11 • Issue 12

Your Complete Hunting, Boating, Fishing and Repair Destination Since 1948.

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PUBLISHER James R. Baker EDITOR Andy Walgamott THIS ISSUE’S CONTRIBUTORS Randall Bonner, Jason Brooks, Scott Haugen, MD Johnson, Randy King, Jim Pex, Buzz Ramsey, Troy Rodakowski, Mark Veary, Dave Workman, Mark Yuasa EDITORIAL FIELD SUPPORT Jason Brooks GENERAL MANAGER John Rusnak SALES MANAGER Katie Higgins ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES Dawn Carson, Mamie Griffin, Mike Smith, Paul Yarnold DESIGNERS Kaitlyn Chapman, Celina Martin, Jake Weipert

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ON THE COVER This issue we get you ready for the Northwest’s 2019 deer hunting campaign! Chad Zoller bagged this nice muley on his dad’s farm near Arlington, Oregon, early in last year’s season.

(HUNTING PHOTO CONTEST)

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CONTENTS

VOLUME 11 • ISSUE 12

FEATURES 59

ROUGH SEAS SERIES: BLACK TUESDAY A weekday weather-window run out of Charleston for albacore nearly turned into disaster when a storm unexpectedly hit Jim Pex and his crew 32 miles from safety. Pex tells the story of a very rough day at sea during the early years of the Northwest’s tuna fishery.

113 INSIDE THE DAYPACK, DEER/BEAR HUNTING EDITION

Are you bringing enough gear when you head out into the Westside woods for blacktails and bruins? Too much?!? MD Johnson weighs in on what goes into his daypack during the fall season for those two species.

119 PLANNING A DEER HUNT

Sure, some hunters out in unfamiliar country will stumble into a legal buck, but the odds of a notched tag are best for those who’ve done their homework. Longtime deer hunter Jason Brooks has been around the Northwest and shares tips for being successful in new spots.

75

WELCOME TO SILV-EMBER!

(YO-ZURI PHOTO CONTEST)

Western Washington anglers can look forward to larger coho returns back to rivers this year compared to 2018, and September and October are prime months to fish for them. Mark Yuasa tracks the salmon from Puget Sound to freshwater and details the best spots and baits to catch your share of the run.

125 THE HUNT FOR A RED-MEATED OCTOBER

Troy Rodakowski is pretty excited about this fall’s Oregon blacktail prospects, as good numbers of healthy bucks are turning up on his trail cameras, but how are things shaping up across the rest of the Beaver State? Troy shares what he’s learned going into 2019’s season.

141 DOVE SEASON ARRIVES

Though not the most popular or abundant game bird in the Northwest, doves can provide fast gunning this time of year. Randall Bonner’s an old hand at downing gray rockets and he has tips on good spots, best loads and how to cook ’em.

SUBSCRIBE TODAY! Go to nwsportsmanmag.com for details.

NORTHWEST SPORTSMAN is published monthly by Media Index Publishing Group, 14240 Interurban Avenue South, Suite 190, Tukwila, WA 98168. Periodical Postage Paid at Seattle, WA and at additional mail offices. (USPS 025-251) POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Northwest Sportsman, 14240 Interurban Ave South, Suite 190, Tukwila, WA 98168. Annual subscriptions are $29.95 (12 issues), 2-year subscription are $49.95 (24 issues). Send check or money order to Media Index Publishing Group, or call (206) 382-9220 with VISA or M/C. Back issues may be ordered at Media Index Publishing Group offices at the cost of $5 plus shipping. Display Advertising. Call Media Index Publishing Group for a current rate card. Discounts for frequency advertising. All submitted materials become the property of Media Index Publishing Group and will not be returned. Copyright © 2019 Media Index Publishing Group. All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be copied by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or recording by any information storage or retrieval system, without the express written permission of the publisher. Printed in U.S.A.

12 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

131

CHEF IN THE WILD:

Backcountry Bears Most hunters treat black bears as an incidental opportunity while out for deer or elk, but others see the species for the challenge they are.

Count Chef Randy as among the latter camp – he shares his spring hunt deep in the woods of Idaho’s Payette River drainage, as well as a recipe for bear bolognese with rigatoni.

(HUNTING PHOTO CONTEST)

COLUMNS 85

BUZZ RAMSEY: Fishing Spinners For Coho Among the many ways to fish for coho in freshwater is to cast and retrieve spinners.

They’re one of the best lures for the widespread salmon species, and Buzz breaks down the many available models and how to best fish ’em.

91

THE KAYAK GUYS: Klickitat Can Click For Kayak Anglers With how late Klickitat coho run and at least 180,000 silvers expected to reach Bonneville Dam on the way to that trib and others throughout the Inland Northwest, this fishery should be on your radar deep into fall. Mark shares how to fish it!

97

NORTHWEST PURSUITS: Pacific Northwest Cast-and-blast Season Arrives Time to get your cast-and-blast on! Combining fishing and hunting in one outing is doable as salmon return to streams running through game-rich lands. Jason Brooks puts together a couple options for multitasking Northwest sportsmen in his new column.

105 ON TARGET: 7 Tactics To Up Your Deer Season Odds

“There are two ways to look at fall,” writes Dave. “It’s when you annually go camping with guns, or it’s the time you sit in camp, cleaning your rifle after hanging a buck from the meat pole.” If you’re interested in the latter option, be sure to check out his tips for success.

147 GUN DOG: Get After Forest Grouse With Your Gun Pup

Ruffed grouse are thriving throughout much of their range in the Northwest, and they are fun birds to chase if you have a new gun dog. Scott H. details how to make the most of the early bird season with your pup.

14 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

y

as out e re. e g o’s as h

24

(ODFW)

THE BIG PIC:

HEADING OFF FAILURE AT THE FALLS Repairs planned to strengthen critical Willamette Falls fish ladder.

DEPARTMENTS

16 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

19

THE EDITOR’S NOTE On wolves, cougars and elk

31

FISHING AND HUNTING NEWS New members join Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission; Oregon Coast Dungeness study; Sign up now for hunter ed

39

READER PHOTOS FROM THE FIELD Chinook, shad, bass and more!

43

PHOTO CONTEST WINNERS Yo-Zuri, Hunting

45

THE DISHONOR ROLL Crack crab cop foils faux fowl flimflam; Seven-rod endorsement?; Kudos; Jackass of the Month

49

DERBY WATCH Upcoming derbies; Recent results

53

OUTDOOR CALENDAR Openers, events, workshops, deadlines, outdoor shows, more

W)

THEEDITOR’SNOTE

Oregon wolves. (ODFW)

W

hy can’t things with wolves be cut and dried, black and white? Is it because they’re gray wolves?

Earlier this summer a longterm study of wapiti and wolves in Idaho came out with pretty interesting results: Mountain lions appear to kill more cows and calves and could also be having a larger impact on the elk herds than wolves. The study also tied calf survival to predation by either toothsome species by how robust the young elk were going into their first winter, which in turn is linked to the quality of their habitat.

“There’s kind of something for everyone in there, and that’s OK, because it’s reflecting the real complexity of the system” Jon Horne, an Idaho Department of Fish and Game researcher, told The Wildlife Society about he and three colleagues’ study.

FOR IT, THEY paid close attention to 1,266 cows and 806 calves (captured at half a year old) in 29 herds from across Idaho between 2004 and 2016 to come up with a model that could predict the risk of death for the elk, according to the paper’s abstract.

They found that outside of hunting harvest, 9 percent of cows and 40 percent of calves died annually. Mountain lions accounted for 45 percent of calf deaths, 35 percent of cows. Wolves were responsible for 32 percent of cow mortalities, 28 percent of calves.

Cougars are an ambush predator, better in rougher, denser terrain; wolves are coursers, more effective in open country.

Washington cougar. (WDFW)

nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 19

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“Wolves preferentially selected smaller calves and older adult females, whereas mountain lions showed little preference for calf size or age class of adult females,” the researchers stated.

They were able to best predict whether a calf would die based on its chest girth – a measure of health – the average number of wolves running in nearby packs, and how deep winter snows were, in that order. For cows, it was age, average number of wolves, and snow depth.

IT ALL LED to some conclusions for hunters, biologists, managers and policy makers to mull: • T hat “differences in selection of individual elk indicate mountain lions may have comparably more of an effect on elk population dynamics;” • That “managers can increase elk survival by reducing wolf pack sizes on surrounding winter ranges, especially in areas where, or during years when, snow is deep;” • And that “managers interested in improving over-winter calf survival can implement actions to increase the size of calves entering winter by increasing the nutritional quality of summer and early fall forage resources.”

While the researchers’ results were not uniform across Idaho, varying by region, that last point has been repeated a billion times, and here I’ll make it a billion and one: Habitat is the key. Elk country really needs to continue to be improved with the ungulates in mind to make them stronger, more fit and able to evade predators.

It’s probably not the final word, but the IDFG biologists’ study is sure to kick up more sparks in the blazing fire that is the debate about the impact wolves are having on our region’s elk herds. In the coming years, details specific to Washington should begin to come out through a big predator-prey study in the Eastside’s northern tier.

MEANWHILE, EVERGREEN STATE hunters should get involved as the Department of Fish and Wildlife launches postrecovery wolf management planning starting with 14 meetings in September and October.

The agency will essentially be asking if there is anything missing in its plans for how to deal with wolves after they reach population goals in the coming years. For hunters or others unable to attend, there will be a webinar version.

As a fellow sportsman, I urge you to make your voice heard; you can bet that those on the other sides will be. –Andy Walgamott 20 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

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Projected forecasts have been encouraging for Pacific coho stocks this year. At the time of this writing, anglers are experiencing early and stronger than expected catches in open areas.

While old school mooching and even jigging can be popular, hands down the most popular way to catch these fish is trolling with downriggers at depths of 40 to 75 feet and speeds of 2.5 to 3.5 MPH. Running flasher/ hoochie or flasher/ spoon combos is especially productive and will usually get the job done.

With hoochies, you want to use heavier 40-pound test leader in lengths of 32” to 36” in conjunction with dual 2/0 to 4/0 barbless hooks in order to impart maximum action. Flashers in the 11” range in cop car and spatterback colors are effective and matching hoochie colors to flasher colors can be a wise choice as well.

Popular spoons are 3 to 4 inch Luhr Jensen Coyotes in cop car, army truck, nickel/neon green and metallic tape colors. Just make sure to lengthen your leader a bit more with spoons.

Lengths of 40” to 48” is about right. Again, matching flasher and spoon colors is important.

Daily limits and specific rules change from location to location so be sure and check your perspective area before heading out. Know the difference between wild and hatchery salmon and be sure to treat our resources with respect.

Have fun and be most importantly, be safe out there! This monthly fisheries message brought to you by the sports fishermen of Wooldridge Boats.

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Northwest Sportsman 21

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Northwest Sportsman 23

Heading Off Failure At T

24 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

PICTURE

t The Falls

Willamette Falls fish ladder repairs would prevent catastrophe at this critical Oregon salmon passageway.

By ODFW staff

F

or more than 130 years, migrating salmonids have found passage over the Willamette Falls near West Linn, Oregon, through a series of fish ladders that helped them reach their destination and complete their life cycles.

They supply numerous fisheries from the mainstem of the Willamette River to the McKenzie, the Santiam system and the Molalla, Tualatin and Yamhill Rivers.

As the fish ladders have deteriorated, there’s a risk that they’ll fail – and keep spring and fall Chinook, winter and summer steelhead and coho from migrating, completing their life cycle and being available for anglers to catch.

A completed engineering study that’s ready to go and a nearly $2 million grant from Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife’s Restoration & Enhancement program would change that.

“Arguably, this is the absolute highest priority project for the fish division,” reads the application for the R&E grant. “Failure of the ladder would be a biological disaster for decades, if it could even be repaired.”

COMPLEX PROJECT

Repairs to a critically important fish ladder (at right) at Willamette Falls are slated to begin. “Because it is the only conduit for those fish to get up into the upper Willamette basin, it’s vital that we fix it,” says Richard Heap of the project. (MRGADGET51, WIKIMEDIA)

Willamette Falls is a natural falls. Portland General Electric generates power there at its Sullivan plant.

The original fish ladder was constructed in 1882, then renovated in 1971. It allows passage for both wild and hatchery fish.

“Really, the ladder allows all species to have access over the falls all year long,” said Ryan McCormick, chief engineer for ODFW. The fish ladder, designed to allow fish to pass even during low-flow seasons, has four entrances. Two are on one “leg” of the

nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 25

PICTURE

ladder and the other two legs each have one entrance. Each of the legs comes to a single pool, and then all fish travel from that pool upward to get over the falls.

Two parts of the ladder need major repairs. On ladder leg one, contractors will attach large steel members to stabilize the entrance block so it will stop moving.

They also will drive some micro-piles to reinforce a failing foundation.

On the second ladder leg, a large concrete slab apron has become dislodged and is starting to fail in places. Contractors will pour concrete to fill in those areas.

“From my perspective as an engineer, the importance of this project is to remove the potential structural failure risk that is present at the ladder today,” McCormick said. “Those failure risks are catastrophic for the fish that use the fishway.”

To do the work, barges will transport the machinery needed to drive in the micro-piles and to pour concrete to tie the micro-piles to the existing foundation.

A contractor will also barge over a mixing plant to the crest of the dam, tie it off and bring a concrete pump to the site to mix and then fill the apron void with concrete. They’ll use hand tools to drill holes in the wall and bolt the large, structural members to each side of the joint that needs stabilizing.

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SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

This “apron,” which has become dislodged, will be addressed during summer work windows. Crews will also work to stabilize an entrance on the other of the two “legs” that form the lower fish ladder. (ODFW)

Some of the planning includes ensuring the river isn’t harmed by the work. Catch tarps will catch debris when parts of the project require working over water.

Equipment will be diapered with wraps.

They will use food-grade hydraulic oil.

“The agency is using quite a bit of

control measures,” McCormick said.

The in-water work period to cause the least stress to fish is summer. ODFW is hoping to do the work in summer 2019, if permits are issued in time. If not, they’ll defer the project to 2020. The repairs could be split so that some are completed in

As the Willamette Valley began to be settled and developed, a fish ladder was first installed at the falls in the early 1880s. This image was taken in 1867 when salmon and steelhead accessed the upper basin during high flows. The last repairs were done nearly 50 years ago. (CARLETON WATKINS)

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FW)

PICTURE

28 Northwest Sportsman

Over the past 10 years an average of 36,880 adult spring Chinook have been counted passing the falls, as well as 12,005 summer steelhead and 10,278 coho, but only 4,844 winter steelhead, a symptom of another problem there: sea lion predation. State managers removed 33 this past winter and spring during the fish migration. (ODFW, BOTH)

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

summer 2019 and others in summer 2020.

IMPACTS ANGLING Without the fishway, salmon fishing in the Willamette River and others would be in dire trouble, said Kevleen Melcher, Columbia and Willamette Recreational Fisheries project leader.

“The primary spawning grounds and even hatcheries are all above Willamette Falls except for the Clackamas,” Melcher said. “They need a way to get up there and that’s what the fishway ensures.”

The fishway is critical for fish to be able to spawn and complete their lifecycle, Melcher said. All fish that pass through that area use the ladder. If it fails, it would have a big impact on sport fishing in Western Oregon.

“Without passage at Willamette Falls the recovery of the listed salmon and steelhead populations above the falls will not occur. Without passage, there wouldn’t be hatchery salmon or steelhead returning above Willamette Falls for anglers to catch,” said Jeff Boechler, North Willamette Watershed District Manager for ODFW. “Maintenance and repair of the fishway system at Willamette Falls is necessary to assure the system continues to operate as designed.”

The Restoration & Enhancement Board wanted to approve a major restoration project that would have a big impact on fisheries. The Willamette Falls Fish Ladder’s high-priority status made it a good choice for fishing dollars, said Richard Heap, recreational fisheries representative for the R&E board.

“Obviously, that ladder needs a lot of work,” Heap said. “Because it is the only conduit for those fish to get up into the upper Willamette basin, it’s vital that we fix it.”

It wasn’t a unanimous decision, Heap said, because R&E is shouldering the full cost of the repairs rather than seeking to match other money. But a majority approved it because without the falls this part of the state would lose entire ageclasses of fish until it could be replaced.

“We’re motivated and dedicated to get the biggest bang for the fisherman’s dollar that we can,” Heap said. “And this project does that.” NS

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NEWS

2 New Members Named To WDFW Commission Molly Linville (left) and Jim Anderson joined the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission in midsummer.

(TVW; JIM ANDERSON)

J

ust as his counterpart to the south did earlier this year, Washington Governor Jay Inslee appointed new members to his state’s Fish and Wildlife Commission. They are a Douglas County rancher and a South Sound administrator: Molly Linville and Jim Anderson.

Linville replaces Jay Holzmiller of Asotin County, whose six-year term officially expired at the end of last year but continued to serve on the citizen panel that sets fish and wildlife policy and oversees the Department of Fish and Wildlife. Anderson moves into a position that has been vacant since Omak’s Jay Kehne resigned in summer 2018 to spend more time with his family and field work.

LINVILLE GREW UP on a wheat and barley farm near Reardan and graduated from the University of Montana with a degree in wildlife biology. Afterwards she worked for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, including managing Conboy National Wildlife Refuge near Mt. Adams.

In 2011 she and husband David took over David’s family’s 6,000-acre KV Ranch in lower Moses Coulee near Palisades. Molly has primarily worked the land, practicing “low-stress livestock handling” and using large guard dogs to help protect the herd from predators like cougars attracted to the area by mule deer and other prey.

Linville has been on WDFW’s Wolf Advisory Group since 2015 and after a 2017 wildfire burned up nearly all of the ranch, she worked to move a bill in Olympia reforming rural fire coverage.

With Linville’s appointment, the commission also has three women on it for the second time since its creation in the mid1990s. The other two are Vice Chair Barbara Baker of Olympia and Kim Thorburn of Spokane, who both served during a sevenmonth overlap with Miranda Wecker in 2017.

AS FOR ANDERSON, where Linville’s strong suits on the commission will be ranching, wildlife biology and an Eastern Washington

perspective, his will be administration, funding and tribal relationships.

The Pierce County resident is the secretary of the board of directors of the Puget Sound Restoration Fund, which works primarily on restoring habitat and native species in the inland sea, and which describes Anderson as “widely experienced in state and federal budget, appropriation, and legislative processes.”

Some of that will have come from a 20year term as the executive director of the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission between 1985 and 2004, and as its part time executive adviser until 2011.

NWIFC came out of 1974’s Boldt Decision and represents 20 tribes in fisheries management and other issues.

