Shad and Sturgeon

The Shad fishery is going good and getting stronger. Been getting about a dozen per hour and each day is getting better. All types of spoons are and colors are working right now. The Sturgeon fishing below marker 82 is getting packed with people and with heavy pressure it is getting more and more difficult you have to keep moving to locate oversize and keepers are hard to come by.

Reg Changes

The Columbia opened to fishing for Shad last Sunday May 16th. You are still unable to fish for Steelhead or Salmon on the Columbia so be careful when Shad fishing as you may hook one of these fish, you must not take them out of the water to release them. No changes for the Willamette it is still open for Salmon and Steelhead fishing and shad have been caught in Oregon City. Sturgeon is closed until Nov 1 on the Willamette.

Strugeon all the way

Even with the Change the early showing is oversize Sturgeon will be OK. Fished the flats below the falls and picked up a few nice oversize, they seem to be hitting anything caught one on shad and the other on squid. Launching is spread through out as some are using Rooster Rock state park, some Dalton point and some the Fishery. I went out of Chinook Landing. Be careful if you launch at Dalton Pt this is notorious for break ins.

Shad

The shad should be coming in any day now. Oversize are in the river heading to their spawning grounds below the dam and a few are being caught. The Willamette is slowing for Salmon though the channel is still producing a few fish.

Willamette Still producing

The Willamette is still producing springers and should for a few more weeks, waiting on the Shad to arrive which is the start of Oversize. There are oversize in the area caught some before the closure above Marker 82. It will be interesting with no fishing above 82 where everyone will target oversize it may get a bit crowded.

Sturgeon Closure

With the April 30th closure of Sturgeon above marker 82 (Multnomah Falls) that will put a lot of pressure on the Troutdale area for Oversize. I got in a few days of fishing before the closure and it was great. One day we got 47 fish which included 2 keepers and 1 oversize, too bad it closed.