Halibut fishing in the Northwest near Seattle.

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kevrangray

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Anybody done any halibut fishing up near the Seattle area? Just got back from doing some out at Newport, OR and did pretty well. Limited out on Halibut and caught 4 Tuna.
 
kevrangray":stirilvd said:
Anybody done any halibut fishing up near the Seattle area? Just got back from doing some out at Newport, OR and did pretty well. Limited out on Halibut and caught 4 Tuna.
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Kevin, sorry to hijack the thread, but how far out were the Tuna? I heard that they were 18 miles off Depot Bay.
 
We were just south of the banana curve which I'm thinking was around 24 miles out. We could have easily caught more than 4 but we were getting low on ice so we had to turn around and head back in. The water seemed to have nice clarity and was 61 degrees regardless where we were though.
 
Halibut season in Washington is very limited. It starts in early May on Thurs, Fri and Saturdays and lasts until the quota is taken (usually a couple of weekends in May, plus a little quota reserved for 1 day in June after school is out. The weather and ocean are usually crappy for much of the fishery although they can be caught in areas 5 and 6 in nicer water (area 5 is Sekui, area 6 is the E end of the straight. Right now if you want halibut, you have to fish Canadian waters with a B.C. Canadian license AND the Canadian license must be purchased while you're physically in Canada. E.g. you can't use the electronic license to fish halibut (that's mostly to prevent charter boats from issuing day of licenses out of Neah Bay and running clients across the border to get hailbut.
 
roger I believe the licence restriction only applies to swiftsure bank?? not the rest of Canada.
 
It was a pretty good halibut season for me this year. I got one off of Port Towsend, one off Port Angeles, and two at La Push. All were between 25-35 lbs. Last year I fished fairly hard but got nothing.
 
starcrafttom":2m4ii5m0 said:
roger I believe the licence restriction only applies to swiftsure bank?? not the rest of Canada.
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"Only a Canadian resident may fish for or retain halibut under an electronic licence in management Areas 121, 23 and 123. "

It covers a bit more than just Swiftsure but Swiftsure is the prime hali area within area 121. Regardless, it's pretty easy to get a Canadian license in person - take a day trip to Vancouver or Victoria or even just across the border on the way to Vancouver.
 
This year's halibut season here in Port Angeles was pretty much a non-event. Five indian tribes had a 13 hour longline "season" the DAY BEFORE our recreational season started. Yep, the day before. As a result, success rate on halibut for us regular Joes was a paltry 17%, according to WDFG reporting. It was pathetic. I took vacation days for the season and fished hard 11 of the days. We caught 2 fish. Sad.

The most disturbing part of the whole thing was that we never even had our bait stolen by smaller fish, and that concerns me. It's like Chernobyl down there.
 
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