Anderson graduated from Washington State University with a master’s in environmental science. Last September, Wenatchee-based radio show host John Kruse found that few sitting commissioners hunted and/or fished, but continued on page 36

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Northwest Sportsman 31

NEWS Oregon State University’s Sarah Henkel is studying the surprising longdistance movements of North Coast Dungeness using $300 acoustic transmitters glued to their shells. One caught by a crabber in the Astoria Canyon turned up “a few days later” in a Grays Harbor pot. Researchers have found the species ranges 11.5 miles on average, with some going as far as 50 miles. Why? To find food. Henkel reports there’s actually little to eat in the sandy areas traditionally targeted by crabbers, more in rocky areas. Those caught in the former are usually headed elsewhere. (OSU)

32 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

NEWS

Sign Up For Hunter Ed T

he Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife reminds prospective hunters to complete their hunter education class before hunting season.

“It’s a great time to enroll in hunter education to ensure you can participate in fall hunting seasons,” said David Whipple, WDFW hunter education division manager.

WDFW offers both traditional and online options to complete the hunter education requirement.

“The traditional classroom experience includes direct instruction from certified volunteer instructors, which can be important for younger students,” Whipple said. “The online course offers the same content, but on the student’s schedule.

If you take the online course, you must still complete an in-person field skills continued on page 36

34 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

Longtime hunter education instructor Randall Absolon walks a prospective sportsman through firing a bolt-action rifle. (WDFW)

Hunter Ed, continued from page 34 evaluation.”

All hunters born after Jan. 1, 1972 must complete a hunter education course to buy a hunting license. To find a course and learn about hunter education requirements, new hunters should visit the WDFW hunter education webpage (wdfw.wa.gov/hunting/requirements/ education/basic).

Those who are unable to complete a hunter education course before the fall hunting seasons may qualify for a hunter education deferral. For more information on the deferral, visit wdfw.wa.gov. –WDFW

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WDFW, continued from page 31 according to WDFW, Anderson “started fishing when he was 4, and hunted since he was 10, and has had fishing and hunting licenses every year since.”

It is his strong background with tribal interests that makes him an interesting choice of the governor’s to fill one of three statewide at-large positions on the commission. On the one hand it will give sportsmen and possibly some members of the general public pause because the panel represents the state’s hunters, anglers and others, and oversees state fish and game harvest, and state management.

On the other, with how closely linked state and tribal comanagement is these days, Anderson’s past nexus could help improve high-level relationships during a period of great stress on Washington’s shared natural resources.

August’s commission meeting was the first for Anderson and Linville, and in introducing himself, Anderson acknowledged spending his “entire professional career” working for tribal entities.

“I’m pledging to you that I’m an honest person and that I’m going to do my very best to understand the issues. I know that I’m on a state entity ... I know that you are shaped by your experiences,” he stated.

Both new members now have a chance to prove their abilities on the important body. Chair Larry Carpenter assigned them to the commission’s wolf committee as WDFW launches a post-recovery planning process. –Andy Walgamott

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Northwest Sportsman 37

It No –

READER PHOTOS

With more than 3 million shad making it over McNary Dam, Liam and Sofia Romig enjoyed good fishing on the Mid-Columbia, while simultaneously securing their grandpa some crab and sturgeon bait.

(YO-ZURI PHOTO CONTEST)

Cheri Crawford of Richland, Washington, shows off a nice Sitka king caught in July.

“Motor mooching herring was the key to fooling this big boy,” reported husband Jon. (YO-ZURI PHOTO CONTEST)

It wasn’t the best of sockeye seasons at Baker Lake, given the low number transferred to the North Cascades reservoir, but kayak angler Spencer Ewing had an interesting moment in mid-July – a double before the bigger one unfortunately slipped the hook. (YO-ZURI PHOTO CONTEST) The Hanford Reach is one of the fishiest stretches of river in the Northwest, and besides hosting good salmon, steelhead, oversize sturgeon and walleye action it is also productive for smallmouth. Adam Dauble caught this nice one there this summer.

(YO-ZURI PHOTO CONTEST)

Chinook season was short in the San Juans, but it wasn’t over until Corrin Campion did battle with this one. “What a fight – it put up four big runs,” reports her dad, Mike. (YO-ZURI PHOTO CONTEST)

For your shot at winning great fishing and hunting products from Yo-Zuri and Northwest Sportsman, send your fullresolution, original images with all the pertinent details – who’s in the pic and their hometown; when and where they were; what they caught their fish on/weapon they used to bag the game; and any other details you’d like to reveal (the more, the merrier!) – to awalgamott@media-inc.com or Northwest Sportsman, 14240 Interurban Ave S, Suite 190, Tukwila, WA 98168. By sending us photos, you affirm you have the right to distribute them for use in our print and Internet publications.

nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 39

READER PHOTOS We hope to share Trishana Eileen’s stirring triumph over personal adversity in a future issue, but in the meanwhile, here’s her triumph over a midsummer Puget Sound Chinook! (YO-ZURI PHOTO CONTEST)

The Brothers Backman are fishy little fellows!

Hugo, 5 years old, shows off an opening day 2019 rainbow, and his older sibling, Sal, was on our May cover with a North Sound bass.

(YO-ZURI PHOTO CONTEST)

John Leppell, Mike Franklin and John Lacross make themselves comfortable at a Western Washington fish camp during winter steelhead season. Friend Marvin Holder describes it as “a great time of year that the whole gang enjoys.” (YO-ZURI PHOTO CONTEST)

Wes Akin expertly guides a nice Chinook into a crab pot at the Edmonds Pier in mid-July, less than two weeks before he collapsed from a heart attack there, dying the next day.

The editor had just started fishing at the pier this season when Akin introduced himself one evening and added, “I’ll be netting your fish tonight.” He didn’t get the chance (mostly because of how poor a fisherman the editor is), but fellow pier anglers held a moving memorial on the water soon after Akin’s passage. (ANDY WALGAMOTT)

Nate Scanlon beams proudly at his mom Lara after she landed this estimated 30-pound upriver bright just above the Astoria-Megler Bridge early last month.

They were fishing at Buoy 10 with guide Joel Henley of AnvilOutdoors.com and running a green-label cut-plug herring behind a custom Fish Flash and 14 ounces of lead in 38 feet or water. (YO-ZURI PHOTO CONTEST)

40 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

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42 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

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Chad Huffman is the winner of our monthly Yo-Zuri Photo Contest, thanks to this great shot of Annika Miller and her Washington Coast Chinook. It wins him gear from the company that makes some of the world’s best fishing lures and lines!

Troy Wilder wins our monthly Hunting Photo Contest, thanks to this pic of son Jayce’s Southern Oregon youth hunt buck. It wins him a knife!

For your shot at winning hunting knives and Yo-Zuri fishing products, send your photos and pertinent (who, what, when, where) details to awalgamott@media-inc.com or Northwest Sportsman, PO Box 24365, Seattle, WA 981240365. By sending us photos, you affirm you have the right to distribute them for our print or Internet publications. nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 43

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44 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

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MIXED BAG

Crack Crab Cop Foils Fowl Flimflam

A

South Sound scofflaw (or scofflaws) gave new meaning to the phrase getting your ducks in line.

They strung mallard decoys on ropes attached to crab pots to illicitly try to catch Dungeness and red rock crabs in closed waters in midsummer.

But the faux fowl turned out to be, er, sitting ducks against the sharp, skeptical eyes of state game warden Natalie Hale.

During a marine patrol through Vashon and Maury Islands’ Quartermaster Harbor with fellow Department of Fish and Wildlife officer Tylar Stephenson, Hale spotted “an out-of-place bird bobbing oddly in the water,” according to the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.

“Upon inspection, it was discovered that it was a duck decoy. Officers investigated and found a freshly baited

W

KUDOS

hether in their trademark blue rigs, aboard an ocean-going or river-running boat, by airplane or on foot, Oregon fish and wildlife troopers use all manner of transportation to patrol the Beaver State – and now they

By Andy Walgamott

crab pot attached. After scouring the area, two more pots were discovered with duck decoys attached,” the agency reported on its law enforcement Facebook page.

There was no sign of who was responsible, but this part of Puget Sound

was closed for summer crabbing to rebuild Dungeness abundances that crashed in recent years, possibly due to overly warm waters, north-south larval transport issues, and/or overharvest. According to a WDFW presentation, two entire back-to-back year-classes of crabs that would have been legal-sized for sport and tribal fishermen in 2017 and 2018 were “missing, not detected,” while this year’s keepers were said to be “greatly reduced.”

Wardens noted that even if crabbing had been open, the buoys weren’t legal; they need to be half red, half white above the waterline, as well as marked with the crabber’s identification.

“Sadly the ducks had no collar or microchip with their owner’s contact information,” WDFW posted in asking any tipsters to give them a call at (877) 933-9847.

can add riding the rails! When a call came in from the Union Pacific that a bull elk had become entangled in old downed wires running along the train tracks in the upper Meacham Creek drainage, Senior Trooper Ryan Sharp met up with a railroad worker and responded to the scene. “They initially attempted to cut the bull free, but could not safely do so,” OSP reported, so

Sharp got ahold of Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife biologist Greg Rimbach to bring up a tranquilizer. After the big fella went to sleep, the trooper, bio and a Umatilla County Sheriff’s Office deputy were able to successfully free the elk from the wires and it waltzed off in good condition. “#TeamWork #AgencyPartners #FishandWildlife,” OSP tweeted.

Quack-quack! Somebody used duck decoys as buoys to crab in the closed waters of Puget Sound’s Marine Area 11, but an alert state fish and wildlife officer wasn’t fooled. (WDFW)

(OSP, ALL)

nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 45

MIXED BAG

By Andy Walgamott

Seven Rods A-running W as he trying to top last issue’s story on the Bainbridge Island dentist busted in August 2018 running six lines in the Strait of Juan de Fuca for salmon?

Maybe, maybe not, but a Columbia River angler was discovered with seven rods out earlier this summer.

No, there is not a seven-rod endorsement in Oregon or Washington.

How on earth he planned to bring in any summer steelhead or off-limits salmon he hooked without getting hopelessly tangled in all those lines – not to mention the two drift socks and pair of anchor ropes – is a damned good question too.

Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife Officer Nelson and pals with the

Running seven rods off a boat resulted in a nice tangle for one Columbia River angler – with a game warden, who ticketed him for various violations. (WDFW) Hood River County Sheriff’s Office came across him in mid-July while searching for a missing person.

A photo of the guy and his boat with all the lines out and posted to the WDFW Police Facebook page drew quite a few shares – and chortles.

“Maybe he filed the missing persons report,” Chris Ostriem wondered. “Lost 6 people.”

“One rod for every day of the week,” laughed Ryan Gedlund.

(Becky Bennett, who runs the social media page, said that the eighth rod on the boat that so many people noticed wasn’t actually fishing at the time.)

“Maybe the guy identifies as the seven dwarfs!” Brian Drake posted.

“With the number of tangles this must lead to the crime is almost its own punishment!” noted Ethan Adams.

As for the big question, it was asked by Moose Zuma: “Was he catching anything?”

“Catching a few violation tickets,” WDFW responded.

JACKASS OF THE MONTH

T

he name Mike Long may not mean much in the Northwest, but in the country’s bass world it stood for an angler who caught legendarily sized largemouth – until it didn’t.

Earlier this summer, a devastating one–two punch destroyed the San Diego-area man’s vaunted legacy through a deeply reported 19,000-word story put together by SDFish.com editor Kellen Ellis. The package also included video Ellis took of Long snagging bass off beds – fish he’d crowed about on social media as if they’d been legitimately caught.

Long hasn’t responded to the accusations; his website has been “down for maintenance” since the piece came out in late June, and his Facebook, Instagram and YouTube feeds are offline. But at one time in the early 2000s he was listed as the best fisherman in all of the Golden State by the defunct California Fishing & Hunting News.

In naming Long to the top spot that year, his catch of an 18-pound, 2-ouncer that February was specifically called out, but according to Ellis, Long used an image of himself holding a 16.25-pounder that his tourney partner had actually caught to publicize it. Then three years later, he used the same pic to claim he’d caught another of his halfdozen lake record fish at a nearby reservoir. Long would later admit to using the pic for the first record but not the other.

Through interviews with multiple sources including tournament partners, lake managers and a boy Long allegedly stalked after the kid saw two bass in a fish tank in Long’s garage next to his boat, as well as the video, Ellis essentially makes the case that Long’s achievements over the years were “preposterous, absurd, and fraudulent.”

As Long slipped down that F&H News top 40 roundup, his local tournament career also came to a sudden halt in 2010 as the directors of three different series told him he couldn’t participate without taking a lie detector test to address allegations of cheating.

By that time Long had already collected a reported $150,000 46 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

Mike Long’s reputation as one of the West Coast’s trophy bass savants was blown up when a report on the fishingwebsite SDfish.com accused him of cheating, snagging fish and bullying fellow anglers. (SCREEN SHOT OF SDFISH.COM) in winnings over the years. Somehow he finished first more than twice as often while fishing by himself than with a partner (former ones say he was actually a poor angler), and events were drawing fewer and fewer anglers because competitors believed the fix was in, according to Ellis.

Since then Long has popped up here and there as an article source on fishing for big bass, as well as taken to the aforementioned social media channels. All totaled, during his run he appeared on a reported 45 magazine covers, and was featured in the pages of minnows and heavyweights (Outdoor Life, Bassmasters) alike.

One of Long’s chroniclers, former San Diego Union-Tribune outdoor reporter Ed Zieralski, tweeted that if it all was true, “this big bass asshole brought down his best friend and defrauded an entire bass fishing community.” And for our sister publication California Sportsman, author and local angler Bill Schaefer, who fished with Long for “the big one,” lamented, “There are many big bass hunters who do things the right way and are rewarded for their catches with praise. Long cast a shadow over even them.”

Coho Derbies, Raffle Boat On Tap A s summer nears an end, a pair of big silver salmon derbies appear on the calendar, with one also providing the venue for the annual raffling off of a $75,000 boat package.

Sept. 7 sees the Edmonds Coho Derby while the Everett Coho Derby goes down Sept. 21-22. At the latter somebody who’s entered one of the Northwest Salmon Derby Series’ many events across the region will have their name drawn for a Weldcraft 202 Rebel Hardtop with Yamaha 200- and 9.9-horse motors, EZ-loader galvanized trailer and more.

For the past two years the package has been won by Idaho anglers who entered

Anglers like Michael Rian (second from right) will be competing to catch the largest silver at a pair of derbies in September to score cold, hard greenbacks. First up is the Edmonds Coho Derby, then comes the Everett Coho Derby, which Rian won $10,000 at last year with a 13.27-pounder. (EVERETT COHO DERBY; MICHAEL RIAN)

By Andy Walgamott

The winner of the 2019 Northwest Salmon Derby Series grand raffle prize, this boat and all that comes with it, will be awarded at late September’s Everett Coho Derby. (NMTA) late July's The Big One Derby on Lake Couer d’Alene, but who knows who will win the 2019 edition.

Anglers will be more focused on pulling the biggest coho out of local waters, but should note that while the southern portion of Marine Area 8-2 will be available for Edmonds event participants, it won’t be open during the Everett derby.

With federal fishery overseers classifying Snohomish coho as an “overfished” stock, state managers are trying to get as many wild and hatchery fish back to the system as they can. Another saltwater option for both

events is the Tulalip Bubble, which is open Saturdays and Sundays through September.

The Edmonds Derby is put on by the Sno-King Chapter of the venerable Puget Sound Anglers organization, and features a $5,000 top prize for largest silver, $2,500 for second and $1,000 for third. Unlike the Everett derby, it is only held on saltwater.

Last year’s winner was Bill Turner who weighed in a 10.1-pounder.

For more, see edmondscohoderby.com.

AREA 8-2 IS where 2018’s Everett winner caught his $10,000 fish in heaving seas, but you can bet that Michael Rian will just take his very specific strategy to nearby Area 9, Admiralty Inlet, the pipeline that will funnel hundreds of thousands of coho to Central, South and Deep South Sound streams.

He swears by 66 feet based on experiences in British Columbia and at last year's derby. “Our group … has caught a very high number of coho at that exact depth, and have tried to disprove the theory, and we keep losing!” he told me.

Rian used an orange-label herring in a Rhys Davis anchovy helmet in gold, green and chrome and tandem 2/O and 3/O barbless hooks on a 6-foot, 30-pound fluorocarbon leader behind an 11-inch flasher in gold green. nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 49

Last year was the first time the Snohomish Sportsmen’s Club and Everett Steelhead & Salmon Club had been able to hold the derby since 2015 due to low returns and fishery closures. Over the past decade or so, Areas 8-2 and 9 have both produced three winning fish, Area 10 one and the Snohomish one (coincidentally also the largest, 18.16 pounds). Proceeds benefit local fish projects, including the release of 80,000-plus coho fry annually.

To get ready for the event, check out John and Conner Martinis’s free “High Percentage Coho Fishing” seminar starting at 6 p.m., Weds., Sept. 19, at Everett Bayside Marine off of West Marine View Drive.

For more, see everettcohoderby.com.

RECENT RESULTS  Summer

Steelhead Challenge, Lower Columbia River, July 19-21: First place: Jason Cobb, 8.8-pound steelhead; second: Steve Long, 8.76-pound steelhead; third: Aaron Pascoe, 8.21-pound steelhead  2019 Big One Derby, Lake Couer d’Alene, July 24-28: First place: Brett Hojem, 13.54-pound Chinook, $1,000  Baker Lake Shootout, Baker Lake, July 26-28: First place: Todd Bennin, 6.06-pound sockeye; second: David Sitton, 5.28-pound sockeye  Brewster Salmon Derby, upper half of the Columbia River’s Brewster Pool, Aug. 2-4: King of the Pool: JR Dorsey, 25.2-pound Chinook, $2,000; adult first place: Kim Hammons, 23.57-pound Chinook, $1,500; youth winner: Alex Davis, 22.42-pound Chinook, $550  South King County PSA Salmon Derby, Marine Areas 10, 11 and 13, Aug. 3: First place: Steven Pringle, 21.40-pound Chinook, $3,500; second: Alan Salitono, 21.05-pound Chinook, $1,500; third: Garrett Werlinger, 19.95-pound Chinook, $1,000  Gig Harbor PSA Salmon Derby, Aug. 10, Marine Areas 11 and 13: First place: Chris Tremblay, 24.98-pound Chinook, $2,500; second: Ken Maxfield, 18.49-pound Chinook, $1,000; third: Leroy Bell, 18.03-pound Chinook, $500

50 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

Tourney Cancelled To Reduce Pressure On Low Run

T

he show must go on – or at least the raffle in this case.

With Chinook returns to Yaquina Bay and other Central Coast rivers forecast to come in at “near historic lows,” the U Da Man Fishing Tournament board made a “difficult decision” to scrub their annual fall derby, but they will still raffle off a 17foot Willie drifter.

Two hundred tickets ($50) were slated to be Chinook caught during 2014’s U Da Man Fishing Tournament on the available at Englund Yaquina River lay on a bed of ice. With low runs expected this year, the organization cancelled its fall derby. (U DA MAN FISHING TOURNAMENT) Marine, at the far end of the Bayfront in Newport, which is where the drawing will also be held at noon on Oct. 12.

