Photographs can be tricky. It looks like angler Steve Saville is enjoying a quiet evening at Puget Sound's Dash Point, but check out the photo below....
I'm thinking about all the evening hours I've spent during the past 40-odd years watching fish rise, boil or swirl at my feet.
I'm thinking about all this because I spent about 90 minutes casting a fly at scattered pods of pink salmon at Dash Point Wednesday night, and all I got was a strong take and one head shake. I did strip in many green, slimy weeds.
The fish were scattered and sparse -- the Big Puget Sound Pink Run of 2009 is just getting rolling -- but the fish moved in shallow just at twilight. Nice pinks jumped and swirled almost at my feet. I'm sorry to say that I didn't hook any of those fish -- probably from lack of skill.
I think I have to pester those pinks a little more on Thursday -- and perhaps on Friday morning. I suspect I'll be on the pinks for a couple of weeks, as I'm eager to reenact the hot fishing I enjoyed back in 2007.
My friend Steve Saville, who haunts the www.washingtonflyfishing.com saltwater board, was on the beach when I arrived. Steve didn't recognize me at first, but it was great to shoot the breeze. I wandered off to gear up -- by some miracle I had found a spot in the parking lot -- and I watched Steve hook up to a nice pink.
Steve lost that pink right at his feet, but we should all land a few pinks this year -- biologists say Puget Sound will get 5 million of the fish this year. Steve hooked all of his fish on his secret pink salmon fly. I promised not to share the fly with the world at large, so I won't.
It is, however, pink. It's hard to go wrong with a pink fly for pink salmon. Steve is a great guy, and he lives near Dash Point, so he knows the drill really well. Steve gave me a few pointers -- and reminded me that big pink salmon runs off Dash Point are a fairly recent deal.
Pink salmon heading to the Puyallup River swim within easy casting range of Dash Point. An estimated 700,000 pinks are heading to the Puyallup this summer, so it's easy to see why Dash Point is a busy spot.
Dash Point isn't quite the madhouse it will be when this run really gets cooking, but there are some testy folks in the parking lot, and you have to dodge pink Buzz Bombs if you walk onto the pier.
Here's what the shoreline looked like Wednesday evening:
You can see Steve Saville in the far distance. He was the only fly caster on the scene until I showed up.
I think Puget Sound salmon are a double-edged sword for anglers. It's great to have a big run of fish, but salmon also attract hordes of anglers, and some of them are not pleasant people. Some people -- crazed with greed, big egos and who knows what else -- act like morons whenever salmon arrive. Luckily, most anglers remain sane and friendly.
I talked to a nice man who owns a house on the beach, and he is happy to see anglers having a good time. But the private property owners along the beach don't want hordes of anglers passing over the park boundary and tromping around on their land.
I understand this, as I'd hate to see a bunch of strangers loping around my front yard for most of August.
We anglers can enjoy the fishing at Dash Point -- especially when massive schools of snappy pink salmon finally arrive -- but we should respect the local folks.
I just hope for at least one evening where the pinks are silly for my fly.
