Spring Chinook Fishing on the Columbia and Willamette Rivers in Oregon

Our Spring Chinook fishing trips are done in a 26 foot, North River Jet Sled on The Columbia or Willamette Rivers. The Spring Chinook Salmon is the largest species in the salmon family. It is a Pacific Ocean salmon and is variously known as the king salmon, tyee salmon, Columbia River salmon, black salmon, chub salmon, hook bill salmon, winter salmon, Spring Salmon, Quinnat Salmon and blackmouth. Chinook salmon are highly valued, due in part to their relative scarcity compared to other salmon along most of the Pacific coast. Fisheries officials predict that the 2011 return of summer chinook salmon to the mouth of the Columbia River will be the largest on record dating back to 1980. The upriver spring chinook forecast is a return very close to the recent five-year average.

We are fishing The Columbia and Willamette Rivers for Spring Chinook from now through May. We are offering half and full day Spring Chinook Fishing Trips:

1/2 day trips for up to 6 people for $125 per person
Full day trips for up to 6 people are $225 per person

Bass Fishing on the John Day River in Oregon

John Day River Bass fishing trips are a day float down the John Day River in a North River Drift Boat. The boat accomodates up to 4 people and is powered by Yours Truly. John Day Bass fishing trips are $225 per person

Spring Chinook Lifecycle

Chinook salmon may spend 1 to 8 years in the ocean but average from 3 to 4 years before returning to their home rivers to spawn. Chinook spawn in larger and deeper waters than other salmon species and can be found on the spawning nests known as redds from September through December. After laying eggs, the female guards the redd from 4 to 25 days before dying. During this time the male will seek additional mates. Chinook salmon eggs hatch, depending upon water temperature, 90 to 150 days after deposition. Egg deposits are timed to ensure that young salmon fry emerge during an appropriate season for survival and growth. Fry and parr (young fish) usually stay in freshwater 12 to 18 months before traveling downstream to estuaries, where they remain as smolts for several months. Some chinooks return to the fresh water one or two years earlier than their counterparts and are referred to as "Jack" salmon. "Jack" salmon can be half the size of an adult chinook salmon, and are usually released by sportsmen but kept by commercial fishermen.

Spring Chinook Range and Habitat

Chinook salmon range from San Francisco Bay in California to north of the Bering Strait in Alaska and the arctic waters of Canada and Russia (the Chukchi Sea). Populations occur in Asia as far south as the islands of Japan. In Russia, they are found in Kamchatka and the Kuril Islands. Their populations have disappeared from large areas where they used to flourish, shrinking by as much as 40 percent.