The boat comes with oars, anchor, a pair of inflatable personal flotation devices and a Saxon galvanized trailer, an overall package estimated to be worth just under $10,000, according to organizers.

“While we are disappointed in having to cancel the October event, we feel it would be hypocritical of our group to hold the tournament and put even more pressure on the forecasted low returns of nonclipped Chinook salmon,” they said in calling it off early this summer.

The derby provides key funding for U Da Man as members work on salmon and habitat issues in the Yaquina watershed.

Each spring they clean up the lower river’s banks between Toledo and Newport, and after Christmas, they place trees in the water for young coho to shelter under. Scholarships are also awarded to budding local biologists.

“Without the monies generated by the tournament, our available funds will be severely depleted,” the organization stated.

2019 NORTHWEST SALMON DERBY SERIES  Sept. 7: Edmonds Coho Derby  Sept. 21-22: Everett Coho Derby

For more details, see nwsalmonderbyseries.com.

MORE ONGOING/UPCOMING EVENTS

 Now through the end of season: Westport Charterboat Association Weekly Lingcod, Halibut, Chinook, Coho, Albacore Derbies; charterwestport.com

 Now through Oct. 31: 2019 WDFW Statewide Trout Derby; fishhunt.dfw.wa.gov  Nov. 23-27, 29-Dec. 1, Lake Pend Oreille Idaho Club Thanskgiving Derby, Lake Pend Oreille; info: lpoic.org

 Sundays in late fall/winter, Tengu Salmon Derby, Elliott Bay  Jan. 18, NW Ice Fishing Festival, Sidley and Molson Lakes, Molson, Wash.

For more Washington contests, see wdfw.wa.gov/fishing/contests.

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SEPTEMBER 1 Washington statewide cougar, deer (bow), dove, grouse and various small game openers; Northeast and Southeast Washington fall turkey openers; Oregon statewide grouse, dove openers; Oregon California and mountain quail openers in portions of state; Northeast Oregon steelhead opener; Steelhead restrictions begin on the Columbia between The Dalles and McNary Dams 6-8 Oregon Central Coast nonselective coho opener (open following FridaySundays through Sept. 30 or until 9,000-fish quota filled) 7 Washington bow elk opener; Washington September early goose opener; CAST for Kids event at Gene Coulon Park, Lake Washington – info: castforkids. org; Pheasant Hunting Workshop at Sauvie Island Wildlife Area near Portland ($) – info: odfwcalendar.com; Olympia, Polk County, Sauvie Island DU Chapters Banquets – info: ducks.org 7-8 Youth Pheasant Hunt at Fern Ridge WA (free) – link above 8 CAST for Kids event at Hagg Lake near Forest Grove – link above; Pheasant Hunting Workshop at Sauvie Island WA ($) – link above 9 Opening of four-week-long fee pheasant hunt at Fern Ridge WA 12-15 36th Annual Portland Fall RV & Van Show, Expo Center – info: otshows.com; 2019 Seattle Boats Afloat Show, S. Lake Union – info: boatsafloatshow.com 14-15 Pheasant Hunting Workshop at EE Wilson WA ($) – link above 14-15 Youth Pheasant Hunts in the John Day Valley, and at Denman, Klamath, Ladd Marsh, Sauvie Island, White River WAs (free) – link above 15-23 Bandtail pigeon season in Oregon, Washington 15-25 High Buck Hunt in several Washington North, Central Cascades and Olympics wilderness areas, Lake Chelan National Recreation Area 16 Opening of fee pheasant hunts at Denman (19 days), Sauvie (14 days) WAs 19 Bellingham DU Banquet – link above 21 Enumclaw DU Banquet – link above 21 (22) Various Washington youth bird hunting opportunities – info in pamphlet 21-22 Youth Pheasant Hunts at EE Wilson, Irrigon WAs (free) – link above 23-27 Washington statewide senior, disabled hunter pheasant hunting week 26 Portland DU Banquet – info: ducks.org 28 Oregon Coast, Cascade and most controlled rifle buck openers; Washington muzzleloader deer opener; Take a Warrior Fishing event on Lake Washington – info: castforkids.org; Whidbey Island DU Banquet – link above; 48th Annual National Hunting & Fishing Day – info: nhfday.org 28 (29) Various Washington youth bird hunting opportunities – info in pamphlet

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OCTOBER 1 Salmon and steelhead opener on numerous Oregon streams, coho opener on select lakes; Opening of month-long fee pheasant hunt at EE Wilson WA 5 Eastern Washington quail and chukar openers; Oregon statewide rooster pheasant and partridge openers; General Central and Northeast Oregon turkey openers; Eastern Oregon California and mountain quail openers; Oregon Zone 2 duck and scaup and Klamath, Lake, Harney, Malheur Counties Canada and whitefronted goose openers; Kitsap, Summer Lakes DU Banquets – link above 8 Gig Harbor DU Banquet – link above 10 Deer, elk rifle openers in many Idaho units 12 Washington rifle deer and first waterfowl openers; Oregon Zone 1 duck and Southwest and East Zones goose openers; Oregon Cascades rifle elk opener; Family Fishing Event at St. Louis Ponds near Gervais (free) – link above 12-13 Youth Pheasant Hunt near Ontario (free) – link above 15 Western Oregon turkey opener; Last day of Oregon ocean crab season 19 Oregon Cascade Buck second opener; Northwest Oregon Permit Goose first opener; Eastern Washington pheasant opener; Family Fishing Event at Mt. Hood Pond in Gresham – link above; Grande Ronde DU Banquet – link above nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 53

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58 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

ROUGH DAYS AT SEA

What began as a good day to fish off Oregon’s South Coast for albacore turned bad on the run back in for several boats. (JIM PEX)

Black Tuesday A weather-window run out of Charleston for albacore nearly turns into disaster when a storm unexpectedly hits 32 miles from safety.

By Jim Pex

I

never encourage people to take up albacore tuna fishing. All those fish just offshore and easy to catch. If you go one time, you will be hooked for life. Don’t do it! It is what happened to me in 1990 and I have been afflicted ever since.

The following is a story about one of those early trips at the height of my addiction. Here I must note that my friends were not a support group, as they were afflicted too.

THE EXPEDITION STARTED with phone calls on the local fishing network, visiting the docks, talking to commercial fishermen, reading the Salty Dog forum and studying the weather reports. It was not like getting the local news and weather; here we look at actual ocean buoy reports and sea surface temperature maps for 60-degree waters inside the 125 line.

It might also include walking up to people sitting in their boat fumbling

with tuna gear and mumbling under their breath. You just knew a kindred spirit when you saw them.

In longitude, the edge of the continental shelf is at about the 125 degree line west of Charleston, outside Coos Bay, and about 37 nautical miles west. In theory, when underwater currents reach the shelf, upwelling occurs and this is where we often find the fish. This is also close to the limit in miles for many recreational boats based on their onboard fuel supply.

How much boat fuel to use before getting concerned is different than with trucks and cars. With boats we use the rule of thirds: one third to get there, one third to get home. If the seas turn on you, the amount of fuel used returning could be much more than the trip out. For example, if you take a string and label the ends A and B, one can measure the length of the string stretched full length. Now make a series of bends with the string and remeasure the distance between

A and B; it will be considerably shorter. Such is the case when ocean conditions worsen while you are out there traveling up and down with the waves. The trip home becomes longer than the trip out.

My friends Cliff and Dale were avid fishermen. We would pursue fish almost every weekend that we could escape our household responsibilities.

We all had boats, but mine was a little more seaworthy than theirs were. It was a 1990 Bayliner Trophy with an enclosed cabin area. At 21 feet with a single 5.0-liter engine, it was adequate for getting us to the fishing grounds and back. There was room to fish three comfortably, and it had sufficient fish boxes to stack ice and tuna. My boat had the usual safety equipment that included a VHF radio, a Loran and a GPS – enough stuff that we thought we were prepared for the day.

THE WEATHER HAD been bad for several days and the ocean conditions were unsuitable for fishing with a boat the nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 59

ROUGH DAYS AT SEA

size of mine. The three of us were often talking back and forth on the phone, listing every resource possible in our search for a day to get out.

Then it happened, it looked like there was going to be a break in the weather. It was July, and in our area, the wind blows hard and often in July. But it looked like on the following Tuesday that there would a window before the wind started howling again. I normally know better than to trust the weatherman, but when addicted, I only need one positive resource.

The three of us were not the only ones who spotted this chance. Back in the 1990s, there were not a lot of sport tuna fishermen in our area. All total, we had four boats heading out that morning. None of us on my boat could sleep the night before and I was up a dozen times checking stuff that I might have forgotten. At that time Author Jim Pex was among the early entrants into the Northwest’s recreational albacore fishery, getting hooked on the “addiction” nearly 30 years ago with a handful of other Southern Oregon anglers. “Back in the 1990s, there were not a lot of sport tuna fishermen in our area. All total, we had four boats heading out that morning,” he writes. (MIKE CAMPION)

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SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

of year daylight arrives at about 5:30 a.m. and we were at the dock at 4:00 a.m. with the guys from the other boats. Everyone was excited and the talk was all tuna.

The recent intel suggested the tuna were 17 miles out to the northwest.

Tuna are sight hunters and require clear water to find food. Inshore, the water has algae within it and the color is green. When you are out far enough to find the tuna water, the color is blue. Blue is the reflection of the sky in clear water.

My friends John and Lou were already pulling out from the dock when we got there. John was running a 24-foot Osprey, Lou a 24foot Sea Sport. My friend George and his wife were launching with us and they were in a 23-foot Olympic. They were much older than our crew but still loved the challenge of the sea.

Little did we know the day would challenge that love affair.

WE RAN OUT of the bay by GPS in the dark hoping not to run into any crab pot lines or logs. It was a little unnerving, as I could hear the bar crashing on

the jetties long before we got there.

The swell was present well inside the channel, which is usually a warning, but undaunted, we kept going.

Once on the bar we dropped to displacement speed, which is slow, and climbed up and down the waves for the next half mile. If you have not tried this in the dark, there is a certain amount of pucker factor that goes with it; be sure to wear your life jacket.

The crossing reminded me of years past when I lived in Medford, when I would run some sections of the Rogue River at night in my drift boat to be the first one to get in a fishing hole.

The sound of the rapids by flashlight was intense too. Here we had bigger boats and larger waves. Are some of us a little bit crazy? Probably.

After the crossing we made good time heading northwest behind the other boats. I love to see the sunrise in the east from the ocean side; it is always beautiful. On this day it was spectacular. The waves were tolerable, the wind was up early but we were making about 20 knots heading out.

What was a surprise was the view

The plan that Tuesday was to run 17 miles to the northwest out of Charleston where fish had been recently reported, but it wasn’t until the boats were 40 miles out that schools were found. (NOAA)

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nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 61

ROUGH DAYS AT SEA

to the south. In the distance we could see a black wall of weather hanging clear down to the water. Thank goodness we were not going in that direction. I don’t recall ever seeing a cloud pattern like that one. But to the northwest, the sky was clear. As the three of us talked about fishing, the mood was great.

In an hour we reached the GPS coordinates at 17 miles, but the water was still green, so we kept running.

John and Lou were into fish about 40 miles out in 60-degree water, so that was our destination too. George agreed, as he was still running in my prop wash.

When we arrived at 40 miles out, we were in blue water. We set the hand lines and had fish on immediately. The fishing was good, the skies were clear and blue but the wind and waves had picked up and were making the troll uncomfortable.

Cliff is a tall guy and the gunnels on my boat were not high enough for him to brace himself, so he was on his hands and knees getting to the lines, while Dale was hanging on the best he could. But the fish were there, and we were catching them. In a little over an hour we had 27 albacore on board. The rear deck was covered in fish blood and the two of them were so bloodied they looked like they had

lost a bar fight.

I stayed up front and ran the boat, watching for schools of fish on the surface, what we call jumpers. I talked to George on the VHF and said it was getting a little too lumpy and probably time to head for the barn.

He and his wife had all the fish he wanted and agreed. The “sheep was on the water” out there and I knew we were cutting it thin on this trip.

John and Lou decided to hang in there a little longer. The fishing was too good to give up just yet.

I LOOKED SOUTH and that black wall of cloud had moved north and was now getting between us and shore. It is not unusual to be able to see all the way across a squall line and this was no exception. I could still see blue sky nearby. I took off with George behind me, making good speed under the current conditions. It did not take long to see what was happening ahead.

Some of the waves were out of the west and the wind had shifted from the northwest to out of the south.

Some larger waves were coming out of the south, causing mixed seas.

Weather fronts always have a good wind before the actual storm hits and this was no exception. The seas were about 6 feet when I set a course for Charleston due southeast.

At 32 miles out, we hit the storm.

Visibility dropped in the driving rain and the seas doubled in size. To consider them at 12 feet was certainly in the ballpark, but I was never sure.

How do you judge from inside a small boat? It was unusual in that we did not hit this storm gradually. We were doing OK, then we were in it in minutes. I dropped into a trough between waves so low I could not see anything but the surrounding water. Then the first wave broke over the bow and up the windshield. To starboard, I was momentarily looking underwater. The boat rocked hard as the wave pushed the bow off course to port. Just as we cleared that wave, we were struck again. The skies were dark gray and the surrounding seas were also gray and angry.

Our course kept changing to east instead of southeast. I attempted to steer into the waves to get back on course but that was stupid. We were in trouble. The only thing I knew to do was quarter the seas and continue east as best I could at a slow pace. I kept watching for the waves that break over like you see in surfer movies. They are especially bad as they are full of air. Air does not float a boat. When I would reach a wave top, we would look around for George and reassess the seas. Here I had a brief moment to talk with him on the radio. George and his wife were frightened out of their wits. The next time we hit a wave top, I tried to reach the Coast Guard to advise them of our position and sea conditions, but I got no response.

WE’D CLOSED THE cabin door when we started back, and Dale had pinned

As seas got lumpier, Pex and crew decided to head back to shore with another boat, but ran into the storm. “It was unusual in that we did not hit this storm gradually. We were doing OK, then we were in it in minutes,” he writes. (JIM PEX)

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SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

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Northwest Sportsman 63

ROUGH DAYS AT SEA

himself between the table and the forward bulkhead. Cliff was on the other side of table and tight to the door with his long legs. Dale’s eyes told it all: He was sure we were going to die. You could see his fear as he looked around at the churning seas.

Then he said it.

“Well, Jim, do you think we are going to make it?”

“I don’t know, Dale,” was my response.

Cliff was silent, which if you knew the guy was a statement in itself.

As the captain, I was in uncharted territory; nothing like this had ever happened to me. I don’t think I was scared, just intent.

VHF radio transmits along line of sight and the 8-foot antenna mounted to the side of the boat was too low to send a signal above the wave tops. At some point I looked past Dale out the window only to see a part of my antenna shattered like a wet noodle strike the window. Now that radio was useless. I grabbed my ditch bag, found the handheld VHF and turned it on. These only have 5 watts of transmitting power, limiting the distance it could send and receive.

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How serious were things becoming? At one point on the wave-wracked run in, with water seeping into the motor compartment and the bilge pumping, the men mulled tossing their 27 albacore overboard to lighten the load. But none wanted to risk going out on the sea-sloshed decks. (DAVE ANDERSON)

We were still making headway with the wipers going in the rain and the high seas, but at some point had lost visual on George. I tried to reach him on the portable but got no response. Cliff and I both thought we had to go back, while Dale was silent.

So I waited a few minutes trying to decide just how I was going to reverse direction. I had plenty of power, just no place to use it.

Finally, I decided to do the snow ski trick. As we started up a huge wave, I cut the wheel and hit the throttle doing a 180-degree turn. One look at Dale and he was sure it was the wrong move. We accomplished the turn just ahead of a following wave that was rolling off the transom and lapping at the swim platform. We hit the bottom of the trough hard and plowed the next wave. I dropped the throttle and the bow lifted us to safety. We found George putting along making some headway, but just not able to keep up with me. We spoke words of encouragement over the portable and I did another fancy turn into the churning seas. Then Dale spoke: “Well, Jim, do you think we are going to make it?”

“I don’t know, Dale,” I said.

BY THIS TIME, John and Lou, who had stayed behind to fish a while longer, were in the storm. John got on the radio and said he had standing waves running down the walkways on both sides of his hardtop boat. Lou and his crew were in an open windshield boat and were not up for talking. They were bailing instead. Lou told me later that the waves were coming over the side of the boat. The water would hit the shift lever causing a short that would shock him if he was slow to remove his hand. The crew was bailing with 5-gallon buckets to stay afloat.

The only way I could tell we were making progress was watching the distance meter on the GPS to the waypoint I had laid for the Coos Bay Bar. The going was slow, green water was still running over my windshield and I was often looking underwater out the starboard side. It was wearing all of us out with the bracing for impact, the rocking of the boat and the worry. Then we lost George again.

Cliff could not get a visual and I could not raise him on the VHF. A few moments later we did hear

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Northwest Sportsman 65

ROUGH DAYS FISHING ROUGHATDAYS SEA AT SEA

George on his VHF and we heard him contact the Coast Guard trying to explain our dire circumstances.

Cliff kept looking back each time we reached a wave peak, then suddenly he saw George about 100 yards off our port side. Fear had him applying a little more throttle to keep up with us. I could hear him but not the Coast Guard. He had a top-mounted VHF antenna that was still intact, which gave him the ability to reach out even

in these seas. What I did hear was that no one was coming if we were still underway.

Dale had that look again.

At one point, I was sure the oncoming waves were larger and were going to break the windshield.

We held our breath as they struck hard, rocked the boat and passed over

Eventually the storm and seas began to lay down, but the entry to Coos Bay posed another problem. “The swell from the storm had kicked up the bar. The Coast Guard had not closed it, but I thought they probably should – right after I got in,” Pex wrotes. (JIM PEX)

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Northwest Sportsman 67

ROUGH DAYS FISHING ROUGHATDAYS SEA AT SEA

The safety of Charleston’s harbor reached, Pex’s friend Dale Reiber kissed the docks, “seagull poop and all,” and swore off ever going to sea to fish again, something he’d enjoyed. (ANDY WALGAMOTT)

the hard top.

“Well, Jim, do you think we are going to make it?”

“I don’t know, Dale,” I said as I kept quartering the seas.

By this time our progress was taking me north of my intended destination and I was worried that if we made it, we would end up at Winchester Bay but under impossible conditions for a bar crossing. Hours

went by, I was getting tired, Cliff was getting banged around in the boat as he tried to brace himself and then there was Dale and his question.

We were still in the thick of it and had not seen George for at least a half hour. Attempts to raise him on the radio were negative, so I made another power turn like a skier would do on a mogul and we headed back out to sea.

We found George again: He just could

not keep up with me, was bone tired and his voice was weak on the radio.

There was nothing I could do but try to keep him close. I could see the water pass over his bow in the troughs, but it would lift just in time to wash it away and clear his windshield . I told him to raise his outdrive a little and it would give his bow more lift. He did but it did not help much when the headway was limited.

