Any idea what they are doing?? Looks like they're throwing them back.
Is that Chicken Island in the background?

Rawhyde on 23rd June 2014 @ 7:03am

Obvious they are netting and then throwing back what they don't want or are too small to keep. Notice the big ugly gaff hook in the front of the photo.

charlott on 23rd June 2014 @ 7:03am

Looks like they are cleaning them, but those look like big intact fish in the water.
I bet when they went to bed at night, all they could smell was fish.

A pre-dam photo. A couple of those faces should be recognizable to someone.

l.e. on 23rd June 2014 @ 7:09am

um, Charlotte, that's a boat hook, not a gaff hook. Day is on another boat, that is being held to the fishing barge with the boat hook. Some of those are rather dark bellied, tule's perhaps, so fall? Would go along w/ calm water conditions if Fall. With Day's association w/ ODFW and stocking, this may be more along that line, rather than fishing. The net openings are too small for a "gill" net. Not sure how involved ODFW was with salmon stocking/research at that time.

spinsur on 23rd June 2014 @ 7:13am

I don't understand all this, but boat hook looks like what we called a pike pole when rafting logs, only with a wood handle. Hard to tell, but is this some kind of fish wheel? The one fish partly out of the water looks like what we called dog or chum salmon. Was real oily and used mostly to feed dog teams. But don't know if they even run in the Columbia. Thought there were just 5 kinds of salmon. What is a tule?

Buzz on 23rd June 2014 @ 7:38am

Could they be collecting eggs?

Buzz....I'm not an expert on fish, but Tule are fall Chinook that run on the lower Columbia R. The White Salmon had a Tule run.
As a kid, that is all I knew of as Fall Chinook. They taste lousy. Mushy, like they are half dead, which is exactly what they are.
It wasn't until I moved farther east up the Columbia that I learned about Upriver Brights which taste much better. They are a fall Chinook genetically capable of staying in the Columbia for a length of time and spawning way up river.
I think I have that right???

l.e. on 23rd June 2014 @ 8:01am

Looks like a hand crank wench- attached vie of a wire above- a pouch/ catch may be present in the net behind the guys- the wood troughs appear to be used to get the unwanted fish back to the water.

Steve r on 23rd June 2014 @ 8:56am

Brain dead, that is a pike pole............

charlott on 23rd June 2014 @ 10:36am