Buoy 10 Fishing Trends for 2022

Anglers have the chance to catch chinook salmon and coho salmon right out of the ocean at the Buoy 10 fishery in Astoria, Oregon, where the Columbia River and the Pacific Ocean merge. The Buoy 10 salmon season runs from August through September. It's the time of year when Buoy 10 Salmon and ocean abundance numbers for Astoria begin to get hurled around. All five species of salmon are immense, but at Buoy 10 is where anglers can generally hook chinook salmon and coho salmon.

The bodies of Chinook and Coho Salmon undergo a rapid change before starting their annual migration from the Pacific Ocean upriver. Before deciding to swim upriver, the salmon try to cram every last fraction of food into their mouths. As a result, there are a ton of hungry, aggressive fish, which makes fishing in Buoy 10 in the Columbia River so spectacular. This article will guide anglers on the latest Buoy 10 fishing forecast as the season begin.

Chinook Salmon

The preliminary forecast shows about 500,000 chinook salmon will end up in Buoy 10 at the mouth of the Columbia River for the 2022 season. Most of those fish, or 80 percent, are "upriver brights" and will likely swim toward regions above Bonneville Dam, like the Hanford Reach and Snake River.

Massive chinook salmon always find their way into the estuary and are frequently caught near the Astoria-Megler Bridge on the first or very next day of the season. Depending on tides, the chinook salmon fishery often heats up around the middle of August and remains highly productive well past Labor Day. Chinook salmon often occupy the deeper waters. The forecast says anglers should fish for them is prevalent in channels closer to the Washington shore, including off the Church Hole and upstream well above the bridge. This season, anglers catch chinook salmon in the deep shipping channel along the Oregon coast from Buoy 10 up to Tongue Point, off Hammond, Warrenton, and Astoria.

Coho Salmon

This season's forecast says about half a million coho salmon are returning to the Columbia. A significant increase in coho salmon populations is anticipated to affect fisheries in the Columbia River positively. That would be more fish than last year's abundance and better than the five-year average. On some days when schools of fish come in with the tides as soon as the season begins, coho salmon fishing can be good in the mornings close to the Buoy 10 fishery. The fishing trend for coho salmon is that coho bite can remain good until late September.

The perfect areas for coho salmon fishing are close to Buoy 10. Along the Washington coast, off Upper Sand Island, up to Chinook, Washington, and near the north Washington end of the Astoria-Megler Bridge, coho salmon are also caught in significant quantities.

Fishing Trend For the Peak Season

The first half of the Buoy 10 salmon season has been quite the ride. The drawback of last year's spectacular opening weekend is that suddenly people seem to think they can anticipate it every year. That might have been a once-in-a-lifetime or twice-in-a-decade occurrence, and even in a good year, the bite will fluctuate throughout the first half of August.

The good news is that salmon fishing at Buoy 10 will only improve over the next few weeks as the chinook salmon run approaches its peak and the coho salmon starts to enter the Columbia River. Time will tell, but the last weeks of August are a reliable indicator of the size of the fall run. Additionally, this is the moment during the salmon season when large crowds gather. If you're in a group and you're not getting any fish, you might as well leave and look for uncharted waters. Sometimes these fish don't swim where they should, so you must search out unusual places to find them.

Recommendations for Fishing in Buoy 10

It is best to hire a fishing charter if you wish to fish at the mouth of the Columbia River. Since fishing can be erratic, some fishing trips may last only a few hours or come to an end at dusk. An experienced fishing guide will help you brave the Buoy 10 fisheries throughout the overwhelming salmon season. Chartered captains are also knowledgeable about the particular trends for the 2022 season. The tides will also significantly affect your fishing adventure. Salmon fishing at Buoy 10 is best done by trolling herring and anchovy baits behind a flasher. The ideal setup consists of long rods with a soft or medium tip, a heavy backbone, and line counter reels. Line counter reels are handy for determining the depth at which we are fishing. Fishing can be fantastic with the proper setup, occasionally hooking up before all the rods are in the water.

Always take note of the salmon fishing trends this year, and remember that Buoy 10 fishing is perfect for just about anyone.