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Northwest Sportsman 69

I LOOKED BACK at my rear deck and there would be no need for cleanup at the dock. It was as clean as a whistle from the seawater. I had been so intent on watching the surrounding seas that I did not immediately see the bilge pump light come on. That meant there was water in the bilge and the pump was working on it. To do an inspection, I would have to get on the back deck and raise the engine cover for a look. There was no way I was going to let go of the steering wheel and it was clear that the other two were not venturing past the closed door either. We would just have to continue not knowing.

Ever try to not think about something important? Ever try not thinking about the water building up inside your boat in rough seas? It just does not work. We discussed tossing out the 27 tuna on board to lighten up the boat, but again we would have to go outside the secure cabin to open up the fish holds. None of us were willing.

I tried to reach the Coast Guard on my portable VHF but got no response.

As the hours passed, I lost sight of George but could hear him talking to the other boats. I wondered how his wife was taking all of this. None of us had ever been in seas like this and it was a fright.

We did have one thing going for us and that was the design of modernday fiberglass sport boats. Unlike commercial boats, the sport boats sit on top of the water like a cork, which lets most of the seas pass under the hull. Commercial fishing boats have displacement hulls and displace a lot more water when underway. Turning around like I did would be nearly impossible in a displacement boat and they seldom are capable of running faster than 10 knots.

I kept telling myself how well the boat was performing under the conditions. We would climb a wave, reach the top, then cascade down the other side like a surfer to the bottom of the trough, then turn up to meet the next wave. The wind was blowing 70 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTMEBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

the tops off the waves, creating a white foam that could be seen on the water and on my boat. We refer to this as the sheep were on the water.

In time, I could feel there was hope that we would make it, provided the bilge did not fill with water and kill the engine under the deck.

“Well, Jim, do you think we are going to make it?”

“I don’t know, Dale.”

LATE THAT AFTERNOON the waves started to subside, and the skies began to clear. We were about halfway between Charleston and Winchester Bay for latitude and still about 10 miles out. We had passed out of the weather cell and I was able to pick up speed with the changing conditions.

Soon we were on the bar at the entrance to Coos Bay. Here we go again, the swell from the storm had kicked up the bar. The Coast Guard had not closed it, but I thought they probably should – right after I got in.

We sat outside watching the pattern of the incoming swell, waiting for the right wave. I hit the throttle hard and jumped on the back of one.

From this position I was high enough in the air that I could see across both jetties. The situation was intense: I was at full throttle doing close to 30 knots trying to stay on the back of the swell and in front of the one lapping off my transom. I didn’t look back to see how the other two were doing. I don’t think I took a breath for several minutes.

Then we were across and in the safety of the inner bay under blue skies. When we got to the dock, Dale got out of the boat, laid on the dock and gave it a kiss, seagull poop and all. Cliff had been banged around so much he could hardly walk. In time we got the boat on the trailer, iced down the fish and called it a day.

I turned to Dale and said, “We made it.”

I slept hard that night after telling the family about our adventure. I don’t think I could verbally express nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 71

the circumstances well enough for them to appreciate the danger, so I went to bed.

The next morning I called Cliff.

He said he was stiff and had several bruises from being banged around in the boat.

I called Dale in midmorning. He had just gotten up to get a drink of water and was going back to bed. Dale loved the ocean and the fishing to be found out there. In our conversation he admitted on the way in he prayed to our Lord that if he survived this experience, he would never go back to sea.

He never did.

I keep a St. Christopher medal pinned to my boat headliner and reference it in times of worry. I am sure, in my heart, He was looking out for us that day.

iona

Since

l

1955

ip

pt

h

c

r

e

af

s

ex

c

WE WERE LUCKY, and not just us three.

All the boats made it in that day. As we learned, ocean conditions can change at a moment’s notice, going from the fantastically beautiful to deadly. We all discovered that one can never be totally prepared for events like this but if one survives, the experience is priceless.

When our group occasionally meets for a beer and to reminisce about old fishing adventures, it is clear that none of us will ever forget that day. NS

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Author’s note: My dear friend Dale Reiber passed away this spring. This story is the combined memories of Cliff Lance and I in remembrance of Dale.

Editor’s note: Author Jim Pex is an avid angler based out of Coos Bay and who enjoys fishing for albacore, salmon and rockfish. He is retired and was previously CEO of International Forensic Experts LLC and a lieutenant with the Oregon State Police at its crime laboratory. Pex is the author of CSI: Moments from a Career in Forensic Science, available through Amazon.

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nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 73

74 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

FISHING

Welcome To Silv-ember Coho fishing hits top gear in Puget Sound and area rivers in late summer and early fall as a decent salmon run arrives.

By Mark Yuasa

E

xcitement about coho salmon – also known as silvers for their chrome-bright flanks – began back in June when central Puget Sound and coastal fisheries lit up like the New York skyline.

Anglers were star struck with easy limits and many began to wonder if this was a precursor for late summer and fall when their migratory relatives enter Puget Sound and Strait of Juan de Fuca.

Those are two completely different stocks, resident and ocean-returning fish, of course, but still hopes are high.

“We’re expecting pretty good coho fishing in open marine areas, especially in late August and by the second and third week of September,” said Mark Baltzell, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife Puget Sound salmon manager. “I’m predicting a season like last year but with more opportunities in Puget Sound. We hope what we’ve seen off the coast this summer is the same for our inside water areas too.”

That optimism hinges on a Puget Sound coho forecast of 670,159, which is up from 557,149 in 2018 and much higher than the dismal returns in 2017 and 2016.

COHO CREATE A fishing frenzy with long

Western Washington anglers can look forward to larger coho returns back to rivers this year compared to 2018. September and October are prime months to fish for them on Puget Sound, where author Mark Yuasa caught this one, and in the rivers. (MARK YUASA) nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 75

FISHING lines at boat ramps and shore anglers standing shoulder-to-shoulder casting their hopes toward feisty acrobatic fish known to jump out of the water and zigzag in all directions when hooked.

To be successful there are strategies and tactics that will lead to more coho in the fish box.

First off, coho like a fast presentation so pushing up the trolling speed – 2.8 to 3.5 mph – is by far the most important factor into getting more hookups.

Another is finding schools of silvers, as they tend to move around a lot. Most boat anglers will focus on the Strait’s and Sound’s shipping lanes, in rip tides and at the edge of a current.

Be sure to keep an eye out for birds feeding on krill and baitfish schools, which is another sign of silvers lurking underneath.

Knowing their tendencies during the time of day is also important.

Early mornings and late evenings are when coho can be found within the top 50 feet of the water column.

Remember that as the sun rises, don’t be afraid to drop your lines as deep as 125 to 150 feet.

In the morning, I like to stagger my gear with one set at 25 to 30 feet and the others as deep as 50 to 80 feet below the surface. When you hook a fish be sure to set the rods at the same depth. Watching your fish finder to see where the bait and salmon are holding is a sure way to

see how deep you should go.

Utilizing a downrigger or two on a boat enables an angler to keep their presentation at a specific depth. But not having ’riggers isn’t a hindrance as simply using a banana lead weight of 2 to 6 ounces will do the job too.

Be sure to count out the line so you can get the bait to the depth where the fish are located.

When fishing with a downrigger, tie your mainline to a barrel swivel.

The leader to the lure or hooks should be about 6 to 8 feet of 25- to 30-pound monofilament tied to a flasher.

On the topic of what anglers use, generally, it’s either herring or artificial lures. Most will use flashers to create some motion to the lure or bait. Popular artificial lures include spoons like a Silver Horde Coho Killer or Kingfisher Lite, or a Luhr Jensen Coyote; plastic hoochies (2- to 4-inch squid imitations); and the Silver Horde Ace Hi Fly in a purple haze or green spatterback. Adding artificial scent to your bait or lure will also help entice a bite.

A technique that became popular at Neah Bay was skipping a bucktail fly across the surface when coho schools were abundant. Anglers would stick the flies behind the motor prop wash, where bubbles and wake create a disturbance on the surface, luring silvers to the surface. This is often referred to as an instinctive strike response.

You can also catch them drifting bait – mooching a cut-plug or whole herring – or vertical jigging with leadstyle jigs.

MANY MARINE AREAS are currently open for coho, but before going out check the WDFW pamphlet or website (wdfw.wa.gov) for details.

The coast from Neah Bay south to Ilwaco (Marine Catch Areas 1 to 4) is open for hatchery coho through Sept.

30; the Straits including Sekiu and Port Angeles (Areas 5 and 6) is open for hatchery coho through Sept. 30; and the San Juan Islands (Area 7) are open for all coho through Sept. 30.

Locally, most will focus on the North Sound (Area 9), which is open for hatchery coho through Sept. 30; Central Sound (Area 10), which is open for all coho through Nov. 15; South Sound (Area 11), which is open for all coho through Sept. 30; and Deep South Sound (Area 13), which is open year-round for hatchery coho.

Different this year is that along the east side of Whidbey Island (Area 8-2), the southern portion from the Mukilteo-Clinton line south and west towards the Area 9 boundary is open through Sept. 15 for hatchery coho and pinks only, meant to protect low returns of the two salmon species to the Snohomish River. This area was a hotbed for big coho in 2018 and anglers should see a similar scenario this season.

Silver slayers work from boats and the beach as the salmon surge into the Sound. The former are more successful overall, but the inland sea’s shorelines provide many good places to cast a Buzz Bomb, Rotator, other jigs, or hang a herring under a bobber. (ANDY WALGAMOTT) 78 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

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FISHING Fast-trolling an aptly named Coho Killer or other spoon, hoochie, Ace High Fly or bucktail is a top technique from a boat for picking up silvers like this duo held by Carsten McIntosh of the Northwest Marine Trade Association.

(MARK YUASA)

Up north, Area 8-1 is open for all coho through Oct. 31.

Target coho in the shipping lanes from Sekiu to Port Angeles; Midchannel Bank off Port Townsend; west and east sides of Whidbey Island; Point No Point; east side of Marrowstone Island; Possession Bar; Pilot Point; off Edmonds Marina south to Richmond Beach; Jefferson Head; Meadow Point near Shilshole Bay south to West Point; Shipwreck south of Mukilteo; Des Moines to Tacoma; and Browns Bay. Shore-bound anglers can also catch their fair share of coho along the west side of Whidbey Island at Bush and Lagoon Points and Fort Casey, Lincoln Park in West Seattle, Point No Point, Possession Point, Marrowstone Island, Point Wilson near Port Townsend, and 80 Northwest Sportsman

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various piers, docks and shorelines from Edmonds to Seattle and as far south as Tacoma.

Derbies are a big draw during coho season, and the Puget Sound Anglers Sno-King Chapter Edmonds Coho Derby on Sept. 7 is followed by the biggest on West Coast – the Everett Coho Derby on Sept. 21-22.

For more, see nwsalmonderbyseries .com, edmondscohoderby.com and everettcohoderby.com.

PUGET SOUND RIVERS will come alive for coho in late summer and from early to midfall. Once coho sniff the freshwater they become less focused on feeding and their primary goal is spawning, but there are ways to trigger a bite or reaction on a very finicky fish.

The go-to lure, especially in

local rivers, is a Dick Nite spoon with a dropper weight. Be sure to take along a wide variety of color choices – 50/50 (nickel-brass), frog UV, brass redhead, silver/chartreuse, chartreuse/pearl and silver/orange are usually good. Sometimes a slight color or size can make the difference between going home skunked or bringing back a limit of fish.

Another favorite for casting and retrieving is a size 4 or 5 Blue Fox Vibrax spinner. Different colors work on different days based on water conditions and time of day. Chartreuse, flame orange, red/gold, green/silver or solid chrome are the top picks.

When fishing from a boat, anglers like a Yakima Bait Mag Lip 3.5, Brad’s Wiggler or a Wiggle Wart to cast or troll in slower sections of rivers.

FISHING

Once they enter the rivers, coho are notoriously fickle, and with some of the places they hang out being snaggy, bringing a wide variety of gear is a good idea. Big spinners, twitching jigs, casting and back-trolling plugs, eggs and more are among the best bets. (ANDY WALGAMOTT)

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An old-school favorite is the Luhr Jensen Kwikfish. A deep-diving, smaller K11 to K13 works well in clearer water, although a larger K14 or K15 with a sardine wrap is a more standard size. Color choices here are flame orange, cerise, purple, gold/ orange and fire tiger.

Another method is twitching jigs, which is casting a 3/8-, ¼- or ½-ounce hoochie or marabou jig in pink, blue, cerise, purple, red and orange. Cast a jig into slow-moving water, let it sink and then slowly twitch it back to the boat or shore.

Other tried and true picks include a Yakima Bait Lil’ Corky; Beau Mac Tackle Cheater drift bobber with a piece of yarn or a cluster of salmon eggs; or a ball of cured salmon roe in a mesh netting.

Fishing times and regulations for coho in Western Washington rivers this season may feel like trying to hit a moving target while blindfolded, so

be sure to check the WDFW pamphlet or website on what you can or can’t keep, specific opening and closing dates and emergency closures.

But the following rivers will be open to varying degrees: Dungeness (total 2019 forecast: 12,050, up 2,458 compared to 2018), Quilcene (53,037, up 2,437); Nooksack (75,994, up 6,568), Skagit (67,850, down 4,447); Stillaguamish (26,054, up 7,104), Tulalip Bay (35,043, up 3,832) Snohomish (70,309, down 2,708), Lake Washington (13,560, down 1,442), Green-Duwamish (71,681, up 20,329), Puyallup (41,569, up 18,620), Nisqually (15114, up 12,894; closed on Sundays); Naselle, Willapa, etc.

(Willapa Bay tribs: 157,467, up 92,280); Chehalis, Humptulips, Wynoochee, Satsop and Skookumchuck (Grays Harbor tribs: 135,872, up 42,079); Bogachiel and Calawah (31,560, up 4,498), Queets (24,275, up 6,497) and Hoh (6,963, up 1,147). NS

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Northwest Sportsman 83

Fishing for Walleye, Trout, Pike, Pan Fish, Bass, Stripers, Salmon and WhiteďŹ sh with Bay de Noc Lures

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COLUMN Among the many ways to fish for river coho is to toss spinners, one of the best lures for the widespread salmon species. This one bit a Rooster Tail for Scott Haugen. (SCOTT HAUGEN)

Fishing Spinners for Coho N

ow through the end of fall is the time of year when coho return to their parent streams, especially those enBUZZ tering directly into RAMSEY the Pacific Ocean, the Lower Columbia and Puget Sound. And while some rivers have strong native stocks, most of those available for angler harvest are of hatchery origin and must have a missing adipose fin to keep.

Coho are similar to steelhead in size and shape, and they fight pretty much the same except they can suffer from excessive freakout. In their attempt to get away, the salmon will at times forget to watch where they’re going. For example, I’ve caught myself laughing out loud after witnessing them swim right out of the water and onto the opposite shore, headlong into an underwater obstacle, and a

few times right into my waiting landing net before I had time to scoop. Trying to escape the danger, they got going so fast they forgot to think about where they were going. Crazy!

And while coho can be caught any number of ways, casting weighted spinners is one method seldom overlooked by anglers seeking fast fishing action, which is what this article is about.

THE MOST COMMON way to fish a spinner in a river is to cast out, across and slightly upstream and reel it back to you with a retrieve speed that keeps it working near bottom. If the water is deep, you should allow your spinner to sink near bottom before starting your retrieve. Fished this way, the river current will swing your spinner downstream through the fish-holding water. Once your spinner swings in near shore, it’s time to reel in and cast again.

You’ll be much more successful if you don’t get caught up in a steady, rigid, retrieve mode. Let your spinner work with

the current. For example, if you feel a burst of water grab your lure, slow down or momentarily stop retrieving and let it work. Spinners are most effective when slowly retrieved, as slow as you can, and within a foot or two of the bottom.

Strikes are usually definite, but some fish will just stop the spinning blade, so if in doubt, set the hook.

In addition to allowing your spinner to work with the current, you can sometimes tease these fish into biting by working the lure in an erratic fashion. Use lots of starts and stops, speed-ups and slow-downs.

Even changing the angle of your retrieve can sometimes produce results.

In extreme clear water, where upstream-facing fish might spook when seeing you, upstream casting can be the go-to method. Position yourself within casting range of the fish-holding water and cast at an upstream angle. If the water is shallow, begin your retrieve as or just before your spinner hits the water, which can help you avoid hang-ups.

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Northwest Sportsman 85

There are many different brands and styles of bladed lures out there, and carrying a variety of different ones in different color schemes is a good idea for figuring out what the sometimes finicky silvers want to bite on any given day. (BUZZ RAMSEY) After an upstream cast, especially when the water is shallow, reel as fast as possible until you’ve picked up all slack line and begin to feel the resistance of the spinning blade; then slow down your retrieve speed and work your lure just above bottom.

Another productive technique is downstream casting, which works best on wide holes or tailouts. Cast your spinner out, across and at a downstream angle. Since the current is moving away from you, it requires a slow or no retrieve, as your spinner swings through the holding water.

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numbers visible in clear water or due to them sometimes jumping, you may think a fast limit is a sure thing. And while you may quickly tag out (and I hope you do), realize that these fish can be finicky about what spinner size, style and color they’ll respond to.

Tipping is not just for waiters and cows – adding a short chunk of plastic pink worm to a hook can make the difference for getting a salmon to strike your spinner. (BUZZ RAMSEY)

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Northwest Sportsman 87

COLUMN With coho entering Northwest rivers from late summer into early winter, there’s plenty of time to perfect your spinner skills on the salmon. Robert Campbell caught this one on a Flash Glo. (ROBERT CAMPBELL)

Coho are famous for sometimes turning up their nose at nearly every offering but then going crazy (as in a fish-feeding frenzy) after only one cast with the right lure. My advice: Try different offerings and let the fish tell you what they like.

While tipping is a common practice

among bass and walleye anglers, the trick is often overlooked by those chasing salmon. With spinners, what works is to tip the hook of your spinner with a short section pinched from a scent-filled worm, like the 3- or 4-inch PowerBait or Gulp! worm. And while different worm colors can work, what

often adds to success is to hang a 1-inch section of a worm in fluorescent pink from your hook – just let it hang straight back.

SPINNERS ARE AVAILABLE in an amazing array of weights, sizes and colors. For coho, the most popular weights include the ¼-, 3/8- and ½-ounce sizes – it all depends on water depth and fish preference. Some of the popular names include the Flash Glo, Blue Fox and Rooster Tail. If you’re on a budget consider the Bud’s spinner. Keep in mind that regulations might require the use of a single, rather than a treble, hook when fishing salmon in freshwater rivers.

Some also limit the width of the hook gap.

Although salmon will respond to solid metal finishes like nickel, brass or copper, coho may prefer lures featuring a combination of color and reflective metal. Spinners having fluorescent chartreuse, pink, green, blue, black, orange or red added to their makeup should be included in your arsenal. Remember, these fish can be as fickle as the stock market, so take along a wide assortment of different spinners, sizes and colors.

While both baitcasting and spinning combos work, many anglers (including me) prefer to use the latter when tossing blades. The reason: Spinning reels facilitate the casting of sometimes lightweight spinner sizes and, at least for me, are better able to deal with the fast starts, stops, slow downs and speed-ups associated with fishing one of the lures.

When it comes to fishing rods, 8½to 9-foot medium to medium-heavy actions are the most popular for spinner casting. Most anglers will combine these with medium-sized spinning reels capable of holding 140 yards of 10- to 14-pound monofilament.

Likely due to a spinner’s sonic vibration, coho respond to spinners by striking them savagely. Their built-in weight makes casting easy while their vibration-producing blades attract fish in waters ranging from stagnant to fast moving. In short, the right spinner style and color will produce almost anywhere coho salmon hold. NS Editor’s note: The author is a brand manager and part of the management team at Yakima Bait. Like Buzz on Facebook.

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COLUMN

Klickitat Can Click For Kayak Anglers W

ith an outstanding o c e a n salmon season in the books and the at THE KAYAK GUYS times stellar Buoy 10 Kayak Guys and Lower Columbia By Mark Veary seasons winding down, it would be totally justifiable to pack away your salmon gear and call it a year. But if you’re like me, too much of a good thing is never enough. With that in mind, it’s time to follow the run upriver. Next stop? The mouth of the Klickitat!

Imagine Buoy 10 without the tide change. Nose to tail boats trolling the

shoreline, morphing, midday, into a game of wind drift bumper boats as the majority change over to hover fishing the 60-footlong ledge where the tributary empties into the Columbia.

Of course, the only reason there’d be such a cluster of fiberglass, plastic and aluminum floating craft is the presence of schooling salmon. Some of the fish will be there to get out of the mainstem’s warm waters by nosing into the cooler, glacialfed Klickitat, while others are simply catching their collective breath before completing their journeys to upriver spawning grounds. Whatever their reason for being here, given the right bait and

presentation, these fish are biters.

PREDAWN IN THE Columbia River gorge.

The lights of Lyle come into view from around basalt cliffs as you approach the Klickitat Bridge on Highway 14. Even though first light is nearly an hour off the navigation lights of a dozen boats can be seen far below.

To call the launch a boat ramp is a stretch. Rather, the three-lane-wide, gravelbottomed canyon terminates abruptly at the waters of the Columbia, just east of the Klick. At this hour, the comings and goings of launch vehicles is organized chaos. Lucky for you, nobody’s willing to chance getting

Austin Bowen battles a fish off the mouth of the Klickitat River, a great place to intercept Chinook, coho and steelhead in fall. (MARK VEARY)

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Northwest Sportsman 91

COLUMN

Fishing can be good for those who run prawn spinners or Brad’s Super Baits, as this catch from Mark Veary, Geoff Fanning and Jeff Anderson attests. But with lower king and summer-run returns, at press time this year’s limit is just one adult salmon or steelhead on this part of the Columbia. (MARK VEARY) buried in the sand or dinging their boats on the cliff walls at the edges of the launch, leaving you a perfect place to wheel your kayak down without interrupting the flow.

Above the high desert ridges of the gorge, the horizon glows in anticipation of sunrise. You turn on your 360-degree white light for insurance and push off toward the promise of bent rods and salmon pinwheels. Squinting into the half darkness, you scan around the corner for the presence of gillnet buoys. Finding no obstacles, you deploy a prawn spinner/ inline flasher combo, looking for schooling coho that sometimes rest in the deep pool just off the launch.

Fifty yards straight out you troll, to avoid the sandbar, before making a hard right toward the traffic flowing past the mouth of the Klickitat. Following the contour of an 18-foot-deep step, just off the sandbar, 92 Northwest Sportsman

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you pick your way through submerged vegetation and oncoming boats in search of fish arches. Nearing the river mouth, your rod twitches and loads up but returns to rest before line ever comes off your reel.

In the soft, pink light of morning you continue your troll down the sandbar, along the dolphins and past the lower end of the sandbar. On your turn, you push out to 25 feet of water and follow a guide boat like a running back follows his blocker through the slot. Halfway back, your rod buries and line flies from your reel. Behind you, a hatchery coho cartwheels and dodges but eventually yields to your net.

WITH FRESH CHROME in the catch bag, you decide to chase something bigger and switch over to a Pro-Troll with a Brad’s Cut Plug stuffed with canned tuna liberally sprinkled with Lip Ripperz Hatchery Dust

to stimulate these upriver brights into taking a bite.

Passes at 35, 40 and 50 feet of water prove fruitless this day. Luckily the afternoon winds have held off, in spite of the hour and the glaring sun, so you slide in to the top of the hover fishing drift, just east of the mouth. Your bait of choice is a hot batch of cured coho eggs from an earlier B10 success. Given the slow, warm reach of the gorge, an extra dash of sodium sulfite and a sprinkle of Hatchery Dust can make all the difference.

In the slow-moving crowd, your paddle proves indispensable in keeping you from bumping into your new neighbors. Every time the depth changes you drop your 1-ounce cannonball to the bottom and then reel it back up just enough to keep your bait from dragging.

Two p.m. and the first breaths of

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Northwest Sportsman 93

COLUMN you’ll have a little room to net your fish without tangling in your neighbors’ lines.

This is the mouth of the wild and scenic Klickitat.

With how late Klickitat coho run and at least 180,000 silvers expected to reach Bonneville Dam on the way to that trib and others as far off as North-central Washington, Central Idaho and Northeast Oregon, keep this fishery on your radar deep into fall. It might be cold in November, but it could also be productive. (MARK VEARY) the afternoon blow are in the air. You’re tempted to run for the barn before the sheep come out but decide to work your paddle and finish this drift when your rod tip twitches. With your line moving out past your drift you take up the slack, feel

for the weight of a chomping Chinook and lay into a hookset.

Your call of “Fish on!” elicits the needed shift in the surrounding rods and boats. As your quarry settles into a pattern, you work your way to the edge of the flotilla where

AS FOR SAFETY, the mouth of the Klickitat is a highly wind-dependent fishery, so choose your days wisely. Take advantage of one or more of the wind/kite surfing prediction sites for the Columbia Gorge for the expected wind speeds and directions throughout the day. This time of year, both air and water temperatures are highly variable. Some days will require full immersion gear, while others may simply require an extra application of sunscreen.

Finally, fly your safety flag on a taller mast here so that high-sided boats can track your location over their rails. NS Editor’s note: While this article describes tactics for both Chinook and coho, at press time the daily limit for the Columbia River at the mouth of the Klickitat was just one adult salmon (or one steelhead). Up to six jacks may be retained.

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COLUMN

PNW Cast-and-Blast Season Arrives W

here to start? With so many options for the Northwest sportsman to enjoy in fall, it is hard NW PURSUITS to settle on just one.

By Jason Brooks Instead, plan a trip that allows you to do it all, or at least attempt a “taste” of it all. Let’s discuss a multifaceted fall day, otherwise known as a “cast and blast.” With deer season, bird season and rivers full of salmon all mixed up together, it is an easy and fun way to experience the outdoors all in one day.

Start with a location where you can do all three, or at least two of the activities. If you live near the coast of Washington or Oregon, pack up the gear, load the boat and head west. For those in the drier parts of the Northwest don’t overlook some great fall trout fishing or early steelheading. A road trip can also put you in the right spot and make it a weekend adventure.

FALL COHO ARE in the rivers in good numbers and some of the best places to catch them are near public lands that offer some good grouse and deer hunting. This is a no-brainer when it comes to the ultimate autumn cast and blast. Taking two trucks, one for the shuttle after the day of fishing, also opens up your hunting opportunities without having to tow the boat along.

Head to the clearcuts of the Olympics and glass at first light for blacktail deer and the numerous bears the coast is known for.

Hunt the first hour of light when the deer are most active. If no deer or bears appear, then it’s time to hit the river.

Floating a fall river does not mean you have to be there at first light. The diehard locals often head to the popular holes in the dark, but by 9 a.m. or so some of these spots are void of anyone after the “morning bite.” Fall salmon have one thing on their

Time to get your cast-and-blast on!

Combining fishing and hunting in one outing is doable as salmon return to streams running through game-rich Northwest lands.

A midday float for coho can be followed by afternoon and evening grouse and deer hunts. (JASON BROOKS) mind and that is to get upriver to the spawning grounds. More than once I have launched late and had fantastic fishing on salmon moving upriver. During the lunch break it is best to sit on anchor with some bright-colored plugs out. Run them in the seams and small riffles, current breaks and near the shoreline just downstream of a backwater impoundment. These are known as travel lanes in which coho will

be moving upstream throughout the day. While you sit back and relax the fish will come to you, especially if it has rained during the night and the river is slightly higher than normal and a bit off color.

But once it’s time to go “on the hunt” for coho, twitching jigs is a top producer when the fish are stacked up in deep holes waiting for another fall rain. Black and purple 3/8-ounce Rock Dancer jigs by

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COLUMN Besides ruffies, blues, doves and bandtails, pheasant are available during special earlyseason hunts in places, some near places to wet a line. (JASON BROOKS)

It might be more of a blast and blast, but Washington’s muzzleloader and upland bird seasons overlap, affording author Jason Brooks and his boys – this is his older son Adam with a Northcentral Washington buck – to get after multiple species through an early fall day. “We look for mule deer and then switch over to quail and chukars at midday,” he writes. (JASON BROOKS)

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Mack’s Lure or a Maxi-Jig by Yakima Bait Company in their calypso color are my go-to jigs. Look for backwater areas with lots of woody debris for the fish to hide under and get away from the midday sun.

If it is a cloudy day, then “drift twitching” is a good way to cover water. Simply put, this is drifting down the river and casting to sunken logs, current seams, behind boulders and in riffles – just about anywhere you would float eggs. And float fishing eggs often leads to the occasional fall Chinook that is still in the river system, and even a few early winter steelhead or late summer-runs.

Once the midday float is done, head back to the logging roads where you will find grouse out getting gravel before they head to the roost for the evening. Grouse hunting is one of my most favorite fall activities. From September all the way through the end of the year, when the season ends in my home state, I am always looking for the forest birds.

The ruffed grouse often found in Western Washington tend to take flight, while blue grouse stay still for the shot. I am not a purist when it comes to grouse, as my favorite gun is a .22 pistol. This is probably because it fits in my daypack while out deer hunting.

Speaking of, as evening fades be sure to be sitting over another clearcut looking for a buck, as blacktails are most active at this time.

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COLUMN THOSE WHO LIVE in the eastern parts of

Backcountry hunts often take you to remote troutfilled lakes and streams, and fall is one of the best times to fish them. Brooks’ younger son Ryan takes a cast at a mountain tarn. (JASON BROOKS)

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Washington and sportsmen in Idaho as well as Eastern Oregon know that bird season means more than grouse. With youth and mentored early pheasant hunts before the general opener, a cast and blast or a big game/small game day afield is not only possible but is often overlooked as deer season takes over our impulses.

Chasing birds during the lunch hour keeps you out of camp and is also a great way to keep young and new hunters interested and happy. My boys often have a hard time getting up early to go look for deer but can’t wait to chase pheasants in the middle of the day. More than once I have slipped out of camp and headed to the surrounding mountains to look for a buck. Once the deer have bedded I go back to camp and find sleeping teenagers finally waking up.

Working cover for a rooster and then finding a covey of quail makes for a lot of shooting and memories they won’t forget.

As the afternoon wanes on I have found

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them ready to go look for deer until twilight.

We don’t do this for most of the deer season, but here in Washington hunters are afforded the multiseason tag if drawn during the spring special permit application process. But since it costs more than three times as much as the regular deer tag there are usually leftovers come fall for those who did not get drawn. This allows us to hunt the early muzzleloader season when the upland bird season first opens. We look for mule deer and then switch over to quail and chukars at midday. Since our modern firearm season for mule deer is only 11 days long here in Washington we do try and hunt those days when we can for deer. But if a grouse comes into view, it quickly turns into a bird hunt.

Since 1929

FOR INLAND NORTHWEST anglers, fall fly fishing is one of the most overlooked opportunities. Hunt early in the morning and then as the bugs become active, grab the fly rod and head to some local waters.

Lakes teem with trout ready to take a caddis, and with deer season you will find hardly anybody on the water with you.

Same with small streams and rivers. Swing flies to willing trout in solitude as trucks full of blaze orange- and camo-clad hunters head back to camp during the midday.

I really never have understood this concept of “one thing at a time.” Even when I fly into Idaho’s Middle Fork Salmon River for a mule deer and elk hunt I take a fly rod. The Gem State figured this out years ago: When you buy a nonresident hunting license it comes with a three-day fishing license. Hunting a few days and then taking a day off to rest and head to the river to do some catch and release fishing for westslope cutthroat is one of my favorite memories of the hunt.

DON’T LET CALENDAR pages and the tag in your pocket dictate what you do this weekend. Grab the rifle, shotgun and fishing rod, load up the boat and head for the outdoors. There is so much to do and so little time to do it. Make a day, a weekend, or even a backcountry fly-in trip out of it all and go enjoy the Northwest, every bit of it. NS

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COLUMN

It’s almost deer season – do you know where your buck is? Right at sunrise is a good time to be looking for deer movement, especially in little clearings like this. Ditto sunset. (DAVE WORKMAN)

7 Tactics To Up Your Deer Season Odds T

here are two ways to look at fall.

It’s when you annually go camping with guns, or it’s the ON TARGET time you sit in camp,

By Dave Workman cleaning your rifle after hanging a buck from the meat pole.

Nothing is a sure thing these days, but serious hunters will be doing one or more of the things we’re about to discuss. It’s up to you. We’ve already covered sighting in your gun in previous installments, so let’s skip that.

HAVING NOTCHED A fair number of tags over the years, and not just in my home state of Washington, there are a couple of constants with deer that never change.

Deer need food, water and cover (shelter). Find all three and you’ll find deer. Coastal blacktails can often be found “on the edges,” that is, look for them around clearcuts where they can feed out into areas that have been opened up to the sunshine, where there are things to eat. They dine on all sorts of things including wild blackberries, grasses, salal, salmonberry and if you can find an old orchard, apples. Many have remarkably

small home ranges outside of the rut.

Mule deer feed on shrubs and trees much of the year, but you will also find them along the eastern slopes of the Cascades near orchards, and out in the Columbia Basin around farmlands where alfalfa is the crop. They like to bed down where they can see a long way, and they often are pretty fond of high cliff bases.

Whitetails eat crops including alfalfa, hay and corn, plus grass, clover, acorns and fruits. (Just ask anybody with a farm or orchard!) They can be found in woodlots, canyons adjacent to farmland, and up in the timber.

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COLUMN

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This time of year, author Dave Workman hits the high country to scout and find good spots for makeshift deer stands on the opener. (DAVE WORKMAN)

SCOUT YOUR HUNTING area now! Whether you began this summer, started on the long Labor Day weekend, or have yet to begin, get out there and keep at it.

In Western Washington and Oregon, get into the timber; find stands of second growth and hike through that country looking for the small clearings that seem always to be there. They might be a quarter- to a half-mile from the nearest road, but most people don’t really get that far back. Set up where you can watch one of these little clearings because if there are deer in the neighborhood, sooner or later they’ll show up.

For those who hunt clearcuts, get to a spot at the upper end so you have a view of everything downslope. Now’s the time to find that spot and the best, most quiet way to get there in the wee hours before sunrise.

Once you’ve found such a spot, check to see what kind of game traffic might be evident. Enterprising folks will set up trail cameras, and I’ve known a few people who will visit their intended hunting ground every weekend from now to the opener, to see things with their own eyes, morning and evening. Bring a good pair of binoculars and use them.

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KICK-EEZ®

Find bedding and feeding areas, and the trails in between. Some folks will even get a U.S. Geological Survey quad of the area and actually mark this stuff.

East of the Cascades, where it is typically more open country, use the next few weekends to visit your hunting area and be up early with a pair of binoculars, watching the canyons between feeding and bedding areas. Be there again in the evening, just sitting still, watching for movement.

Look close, not just far. Over on the Snake River a few years ago, we were watching across a canyon when my hunting partner whispered to look straight downhill. There, at 209 yards, was a four-by-five mule deer.

Twenty minutes later, we were dressing that buck and my season was over.

This same principle applies to the Cascade slopes, Chelan and Okanogan Counties, Teanaway and the logging country of Kittitas and northern Yakima Counties, and any Westside spot where a deer might surprise you.

CHECK THE CALENDAR. This year’s October full moon is on the 13th. Washington’s muzzleoader season opens Sept. 28, rifle Oct 12. The first westside Oregon Cascade buck area season runs Sept. 28-Oct. 11, the second season Oct. 19-Nov. 1. Oregon’s coastal buck area season runs Sept. 28Nov. 1. Idaho mostly opens Oct. 10.

If weather is clear and mild, chances are deer will be feeding at night. If it’s stormy, deer may hunker down and wait it out, moving at first light. Your scouting trips over the next few weeks will have let you find a good place for a stand, whether it’s on or behind a stump, maybe a spot on a hill overlooking a clearcut; any place that affords a good view without being spotted, so long as you know how to sit still.

LEARN THE IMMEDIATE area around your stand. I’ve got three rangefinders, and one always goes with me on scouting trips.

If I find a spot that offers a decent view, I’ll break out the rangefinder and check

When you head afield in late summer and early fall, take a good pair of binoculars along. Workman is currently field-testing this pair of GPO (German Precision Optics) 8x32 compact, lightweight binoculars, perfect for this kind of endeavor. (DAVE WORKMAN)

COLUMN

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NEWS FROM INTERIOR The Interior Department is moving the Bureau of Land Management headquarters west to Grand Junction, Colorado, which seems like a good idea to me since most BLM lands are in the West. It’s supposed to save money as well, maybe up to $100 million over the next 20 years, according to a BLM news release.

As Interior Secretary David Bernhardt explained in a July 23 podcast with the Daily Signal, and which was transcribed for an online publication, “Most of Interior’s land, and our responsibilities, are mostly in the western United States. We manage 1 in every 5 acres of land in the United States, and then about 1.7 billion acres on the outer continental shelf. And most of BLM’s

land ... is in the West.”

Quizzed about the 1.4 million acres of additional federal land recently opened up to hunting and fishing, Bernhardt told the Daily Signal in part, “Our Fish and Wildlife Service, we have 10 hunt and fish chiefs.

And they went line by line through our regulatory programs and said, ‘Look, we all recognize that … a critical component of wildlife conservation is getting folks outdoors, conserving wildlife, and then engaging in hunting and fishing activity.’

“Well, why is that,” he continued. “That’s because most of the funding for wildlife conservation comes from taxes and the sales of licenses, and sale of things that facilitate hunting and fishing. That is

Department of Interior Secretary David Bernhardt at the June announcement of a proposal to expand hunting and fishing opportunities on federal lands. (DOI)

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what the lion’s share of money for wildlife conservation is.

“If you ask wildlife recreationists, hunters, anglers, photographers, what leads them to not go hunting or fishing, their No. 1 issue is public access,” Bernhardt said. “That’s number 1. The proximity or lack of access to opportunity really leads to folks not wanting to do those activities anymore.

“The other thing is the complexity of our regulations,” he observed “which you would think is kind of silly, right? But it’s not. The hunting and fishing regulations of states are often very different than the federal government’s.”

Maybe Bernhardt has read the Washington hunting pamphlet, eh? –DW

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distances from my spot to certain nearby landmarks. A big rock, a large tree, and if I spot a game trail, I measure that distance too and mentally record those details.

Knowing the range to a specific spot can save you from making a bum shot.

You can do this on opening morning, of course, so the data is fresh in your mind.

But keep your movement to a minimum, and be quiet!

DON’T STINK. TRY not to laugh or roll your eyes at this one. I’ve encountered people in the woods who I could smell before I saw them, and my nose is nowhere near as sensitive as a deer’s. After-shave, perfume, chewing gum, cigarette smoke, scented soap, even gasoline one guy had accidentally spilled on his boots or pants; all of that stuff can give you away on the slightest breeze. When I hit camp, I wash only with unscented soap, and days before I hang my hunting clothes outside Ditto your rifle. Clean it before leaving home, and wipe it down with a dry cloth before leaving camp.

Also, if it’s cold, leave your rifle, action open, in your locked vehicle so it doesn’t come down with a bad case of condensation.

LEARN TO STAY off the skyline! The number of people I see on any opener hiking the skyline, apparently oblivious that bedding deer can see them, constantly puzzles me.

Deer look for movement and they will leave fast if they are even slightly alarmed.

TURN YOUR PHONE off! Learned that lesson the hard way years ago. About 45 minutes into the opener, I’m sneaking along a fresh trail on top of a ridge miles from anywhere (I thought!), and the phone rings!

“Just checking on you!”

Then there was the time I was hunting grouse on the side of a mountain north of Leavenworth and it’s Tom Gresham – yeah, that Tom Gresham – on the phone.

If you need to leave it on, turn off the ringer and turn on the vibrator, and then tuck it into an interior pocket. The alternate plan is to let people at home know a specific time to reach out, or you will call them. NS 110 Northwest Sportsman

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HUNTING

It’s always interesting to see what other Northwest hunters put in their daypacks, and author MD Johnson shares what goes into his when he’s hunting blacktails and bruins west of the Cascades. (JULIA JOHNSON)

Inside the Daypack, Deer/Bear Edition Are you bringing enough gear when you head out for blacktails and bruins?

Too much?! One hunter weighs in on what goes afield with him.

By MD Johnson

O

ver the years, I’ve written several “Inside the fill-in-theblank” stories. Inside the blind bag. Inside the turkey vest. Inside the range bag. Inside the field first aid kit.

And for you wildland firefighters, an “Inside the line pack.”

Interestingly enough, they all seem

to have been extremely well received, as if folks really want to know what other hunters, anglers, and outdoorsmen and -women carry with them into the field. Maybe it is indeed because they are truly interested in knowing 1) what other folks carry afield, but also 2) how other folks’ stuff – thank you, George Carlin – differs from their own stuff. If you’re

like me, which heaven forbid you are, you read these lists, take stock of what you have, and then take notes on what you actually need.

So, and with that intro behind us, let’s delve into what I pack afield for both deer and bear seasons. (My elk pack is similar in terms of contents; however, I’ll defer to one of you diehard elk hunters/journalists to put nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 113

HUNTING together your list for our dear editor.)

A BIT OF BACKGROUND As the subtitle implies, I want to expound on my personal background into how – or, more precisely, where – I hunt deer and bear, and therefore will explain in part what I carry afield. Why mention this? Because what you pack for Inland Northwest whitetails will likely be different from the gear carried for coastal blacktails.

Or Westside bears.

John Rua, a good friend who makes an annual pilgrimage to the Pendleton area from his home here in Wahkiakum County, packs differently than do I when he hunts deer. Myself, I’m a homebody, focusing my efforts on ground typically within 10 miles of our Little Red House in Cathlamet for deer, but occasionally travelling out of county to the coast for bears.

As an addendum, while I don’t consider myself a lazy man, I’m not

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inclined to drop halfway to Hell in order to shoot a deer. Or a bear. Yes, there are precipices upon which I stand, look down, and say aloud (though no one is there to hear), “Nope! Not shooting one down there.”

I like to hike. I enjoy the walking part of the equation. Still-hunting.

Exploration. Seeing new ground. But as Clint Eastwood/Dirty Harry said in Magnum Force, “A man’s got to know his limitations.” So what you won’t see in my pack, unlike many of your own, is hardcore pack-out gear, mule tape, chainsaw winches, come-alongs, forks, knives and A-1 sauce – the latter three for those bucks you’d best eat onsite rather than hump back to the rig.

FIREARMS AND AMMUNITION I shoot the same rifle every year for both deer and bear as I have since moving back to Western Washington in ’15. For deer, it’s a Marlin Model 336C lever in .30-30 Winchester. I’m

not a long-range guy; 100 to 125 yards is plenty for me. And where I spend most of my time on the Westside, 100 to 125 yards, outside of sitting at the edge of a clearcut, is a rarity.

To go with the Marlin, I’ll pack 10 rounds of 170-grain soft-point Winchester ammunition. My belief is 10 rounds is nine more than I’m going to actually shoot; however, you never know when you’re going to find a three-by-four blacktail and a 350-pound bruin feeding on opposite ends of the same blackberry patch. It could happen, I reckon. That ammunition will be in the pack.

For bears, the nod goes to a CVA Accura V2 .50-caliber muzzleloader topped with a 3-9 Konus scope.

Yes, I said scope. Per Washington regulations, bears can be hunted during the legal firearm season with a scoped muzzleloader. And because I spend a goodly amount of my bear time in the Long Beach Unit at the

coast, I opt for the muzzleloader.

Again, 100 yards is plenty, and more often than not, any opportunity will be under 50 paces.

The load is two 50-grain pellets of IMR/Hodgdon White Hots under a 300-grain Power Belt Aerolite bullet touched off, thanks to an ordinary Federal No. 209 primer. Half a dozen speedloads and a couple dozen primers go into the pack.

Finally, and for that warm ’n fuzzy feeling, I carry a Thompson Custom 1911 .45 ACP under my left arm in an Uncle Mike’s Size 5 shoulder holster.

The magazine – I have two; one, obviously, in the semiauto, and the other in a pouch on my belt – is filled with Federal Premium 230-grain Hydra-Shok JHP ammunition, the same rounds I use for home/personal defense. I figure if they’re dependable enough to protect my family, they’re good enough for any renegade big kitty or disagreeable bruin.

THE PACK

daypack is, again, simple. I want it to be lightweight yet extremely rugged, big but not too big, comfortable, and well organized. Oh, and affordable.

That’s it. The Whitetail Caddy Pack is all those things. She weighs under 4 pounds empty and costs under a C-note. That’s $100 to you Millennials.

There’s plenty of zippered pockets and nonzippered pouches inside and out; 18, to be exact. Without going into too much detail, I have hydration, aka water to us 50-somethings, on the outside, along with shooting sticks and an old school compass. Inside, one pouch holds field-dressing gear.

Another is dedicated to lighting and marking. Scents, lures and accessories go in yet another. As for the main compartment – well, I’m getting ahead of myself here. To proceed.

So here’s where we’re all going to truly disagree (I think), and that’s on the subject of packs. Out of curiosity, I searched “hunting day packs” and Google returned precisely 58.8 million results. And truth is, there may actually be that many options out there. Seems everyone and his/ her brother is offering hunting packs; some good and some not so good.

My personal pack history begins with a military surplus AK-47 magazine pouch with a simple shoulder strap, and culminates, though perhaps doesn’t end, with what I’m rigging today, that being the Whitetail Caddy Pack from Nexgen Outfitters (nexgenof .com). I’ll make this really simple. I’ve used a god’s plentitude of packs from any number of great manufacturers – Tenzing, ALPS Outdoorz, SOG, Cannae, Fieldline, Cabela’s, et al – and they’ve all had their pros and cons.

But what I’m looking for in a

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Northwest Sportsman 115

HUNTING it down, it being the pack contents.

Strapped to the outside and/or in side pouches: Pole Cat adjustable bipod (Primos) Water, 50 ounces (Mother Nature) Orienteering compass (Brunton) Inside: Field dressing gloves, four (Hunter’s Specialties) Lens/glasses wipes (Zeiss) Skinning/field dressing knife No. 1 (Gerber) Toilet paper Moist towelettes LED flashlight, 4-inch (Hot Shots) Additional field dressing gloves, electrical tape, chemical handwarmers Skinning/field dressing knife No. 2 (my grandfather’s Buck) Medicine kit – Carmex, Q-Tips, ibuprofen, bandages, fingernail clippers, dental floss, safety pins Rope, 25 feet of ½-inch Rope, 50 feet of ¼-inch Traditional whistle

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Zippered neoprene pouch containing seven .30-30 rounds, (more) safety pins, and (more) lens/ glasses wipes Cyalume light sticks, 5 Emergency space blanket Blaze orange marking tape (More) toilet paper Brown jersey gloves, 99 cents Blaze orange polyester toque Nitro LED headlamp (Browning) – with new batteries Nondescript incandescent headlamp, also with new batteries Backtrack GPS HuntTrack (Bushnell) Portable power – iPhone charger/ LED light (Waka-Waka Power) Deer Drag (Hunter’s Specialties) Plastic Walmart bags, 6, for mushroom procurement and transport MRE Menu 18 – Beef ravioli in meat sauce Assorted food items, including the requisite 38-cent apple pie

BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE! Other items in addition to those stowed in the pack are carried on my person. These include: Binoculars on harness (Alpen) Multi-Plier multi-tool (Gerber) Thumb-assist lock-blade knife (Boker) Naphtha fuel lighter (Zippo) Seems like quite a bit for a morning’s hunt, but I’ve often had a morning’s hunt transform, almost magically, into a daylong affair.

And while I’ve not unintentionally had to spend the night in the field due to, as my father called it, “getting turned around,” I could be pretty comfortable should I have an impromptu campout, thanks to the above list of stuff.

So, what am I missing here? NS Editor’s note: Deer and/or bear tag, MD? I guess that goes in your wallet, though I do put my wallet in my pack.

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HUNTING

Planning A Deer Hunt If you’re trying a new unit or switching species this season, here’s how to not fly blind.

By Jason Brooks

P

lanning a deer hunt seems like it might not be too difficult if you already have a few years of hunting experience. That is, until you start realizing that moving to a new unit, state, subspecies, or even different weapons type adds several unknowns. With the right planning and a few helpful recommendations it can be a lot of fun, and just might lead you to a new favorite hunt. But if you don’t plan accordingly, you might be setting yourself up for disaster and a wasted fall, not to mention loss of money and valuable time.

LAST AUGUST I was at one of those annual family and friends barbecues, socializing and catching up with everyone. Some of the attendees also hunt and of course our conversations quickly turned to plans for this upcoming fall. I have hunted Idaho, as

well as all three subspecies of deer in Washington, which has led me to just about every county in my home state.

One of the guys started to ask me about my plans. After drawing the multiseason tag earlier this year I explained how I was going to do some hunts in September but would really concentrate around November, when the rut was on. Maybe this will be the year I finally get a mature blacktail, or find an early majestic mule deer. At that point I didn’t have plans for whitetails, but the hunter I was chatting with likes to go out near Pullman and has taken a few himself.

That’s when I asked what his plans were and he simply replied, “I bought a deer tag for Idaho this year.” Of course I was intrigued and our conversation turned to his upcoming hunt. He explained to me how he actually bought a whitetail tag and not the general season deer tag. Idaho does offer some really good whitetail seasons with the

designated tag and I knew he was primarily a whitetail hunter, so this didn’t surprise me too much.

But I was really shocked when I asked which unit he was going to hunt and he replied, “I don’t know yet; you got any suggestions?”

I was baffled and confused how someone would buy a nonresident tag without even knowing where they were going to hunt. Even worse was that he didn’t even know the season dates or which units he could hunt in. With less than two months before opening day in parts of the state, he now had a tag for which he hadn’t even looked at where to go or when.

PLANNING A HUNT takes time and by now you should already have yours set for this year. There is enough time to check out some new areas and can get a feel for what it would be like to spend some time there chasing deer. To be serious about planning a successful trip you really

Sure, some hunters out in unfamiliar country will stumble into a legal buck, but the odds of a notched tag are best for those who have done their homework. (JASON BROOKS) nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 119

HUNTING you decide to buy a tag, either in your home state or as a nonresident, but it should be at the top of the list when it comes time to actually buy the tags.

While many mule deer, whitetail and blacktail tags are available over the counter, some require a special permit to hunt during the rut or on prime lands. Multiseason tags up your odds. (JASON BROOKS)

should start now, or at least once the upcoming season is over when harvest information is provided by game management agencies.

The first thing a hunter who plans on trying a new hunt should do is look for an area. If you are thinking of an out-of-state hunt, then start looking over the regulations and see what that state offers. Is there a special draw such as Eastern Oregon for mule deer, or Montana to just get a deer tag? Some states offer over-the-counter tags and even leftover tags if you are not drawn.

Other states such as Wyoming allow you to put in for more than one choice and if you don’t draw your first, you get a point towards next year’s draw while still being able to pull a tag with the second choice.

To help decide where to hunt you need to decide on what species you want to pursue. I am still looking for a mature Washington blacktail, So much scouting can be done from home, given today’s technology, but it can’t tell you everything about new-toyou country. (JASON BROOKS)

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so if I really want to plan a hunt to fulfill that dream, then I need to look at the western part of the state. Whitetails primarily live in far Eastern Washington, though there are a few in the north-central region and elsewhere, and there are several areas where mule deer and whitetails roam together. A mature mule deer usually means the famed Okanogan County herd or the arid lands around Moses Lake. The former area has plenty of public land, while the latter has hardly any.

After deciding what species or subspecies of deer you want to hunt, start looking for access. Douglas County along the Columbia River in Eastern Washington has a high hunter success rate and can produce a lot of mature bucks, but it has very little public land. Idaho, on the other hand, has millions of acres of national forest.

Access is often an afterthought once

NOW THAT YOU have decided what you want to hunt and maybe where, or at least close to where you want to go, one major deciding factor will be seasons. If you have the right equipment and are proficient in multiple weapons such as muzzleloaders and rifles, or archery, be sure to look at which season would best fit your vacation schedule, as well as offer the best hunt or one you are wanting to try. Washington’s general mule deer season is only 11 days long, but there is also another season that is often overlooked.

This is the fabled High Buck Hunt, a week-and-a-half-long season in midSeptember in select wilderness areas.

Some outfitters offer a drop camp and even a guided hunt during this underutilized backcountry season.

Back to my quest for a mature blacktail, where there are a few muzzleloader and archery hunts starting the day before Thanksgiving and running into mid-December.

This might be my best option, as under normal late fall conditions snow will have driven bucks out of the mountains and the deer will need to eat extra calories, turning these mostly October nocturnal deer into daytime dwellers when winter hits.

Idaho has some units that open in

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HUNTING Getting familiar with the countryside also includes talking to the local wildlife biologist, fellow hunters and outfitters for their read on how the deer herd is faring. (CHAD ZOLLER)

mid-September and don’t close until mid-November and are over-thecounter, but a few units have a special draw to hunt the mule deer rut.

Archery hunters have some of the best options when it comes to seasons. Nevada offers an early hunt for mule deer while their antlers are still covered in velvet, and most Western states offer a general season during the rut in early November.

Plus antler-restricted and even “either sex” hunts are offered. Most hunters who plan a new hunt aren’t going there to kill a doe, but it doesn’t hurt knowing that with a day or two left, if the opportunity presents itself you can fill a freezer if you want.

Some states offer more than one deer tag and this might entice your decision, especially if you are driving a long distance. Montana offers some “B” tags, which you can purchase over the counter and will allow you to harvest does. Knowing you can come

home with meat and still look to fill your buck tag with a mature deer or let it go unnotched takes a little bit of the sting of the cost out. Same with multispecies hunts such as in Idaho with some units allowing you to even use your deer or elk tag on a wolf, black bear or cougar and offer reduced-price predator tags with your deer tag.

STATE GAME AGENCIES play a big role in planning your deer hunt. Most have websites with some sort of planning tab or tool to help make the right decision. Looking at seasons, access and even success rates will help, but don’t rely solely on the data from the websites. Be sure to call the local biologist and talk with them about what the region offers.

A few years ago Idaho had a really bad winterkill but there were pockets of the state that were not hit as hard as elsewhere. Only a biologist who actually goes into the field will know where these areas are located and most are willing to help hunters with information and knowledge gained from monitoring the game.

If there is an outfitter in the area, see if they offer reference lists and then call those hunters. Be polite and ask about the outfitter but also how much game they saw and what the terrain was really like. Keep in mind that while one person might think seeing 10 bucks in a day is a lot, others might think the area is void of game unless they see even more deer.

But you can get a feel for an overall hunt and know that there might be other game in the area such as elk or wolves. Harvest statistics rely on hunters reporting their harvest or lack thereof, and might be slightly skewed.

ONCE YOU’VE FINALLY settled on an area, species, weapon and season, the logistical planning begins. Is the area near a town where you can rent a motel room or a cabin for the duration of the hunt? Or do you plan on using a trailer or wall tent, or maybe a drop camp?

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Using a vehicle to drive national forest roads to and from a trailhead each day means you need to plan for gas. In some rural parts of Western states the nearest station might be an hour or more away.

ATVs are becoming very popular and each year I hear about hunters who hike for an hour in the dark only to be passed by a four-wheeler or what have you just before shooting light. Be sure to look up the state laws and local rules on access and use.

Weather is always part of the hunt and you can look back on seasonal averages of temperatures, precipitation, and sunshine. In the early season water can be a variable, not only for yourself but for finding game. Look over terrain maps but be aware that certain creek drainages that might be dry could fill with a heavy rain and might cut you off from an area.

Late season often means snow and if your travel route takes you over a pass, know the elevation and the possibility of becoming stranded.

This has happened several times in southern Idaho, where the rolling hills are covered in tall sage. Hunters think that even if it snows they can make it out of the woods, but then wake up to 2 feet of white stuff and start their way towards the pass only to find the wind has blown the snow to 4- to 5-foot snowdrifts.

ALL OF THIS needs to be taken into account when planning a hunt. There is more to it than just sitting around a family barbecue a couple of months before season and asking where someone would go. Know the game laws as well as any local ordinances or forest ranger district rules. If you plan on staying at a motel, be sure to make reservations. And if the trip is a year away yet, then go out and do some scouting. You will be glad you prepared and properly planned for the hunt when opening day comes, and just maybe you will find yourself in a new deer camp that will have you coming back again. NS nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 123

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HUNTING

The Hunt For A Red-meated October Here’s a look at Oregon’s fall deer prospects.

By Troy Rodakowski

S

etting up my trail camera earlier this summer I noticed that the stream running below my stand still had plenty of water.

In 2017 and 2018 it had already dried up by mid-July. Since then my camera has photographed more bucks than anytime during the past 10 seasons, including some deer with tremendous antler growth.

Needless to say we are expecting some great results as season kicks off this fall, but how about the rest of Oregon? Here’s a look around the landscape as bow season begins and rifle hunts open soon.

TRAVERSING THE NEVER-ENDING jungle of underbrush and foliage oftentimes makes bagging a buck difficult throughout our state’s coastal mountains.

“Deer numbers on the coast have been improving over the last three years, with fewer cases of hair-loss syndrome being observed,” reports Doug Cottam, an Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife biologist.

He also points out that there have also been higher fawn ratios, including bucks.

North Coast success rates have averaged at or near 20 percent over the last couple years. The Saddle Mountain, Stott Mountain, Willamette and Siuslaw Units have had some of the better numbers.

With around 5,000 to 6,000-plus deer harvested in this region annually

Author Troy Rodakowski and his dad Terry are excited about this fall’s Oregon blacktail hunting prospects, as good numbers of healthy bucks are turning up on their trail cameras. (TROY RODAKOWSKI) nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

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HUNTING hunters should remain optimistic.

Foggy, drizzly mornings seem to have worked best for me in the past and make for good, quiet walking conditions down moss-covered trails.

Late spring rains have also benefited Central, Southeast and Northeast Oregon deer habitat, providing better forage and available water.

Last year’s dry, hot hunting conditions made it tough for many of us. The crackle of pine needles and

crunch of pinecones beneath my feet was like walking on fresh popcorn.

As a result, deer were spooky and bedded early, many of them not moving again until almost dark, making the hunting difficult.

Back to my trail cameras for a moment. In dry years we have seen fewer deer and less bucks, but I anticipate that this season will be different based on available moisture.

Our photos show significant increases

The heights of Eastern Oregon and the big mule deer that roam there draw hunters from far and wide for a shot at a trophy. In 2018 Sara McLendon of Tillamook made good on a Chesnimnus Unit tag, one that took her five years to draw, with this fine buck. Friend Buzz Ramsey chalked up her 433-yard, one-shot kill to McLendon “having practiced long-range-shooting many times,” and a very accurate rifle and scope combo. (HUNTING PHOTO CONTEST) 126 Northwest Sportsman

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in deer activity and movement in areas we hunt, especially when there is ample food and water. During previous seasons deer movement seemed to be somewhat restricted by the lack of both groceries and liquid.

SOME OF OREGON’S biggest mule deer reside in its central and southeast regions. If you were lucky enough to draw one of the coveted permits for units in either, there is an excellent possibility you will bag a muley of a lifetime. The Owyhee Basin of Malheur County features 428,156 acres of public lands rich with nutrients for massive antler growth. Bucks spend summers in the high country of the Steens and migrate to the lower reaches of desert, grasslands and ranch properties to winter. I was lucky enough to hunt here back in 2012 and witnessed firsthand good numbers of mule deer as they migrated from the higher elevations down to the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge and Bureau of Land Management lands.

Some of the best controlled draw hunts include the aforementioned Steens Mountains, Juniper, Hart Mountain, Owyhee Mountains, Burns, Jordan Valley and the Malheur lowlands. But Fort Rock, Silver Lake, Metolius, Upper Deschutes Units near Bend and LaPine are good too.

“There should be decent numbers of both mature and yearling bucks available in most units relative to the population size where buck ratios are near or above management objectives,” district biologist Randy Lewis told me.

To the north, throughout the Columbia Basin the land is enhanced with Conservation Reserve Program enrollments and all the cereal, grass and forage crops produced here.

Higher up, the wooded sections in the Umatilla National Forest hold good numbers of big game. Additionally, the multitude of BLM, Forest Service and private CRP ranches in this section of Oregon make it a prime ticket for hunters looking to score this fall.

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GOOD BUCKS ALSO roam the highest reaches of the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest, Eagle Cap Wilderness and the Snake River Divide. Some of the top hunts often take several years to draw, and yes, I just so happen to be one of those who haven’t drawn a permit. The seclusion of the high country, not to mention the 2.3 million acres of national forest, 361,446 acres in the Eagle Cap and the steep country of Hells Canyon, provide sanctuary for large mule deer. The weather has also cooperated to produce some excellent summer forage and fawn recruitment during this past couple years. Trails and trailheads abound.

Lucky for me I have not one but two blacktail tags in my pocket for 2019, and they both include good rut dates in late October and November.

I have several good friends with tags for the eastern half of the state and I anticipate they will find some good hunting conditions and a few deer.

We all know predators have taken a toll on deer herds and now we have several wolf packs across the state to add to their torment. Always make sure to have a bear and cougar tag in your pocket while you hunt, as you might have a great opportunity to notch one of those tags as well.

THE DAYS LEADING up to the opener of deer season always seem to creep by ever so slowly. I believe it’s the anticipation of a warm campfire, crisp frost on the ground, time with family and friends, good food, invigorating hikes in the mountains and time to reflect and become one with nature.

All of those things drive us as hunters. However, putting that sight pin, buckhorn or cross hairs on an animal in anticipation of fresh venison is what we all hope for come season’s end. Hopefully, the weather cooperates and makes for some better deer hunting than we have seen the last few years.

Best of luck and remember to shoot straight, follow the laws and always be courteous to others. NS 128 Northwest Sportsman

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Northwest Sportsman 129

COLUMN

Backcountry Bears T

he bear color changed from one phase to the next. If the wind blew right, CHEF IN THE WILD he would be a

By Randy King chocolate brown; if it blew the other direction, the bear would turn jet black. It was the coolest bear coloring I have ever seen.

From a distance this bear confused our group – my father, my friend Levi

and I. It would disappear into one side of the willows and appear on another.

For the longest time we thought it was two bears. Below a herd of elk passed by nervously, the cows keeping a close eye on the calves.

It seemed like this should be a straightforward hunt. We had bears in sight. Unfortunately this would not be a Sunday stroll to them. The bears were over 2 miles away and a 2,000-foot climb – from the valley floor at 5,400 feet along

the Payette River to the top of the canyon at 7,400 feet. We had one river crossing and two stream crossings and absolutely no trail. Alder-choked river bottoms and scree slides awaited us. Basically, we had to lose sight of the bears for several hours and blindly climb up to them in hopes that they would be there.

A plan was hatched. Levi and I would head out, leaving Dad behind to signal us if the bears left. We shouldered our packs and pointed our boots uphill.

Author Randy King glasses for black bears during a spring hunt deep in Idaho’s upper Payette River basin. (LEVI SIM)

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COLUMN

Bear bolognese with rigatoni. (RANDY KING)

COOKING BEAR

B

ear has a bad rap. Often described as “fatty” or “greasy,” this game animal is in need of a makeover. It is a mission of mine to do just that. I find bear to be the closest thing to beef in the wild world. It does not have that “twang” that deer or elk can have.

The greasiness that bear has comes from building up the needed fat stores to make it through winter in their den. So killing them in the growth stage means

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you get to keep all that hard work.

I render fall bear fat into pure lard. You basically just cook the solid fat chunks on low until they start to boil, then after a while it will turn clear and stop bubbling.

This means all the water is out of the fat.

That is a good thing. Strain the chunks out of the grease and cool it in a Mason jar. It is the best cooking, whitest and best conversation-starting fat out there.

Make sure to cook all bear to at least

165 degrees. This will prevent any possible food-borne illness – one specifically is to be worried about. According to Wikipedia, “Trichinella spiralis is an viviparous nematode parasite, occurring in rodents, pigs, bears, hyenas and humans, and is responsible for the disease trichinosis.” Symptoms of this include sore muscles, fever and nausea that can last for months. And once you are a host you are always a host. Avoiding it is easy: cook your bear to well done.

COLUMN

Be sure to cook the ground bear meat to at least 165 degrees to prevent contracting trichinosis. (RANDY KING) Bear Bolognese with Rigatoni 1/8 cup butter 1 pound ground bear meat 1/4 pound bacon, sliced into ½-inch pieces ½ teaspoon chili flakes 6 large garlic cloves, minced 1 large onion, fine diced 1 carrot, medium, diced 3 tablespoons tomato paste

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1 pound fresh summer tomatoes, more color the better, diced 1 tablespoon oregano leaves, fresh Salt and pepper to taste 1 tablespoon basil, sliced thin ½ tablespoon sage, sliced thin 1 pound rigatoni, cooked according to package directions

In a heavy stockpot, heat the butter over medium heat. Add the bacon and cook until crispy.

Take one section of bacon out of the pan. Let it cool and eat it.

Next add the ground bear. Season with salt and chili flakes, and cook until browned all the way through.

Reduce heat to medium-low. Add in the garlic, onion and carrot. Cook until the onion is translucent, about five minutes.

Next stir in the tomato paste and the summer tomatoes. Bring to a simmer. Taste it at this point. Adjust with salt and pepper, remember that the flavors will intensify if you reduce the sauce.

Put the pan on low and cover with a lid. Let simmer for 20 minutes or until the ragu has the desired consistency. Add the oregano, sage and basil. Toss with the prepared rigatoni.

Garnish with fresh grated parmesan.

Serve.

For more wild game recipes, see chefrandyking.com. –RK

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A pair of bruins, including a color phase, grazing through a meadow caught the eye of King and his hunting partners, and the pursuit was on. (LEVI SIM)

Getting to their quarry meant several stream crossings and bushwhacking through dense alders, then an uphill trudge to reach shooting range. “The hike that we knew would suck lived up to its expectation,” King writes. (LEVI SIM)

Most hunters treat bears as an incidental opportunity while deer or elk hunting, but others see it for the challenge it is. Brandon Jewett was able to pattern this Eastern Washington bruin and get into position for a 65-yard shot with his bow last month. He planned to try for another now that harvesting two from east of the Cascades during the fall season has been greenlighted. (HUNTING PHOTO CONTEST)

SEVERAL THINGS HAD led the bears to choose this location as a prime spot. First thing was distance from trails. Basically, the nearest road was 6 miles and 2,500 feet below. The nearest trail was 1 mile away and two drainages over. Access to this spot was super hard and I believe bears like that, more so than deer and elk.

The second reason the bears were in this spot was the snowline. As spring faded away in late June, the last drifts capping the mountains in the Sawtooth Wilderness were melting fast, creating fresh new grasses – basically what biologists call “candy grass,” the sweet shoots that all animals love. Bears follow the snowline, eating the grass as it rises.

While it is a common opinion that bears are carnivores, they are in fact omnivores.

Roughly 80 percent of a bear’s diet is forage from plants.

The third reason, and this one is more speculative, is all the elk that we saw nearby. Bears, cougars and wolves are hard on elk calves. It is not uncommon in Idaho to have hunting units that allow two bears per year. This is an attempt to keep calf numbers up. Between the location, the access to forage and the access to elk, we spotted six bears in the same drainage. It was over-the-top successful spot-and-stalk bear hunting.

AS WE CLIMBED, the hike that we knew would suck lived up to its expectation.

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Northwest Sportsman 137

COLUMN

The day’s last light shines on the peaks above a successful backcountry bear camp. (LEVI SIM)

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crossings. Bland uphill trudges.

By the time we came back into view of the drainage that we had spotted the bear in, three hours had passed. We glassed and glassed for the color-phase bruin.

Eventually we found the bear, further up the draw and three drainages over from our initial spotting.

We hustled to get into position. Bears typically do not have the best eyesight so we were more aggressive on the approach than we would have been with deer or elk. We kept the wind in our face and wound up being across the draw from them. Levi ranged the bears, a black and the phase brown I had set my eyes on, at 256 yards.

Both bears came in and out of the foliage for a while. Eventually my bear looked as if he was about to exit the draw and go out of sight. I called out that I was going to shoot.

One quick shot from my .270 and I watched as the bear tumbled down the drain and out of sight. NS

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HUNTING Dove hunting is one of the Northwest’s less practiced pursuits, mostly east of the Cascades, but there are birds to be had on the west side. Scott Haugen bagged these in Oregon’s Willamette Valley. (SCOTT HAUGEN)

Dove Season Arrives Though not the most popular or abundant game bird in the Northwest, doves can provide fast gunning in September and October.

By Randall Bonner

T

he international symbol of peace just happens to be one of America’s most abundant – and tastiest – game birds. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service data shows hunters harvested 11.6 million mourning doves in the 2017-18 season, the most recent statistics available, including 1.27 million in the West.

In spite of that, dove populations remain resilient, mostly because of

their prolific reproduction. They’re basically flying rabbits. Before that aforementioned season began, their abundance was estimated at just under a quarter of a billion strong.

While commonly only producing a pair of eggs for each nest, a mating pair will produce up to five broods of young annually, nesting from March until November. Eggs take just two weeks of incubation to hatch. Once they hatch, the parents work together to feed their offspring “crop milk.”

(Doves have an enlarged esophagus, known as a crop, that allows them to hoard additional seeds for digesting later.) The lining of the crop produces a secretion that is rich in protein and fat and resembles cottage cheese. The young are quickly weaned within a few days, and begin eating seeds themselves, becoming fledged within a few weeks.

“Their ecological role is to be prey. They are born to be eaten, and humans are just one of their predators. nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 141

Using decoys is a good bet for pulling birds toward your setup. Mourning doves are open through the end of October, invasive Eurasian collared doves year-round. (SCOTT HAUGEN)

Hunting has not caused any decline in the various dove species,� says wildlife biologist Phillip Dickerson.

He notes that some gradual historical declines are the result of large-scale changes in existing habitat and loss of habitat due to agriculture and human developments.

But he has also wondered if invasive Eurasian collared doves might be competing with mourning doves for resources. While checking traps, he noticed that the two species seem to utilize different feeding times to utilize the bait as an artificial food source.

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EITHER WAY, THEY’RE both tasty species, and although dove hunting and harvest has actually been on a historical decline, the tradition of these hunts as community gatherings and a wild game food resource remains alive.

Fields planted with seed-rich plants are best, but being small morsels, it takes a few birds to make a meal, and a little work to prepare them for the kitchen.

As far as public land opportunities are concerned, many of the same places that are planted with forage plant species for upland birds managed

HUNTING

It can be a bit of work, but it’s all worth it when your pup retrieves fixin’s for a dove popper. (SCOTT HAUGEN)

by the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife and other state agencies bring hordes of doves in to feed. And the constant gunfire and foot traffic of upland bird hunters and their dogs puts those feeding doves in the air and flying around.

E.E. Wilson and Fern Ridge Wildlife Areas are good places to start here in the Willamette Valley, but note that these state-managed parcels near Eugene and Corvallis are steelshot only. I use size 7 steel in a 23/4inch 12-gauge for these purposes, but if you’re shooting lead (where it’s allowed), a 16-, 20- or even 28-gauge would be sufficient. The birds typically fly in a straight pattern, so they’re easy to bring down if they’re in range and you’re a good shot.

Finding them once they’re down, on the other hand, isn’t always that easy.

If you’re hunting without dogs, be prepared to lose a few birds, so keep your eyes on the prize as it falls from the skies.

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or so, likely indicative of a stable population. Harvests are higher in states well to the south, where the birds winter, but the Beaver State’s northern Columbia Basin counties, farmed areas of Malheur County and agricultural portions of the Rogue Valley can produce.

Three thousand to 5,000 hunters annually pursue mourning doves, according to ODFW statistics. Season runs Sept. 1-Oct. 30 with a daily limit of 15, same as in Idaho and Washington. A migratory bird permit is required.

BLEEDING YOUR BIRDS in the field is recommended to remove the “gamey” taste from the meat. Removing the head quickly after the bird is taken down will drain the blood from the chest cavity, producing a visible difference in the breast that will also leave a recognizable change in the flavor. Overcooking the meat dries it out, adding to that gamey flavor.

Breasting out the birds and making dove poppers is the most common and popular way of cooking them.

The breast is usually placed on top of a halved and deseeded jalapeño pepper stuffed with cream cheese, then wrapped in bacon and placed on the grill.

Don’t get me wrong, dove poppers are a delicious way to eat these birds, but it doesn’t hurt to think outside the box when it comes to culinary creativity. While it seems tedious and messy, plucking makes the juice worth the squeeze. You can cook the birds whole, place them in a crockpot until the meat falls off the bone, or cut the meat free from the bones and grind it, using the remaining meat and bone to create a broth. Either way, utilizing all of the meat from each bird will allow you to branch out and try some new dishes.

While emphasizing the importance of maintaining small game hunting traditions and the community “dove shoot,” it’s worth the effort to branch out sometimes, remembering that this wild food resource is as versatile as it is abundant. There’s plenty of doves to be had, and plenty of ways to enjoy them. NS

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www.EasternOregonMobileSlaughter.com nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 145

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COLUMN

Get After Forest Grouse With Your Gun Pup L

ast fall marked one of the best seasons in decades for forest grouse hunters throughout the West.

Productive brooding and stable weather GUN DOGGIN’ 101 resulted in booming

By Scott Haugen blue and ruffie numbers, and hopefully the same results occur this year. If looking to get your new dog on its first forest grouse hunt this fall, here are some tips to consider.

Concentrate your hunting efforts along gated logging roads early in the morning. Timberlands that allow only walk-in or nonmotorized bike access are prime habitats for forest grouse. These roads are less pressured and due to the level of inactivity on them, food like grass and clover thrive on the edges. Logging roads are also where grouse congregate to gather grit for their crop.

Hunt these gated, limited-access roads early in the morning, when dew is still on the ground. Doing so will allow your pup to pick up the smell of grouse on the ground and more easily follow their tracks into the forest’s edge, where they can get on point.

As morning thermals increase, be sure to hunt into the wind. Doing so will allow your dog to pick up bird scent more easily, resulting in more points. With the morning wind increasing and temperatures rising, a bird’s scent evaporates more quickly, so shaded areas are where you’ll want to concentrate your time, as they’re where the scent of the bird will remain strongest for the longest time.

WHILE RUFFED GROUSE can be found from creek bottoms to high in the Coast Range and Cascades, blue grouse are typically located at higher elevations. However, last year I got into more blues than I’ve ever seen

Author Scott Haugen and his dog Echo with a limit of blue grouse taken last fall near their Western Oregon home. Not since the early 1970s has he recalled seeing so many blues in the woods. (SCOTT HAUGEN)

nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 147

COLUMN BEST GROUSE WOODS

Northwest upland bird managers don’t track grouse harvest at quite the same level as they pay attention to deer, elk and other game animals, but recent years’ statistics at least give a relative indication of which regions are best, at least in terms of harvest.

In Oregon, what the Department of Fish and Wildlife has designated as “Area 1” was most productive for not only ruffed grouse but blues as well, according to info from 2016’s season, the most recent available. Comprised of Western Oregon from the Columbia River south through Lane County, this mix of lower, mid- and high elevation timberlands yielded 12,646 ruffies and 3,726 blues.

Area 5, Baker, Union and Wallowa Counties, was the second most productive strictly in terms of harvest numbers, with 6,153 and 2,507, respectively. Area 2, the five Southwest Oregon counties, yielded 5,479 and 1,302.

ODFW reported that both species are the first and second most popular amongst hunters, though chukar chasers typically do harvest more birds (and with fewer guns afield).

Washington doesn’t break out the harvest by species, lumping it all together as forest grouse, but the Eastside’s northern tier stands head and shoulders above the rest of the state. Colville and the rest of Stevens County were tops in 2017 with 7,232 birds, but not far behind was sprawling Okanogan County at 6,788. Sandwiched between that duo is Ferry, which produced the third most, 5,465, while two counties to the east, Pend Oreille put out 2,936.

On the Westside, Grays Harbor (2,347), Cowlitz (2,066), Skagit (1,942), Lewis (1,914) and Mason (1,882) Counties were best. –NWS

Hunting the edges of nonmotorized-onlyaccess logging roads is a great place to start your search for forest grouse.

(SCOTT HAUGEN)

between the 750- and 2,500-foot elevation mark in the foothills of the Cascades. Nearly every blue grouse I came across at these elevations was within 100 yards of a mature forest, stands that were 30 years old or more.

Blue grouse eat a lot of new fir tree growth this time of year. In fact, an initial crop inspection might look like they’re feasting on dandelions, but look closer and pull those green sprouts apart and you’ll see they’re most likely soft green tips of fir boughs. Inspecting the crop of any grouse you take is the best way to tell what it’s been eating, and on these early-season outings, hunting near bird food sources will yield high success.

BE SURE TO save the wings, or the entire skin, of the first grouse you kill. These are great training tools to use right now to continue teaching your pup how to hunt these challenging birds.

Make certain your dog’s feet are in shape, and that they’re in good physical condition, for a lot of miles can be covered hiking in the grouse woods. Take plenty of water for both you and your dog, as well as a highprotein snack for your canine companion.

The more prepared you are and the more ground you cover, the greater the odds of filling that bird pouch with limits of ruffed and blue grouse, and also understanding why so many upland hunters anticipate the coming of this joyous season. NS

Ruffed grouse are thriving throughout much of their range in the Pacific Northwest, and are fun birds to hunt with your canine partner. (SCOTT HAUGEN) 148 Northwest Sportsman

SEPTEMBER 2019 | nwsportsmanmag.com

Editor’s note: To see some of Scott Haugen’s puppy training video tips, visit scotthaugen .com. Follow Scott on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.

BEDLINERS | ACCESSORIES PROTECTIVE COATINGS

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nwsportsmanmag.com | SEPTEMBER 2019

Northwest Sportsman 149

2019 nwsportsmanmag.com

BUYER’S GUIDE

2019 BUYER’S GUIDE

2019 BUYER’S GUIDE

BOATS/BOAT MANUFACTURERS

Boulton Powerboats boultonpowerboats.com Now under new ownership, Boulton Powerboats will continue to produce the best custom heavy gauge aluminum boats in the industry. From their River Skiff to their largest Pilot House model, every boat is built by hand with the same unsurpassed quality and attention to detail. Boulton Powerboats will be jumping back into the offshore pilot house boats, along with exploring their options for fast water river jets. Expect great things as they rebuild their website and come up with new ideas and bring back some old ones. The new Hook Series is coming out this fall, which will be their entry-level boat built to all the quality and performance specs of their other Boulton models at a very affordable price. Boulton Powerboats is currently looking for dealership opportunities in the Alaska market, the Great Lakes region and along the East Coast.

Check them out at boultonpowerboats. com and at a boat show near you.

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NORTHWEST SPORTSMAN // BUYER’S GUIDE 2019

VERLE’S LLC

V

erle’s LLC is one of South Puget Sound’s largest and oldest marine and sporting goods businesses, serving Western Washington and beyond since 1948. Providing fishing tackle, hunting gear and marine accessories, along with boats, motors and trailers, all with a Northwest focus, it is easy to see – your outdoor adventure begins at Verle’s!

Stop by today to design your boat package just the way you want with one of Verle’s experienced and knowledgeable sales staff. Finding your perfect boat will be easy with quality boats by Alumaweld, Hewescraft, Smokercraft and Sun Chaser Pontoons, powered by Suzuki and Yamaha outboard motors.

Their expansive parts and service department is always ready to get you back on the water with a huge inventory of OEM parts by Yamaha, Suzuki, Mercury, Johnson, OMC, Volvo and Mercruiser.

Verle’s certified marine technicians will keep your boat motor running smoothly for a worry-free experience. Whether it be maintenance, propeller repair, winterizing, fuel system cleaning or a full rebuild, they’ve got you covered.

Whether you are shopping for a new boat, that certain fishing lure, necessary boat maintenance or just want to get the latest fishing report, stop by to visit with their knowledgeable outdoor prostaff team. Let your outdoor adventure begin at Verle’s LLC!

verles.com nwsportsmanmag.com 5

2019 BUYER’S GUIDE

BOATS/BOAT MANUFACTURERS

Maxxum Marine maxxummarine.com Now available at Maxxum Marine is the new 2019 Thunder Jet Chinook OS for $59,995.

The 21-foot Thunder Jet Chinook OS comes with all the factory options, plus: Mercury 200 V6, 2/3 hull side paint, multispeck painted interior sidewalls, hydraulic

steering with tilt helm, upgraded 64-gallon fuel tank, starboard transom door, platform kicker bracket welded, 4-panel easy access front canvas, front suspension seat with swivels, bed rails, washdown with hose receptacle, stern livewell pump kit, dual bilge pumps, dual battery set-up, electric trim tabs, table with mount, porta

potty, three cockpit side wall rod holders (port and starboard), and more.

For more info on stock #T1325, call Maxxum Marine at 541-686-3572.

The Maxxum Marine company was founded in 1988 by brothers Lloyd and Stacy Slonecker. Born and raised in Eugene, continued on page 8

MAXXUM MARINE Built for Adventure!

With our factory-trained technicians for Yamaha, Suzuki, Mercury, Tohatsu and Honda motors, we can handle any project from electronic installs to complete boat and motor overhauls.

Need a new motor for your current boat?

Best prices around on Repowers!

New Larger Location! 1700 Hwy 99 N, Eugene, OR

Toll Free 877-4-Maxxum (877-462-9986) Local

6

541-686-3572 • maxxummarine.com

NORTHWEST SPORTSMAN // BUYER’S GUIDE 2019

Thunder Jet Boulton Fish-Rite

P

POINT DEFIANCE BOATHOUSE & MARINA

oint Defiance Boathouse & Marina has been a staple of the Tacoma waterfront for over 100 years, serving the fishing and boating community of Southern Puget Sound. A part of Metro Parks Tacoma and located in beautiful Point Defiance Park, the Marina provides dry boat storage, boat rentals, and a full-service bait and tackle shop with all the tackle and snacks you need for an enjoyable day on the water. Their knowledgeable staff is also always available to help get your gear set up or give you tips on where the hot bite is. The folks at Point Defiance Boathouse & Marina love seeing people catch fish!

They carry a wide array of Silver Horde spoons and hoochies, perfect for fishing coho and winter blackmouth. From Silver Horde, the Coho Killer has become a staple for when fish are keyed in on small bait, and is the perfect spoon to throw behind your favorite flasher and send down. These spoons fish great behind a diver for coho, or can even be trolled with a sinker for shallow water. Clip one onto your downrigger and send it to the bottom for those finicky winter blackmouth. This tiny spoon can produce big results!

Coho can have a tough time passing up hoochies, and Point Defiance Boathouse & Marina has the Silver Horde Yamashita squids that fish want. Always popular, the Purple Haze is a hoochie that should never leave your tackle box. Its white color with translucent pearlescent finish is an absolute killer at all depths fished behind a flasher of your preference. This hoochie produces all year-round for winter blackmouth, summer kings, and about any other salmon swimming in the Sound.

pointdefiancemarina.com • 253-404-3960

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2019 BUYER’S GUIDE

BOAT TRAILERS continued from page 6 Oregon, the brothers grew intimately familiar with the Willamette River after their parents built a home on the river just downstream from where it merges with the McKenzie River.

Stacy has been dismantling and rebuilding boats since his junior year of high school. Earlier in their careers, Lloyd and Stacy both built custom aluminum boats ranging in length from 13 to 28 feet.

The brothers chose the Maxxum name to stand for maximum strength and maximum performance. Today they customize and sell boats from North River, Boulton, River Hawk, Weldcraft, Duckworth, Starweld and Allied Boats.

Maxxum Marine is also a factory authorized service center for Suzuki, Yamaha and Tohatsu outboard motors.

Gateway Materials gateway-materials.com Gateway Materials is the manufacturer of Gateway Boat Trailers, located in Lewiston, Idaho, and has been in business for over 50 years. The company originated as a steel distributor/fabricator, expanding over time to sell import tools and OEM trailer parts.

Since 2008, they have taken their company goal, to “treat you like you would like to be treated and manufacture a quality product at a fair price,” to include their Gateway

Boat Trailers.

Growing fast and having a strong place in the market, their boat trailers are used by law enforcement, US Fish and Game, US Coast Guard, commercial and private owners alike. OEM boat manufacturers are located in Canada and the United States.

Gateway Materials stands behind their craftsmanship with pride and excellence, while providing customer service that is second to none!

Custom Boat Trailers Reliable Quality Service & Craftsmanship For Over 50 Years!

• NMMA Certified • All Steel Weld Frame, Fenders & Bunks • 2 YEAR WARRANTY

343 Thain Rd., Lewiston, Idaho • www.gateway-materials.com • 208-743-0720 8

NORTHWEST SPORTSMAN // BUYER’S GUIDE 2019

MAY MOBILE MARINE INC.

M

ay Mobile Marine Inc. is an authorized Tohatsu, Klamath, Marlon and Hotwoods Pontoon dealership serving the Port Orchard, Belfair, Bremerton and Shelton area since 2006.

When you are ready to invest in a new boat, May Mobile Marine’s friendly and knowledgeable sales, financing, service and parts departments are prepared to make sure your experience is outstanding, from assisting while you’re making your choice to ongoing maintenance and customization of your boat. They will take care of all your boating needs, from the repairs to installing that new Lowrance or adding that new kicker. At May Mobile Marine Inc., they value the opportunity to create a long-term relationship with their customers, and they do that by giving you the best customer service available.

Featuring a large selection of new and pre-owned aluminum boats, pontoon boats and jon boats, May Mobile Marine has a boat for almost any boater!

maymobilemarine.com

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2019 BUYER’S GUIDE

FISHING GEAR

KNIVES

Bay de Noc Lure Company

Ontario Knife Company ontarioknife.com In the tradition of one of Ontario Knife’s most venerable and popular knives, the trusted classic 499 pilot’s survival knife, the company has added the OKC Journeyman. This knife is a workman and outdoorsman’s knife designed in similar fashion to the 499. Boasting the stacked leather handle, sheep’s foot blade design and deep serrations on the spine, this knife is sure to easily conquer any task set before it. Coming in at only 8.5 inches overall length, 4 full inches of cutting surface, and coupled with a leather sheath, the OKC Journeyman is built to be a true standard in everyday carrying.

baydenoclure.com Bay de Noc Lure Company is proud to announce the addition of all new color patterns of their internationally popular Swedish Pimple lure.

This all new pattern is specifically designed to expand fishermen’s limit catches year-round! The Scales Finish will enhance and give even greater flash, life and color to the legendary Swedish Pimple, enhancing its use in colored or cloudy water typically found in summer fishing.

Fishing for Walleye, Trout, Pike, Pan Fish, Bass, Stripers, Salmon and Whitefish with Bay de Noc Lures

WWW.BAYDENOCLURE.COM Dealer Inquires Welcome!

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NORTHWEST SPORTSMAN // BUYER’S GUIDE 2019

MARINE GEAR

Endurance Equipment endurance-marine.com The Endurance Equipment gas-powered portable capstan winch offers many advantages over a conventional drum winch. It can be used anywhere you can find a safe, solid object to fasten onto, and it can handle an unlimited length of rope.

The EPGW-5 gas-powered portable winch is powered by a 4-stroke, 53cc gas engine. The winch pulls the rope around a rotating cylinder, or capstan. To operate, the operator loops a sling strap around an anchor point, such as a tree, ATV or vehicle, and attaches both ends of the strap to a pair of chain hooks on the winch. Then one wraps the rope around the capstan a few times and starts the engine.

The Endurance Equipment gas-powered capstan winch is especially handy when you need to pull something where your vehicle can’t go.

For example, hunters can use it to pull game out of the woods and to hang and bleed their kill. The engine provides single line pulling power of 2,000 pounds, but additional power can be achieved by using block and tackle pulleys. The winch comes with a safety strap and 75-foot non-stretch polyester rope. It sells for $1,549 and has a 1-year warranty.

Endurance Equipment also sells 150- and 300-foot-long ropes.

LeeLock Anchor Systems leelock.com The LeeLock Magnum Skeg drastically improves performance and straight line travel of bow-mounted electric trolling motors. The use of bow-mounted electric trolling motors for salmon trolling is a gamechanger. Not only does this skeg improve performance, it makes bowmounted electric trolling motors much more efficient. Your batteries will run longer on a charge. The LeeLock Magnum Skeg can be a vital part of your trolling motor system!

This oversized skeg is made of anodized 5052 aluminum. The size is 9 inches high by 11 inches wide and it’s 3/16-inch thick.

It comes with PVC stainless steel nwsportsmanmag.com 11

2019 BUYER’S GUIDE

MARINE GEAR hose clamps. The anodization keeps the aluminum from corroding in fresh and salt water.

The LeeLock Magnum Skeg is available to fit most* 24-volt and 36-volt Minn Kota motors. Call 360-380-1864 or write info@ leelock.com if you have any questions about fit. *The LeeLock Magnum Skeg is also available for MotorGuide trolling motors.

Scan Marine Equipment scanmarineusa.com This year, Wallas has rolled out several new products. Featured among these are two new forced-air diesel heaters that are brimming with features, upgrades and benefits, and both are imported, distributed and supported by Scan Marine Equipment.

The Spartan heater is a 4.5kW workhorse, boasting the broadest power range Wallas has ever offered, and several inlet and outlet options for easy application and retrofit. Using a duplex exhaust/combustion air system produces cool exhaust and unparalleled burn

stability in inclement conditions. All this in a chassis only slightly larger than its predecessors.

The new Viking Air is an updated version of the popular 30GB model. It features lower low-power air volume and amp draw, quieter low- and mid-power sound volume, and broader power range than its predecessor. It has the same footprint as the 30GB, and like the Spartan can be wall- or base-mounted.

These new products utilize full motor rpm feedback, system voltage monitoring and compensation, providing optimized burn control and DC system protection.

These systems help maximize burn, while assuring the best in fuel tolerance, providing maximum power using #2 dock or road diesel.

Both the Spartan and Viking products

use the new Wallas digital control panel #3007, which features tactile turn and rock action to prevent accidental operation. It also boasts the following features: Digital readout of conditions and alerts; running hours, battery voltage and start counter; manual power mode with power settings from 1-6; ventilation mode with power settings from 1-6; thermostatic control with stepless power variation; air power boost when heating; burner output rating; room temperature; and target temperature.

The Wallas Spartan is rated from 4,700 btu on low to 15,400 btu on high, making it Wallas’ most powerful diesel heater to date, with maximum 134 cfm air boost when desired. The Wallas Viking Air is rated from 3,200 btu on low to 10,500 btu on high, producing about the same heating power as the 30GB, but with lower power draw while heating and with very high (105 cfm) air boost available to the user.

SAFES Liberty Safe libertysafe.com From building just six safes each day in 1988 to becoming the industry leader in safe engineering and technology, Liberty Safe has spent the last 30 years doing business for and with Americans. What started in a few storage units has culminated in the ability to manufacture up to 700 safes each and every day. And with over two million safes sold, they take their responsibility to preserve and protect seriously.

Yes, you can store your firearms in a safe. But more and more people are using safes to protect their own slice of the American dream. Each safe owner has a different definition of the things they value 12

NORTHWEST SPORTSMAN // BUYER’S GUIDE 2019

$

1299.00

$

849.00

$

489.00

Model WCH 1000 DECK WINCH For anchor or trap retrieval $

Model EPGW5 GAS POWERED PORTABLE WINCH WITH A CAPSTAN HEAD

Model ETUG2-FL1 PORTABLE 12 VOLT CAPSTAN WINCH

Advantages are portability and capstan design

Fits to pickup trucks, SUVs, ATVs, SBS

1995.00

Model EDMW-12SS STAINLESS STEEL DRUM WINCH For anchor or trap retrieval

With the capstan design, which allows unlimited line length in pulling (versus a drum winch that is generally 35 to 50 feet of cable), and mounts to all 2 inch hitch receivers for trucks or ATV, you can pull your moose from a mile away!

AFFORDABLE, QUALITY DESIGNED MARINE PRODUCTS

604-535-0669 | info@endurance-marine.com

endurance-marine.com

MAKE YOUR HOME AWAY FROM HOME a DAVIS TENT September Special: Save $100’s on In Stock Tents!

www.DavisTent.com

Call Toll Free: 877-ELK-CAMP (355-2267)

Since 1955 4635 Jason St. Denver, CO 80211

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2019 BUYER’S GUIDE

SAFES the most, and Liberty works to make sure they feel secure.

From your grandfather’s pistol to mementos, medication to documents, Liberty Safe is there to protect your story. Their mission to safeguard what matters most is what drives them to continue their focus on engineering and testing their products to create better features and a more secure safe.

Liberty has invested over $30 million in security innovation and engineering to make sure their safes offer the protection they promise.

From stronger welds to better locking mechanisms, their 350 employees in Payson, Utah, (and hundreds of independent dealers across the country) are dedicated to creating the best product for you.

Liberty Safe’s American dream? To do whatever it takes to protect yours.

TENTS Davis Tent davistent.com Davis Tent has earned the reputation as a trusted and dependable manufacturer of high-quality canvas tents. Their products are handcrafted from the highest quality

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NORTHWEST SPORTSMAN // BUYER’S GUIDE 2019

materials, and durability is sewn into every tent they produce. Davis Tents are designed and built to withstand the harshest conditions, season after season. To back it up, they offer an industry leading warranty.

Every stitch in their tents is sewn with care at their Denver, Colorado, production facility. Their staff is full of big game hunters committed to making the best possible tents for their hunting customers.

At Davis Tent, they only use the gold standard in canvas and canvas treatments.

Their double-fill long strand army duck is the best canvas money can buy. And then they have their canvas marine-finished for strength, boat-shrunk for stability, and treated in the USA with Sunforger treatments.

Customers may notice Davis Tent’s price competitiveness when looking at other tent builders. They only sell their products directly to customers, so there is no retail mark-up in their tents.

The folks at Davis Tent have built their business on customer service and longterm relationships. Call them directly and you can speak with a hunting tent expert anytime. The phone number is 877-ELKCAMP (355-2267) or visit davistent.com.

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