Siuslaw salmon launch/fishing info

Getting good reports on Siuslaw chinook, appears to be a good return of large fish, and coho, which open Sept.15, should be coming in soon.  This year, Siuslaw is 1 chinook/day - 2 total for the year and 1 coho/day - 1 total for the year.  I'm also getting reports of very good crabbing all the way up to the 101 bridge.

My first trip out is tomorrow in the PB, running 3 rods, then Pepper and I are planning to be out in the kayak on 15th and 19th.

You can avoid the big Port of Siuslaw launch by using the kayak/canoe slide at Exploding Whale Park, only 5 parking spaces in the small park but no beach wheels required, not very far to the water and it puts you right below the 101 bridge in a very productive stretch for fresh chinook and coho, especially good on incoming tide from mid incoming to high slack.  You can also troll up past town to the good stretch from mouth of n. Fort to the RR bridge at Cushman.  Not much overflow parking but I marked on the image with red squares the nearest places you can get off the road just in case the small lot if full.

This area below the bridge has good crabbing, I have not had any issues in the past with pots 'vanishing', and it is wide enough that boats zipping down to the mouth are not much of an issue even on busy days. Most people troll along the west/south side, along the dunes.

Past years we found the salmon moving through the lower river here were pretty strong through September to about mid-October.

cheers, roger



   

 

Thanks for the info sir!

Did exactly that today.  Launched about 10:30 from the Exploding Whale and rode the incoming tide until a little before Cushman where I managed to land a 37” Chinook.  Crabbed on Saturday straight out from the park and it was good except nearly all crab were softies with little meat, especially the large ones.

Did exactly that today.  Launched about 10:30 from the Exploding Whale and rode the incoming tide until a little before Cushman where I managed to land a 37” Chinook.  Crabbed on Saturday straight out from the park and it was good except nearly all crab were softies with little meat, especially the large ones.

excellent, you might have seen Pepper and my footprints in the sand, we were there checking the slide launch area about 9am.

Update- coho are moving into the river now, released this beauty near the RR bridge on Tuesday.

Thanks for the info, Roger! Looking forward to fishing with you on Tuesday

Exploding Whale update-  at low tide, some muddy area is exposed, I needed to go down the beach a bit to launch (red star in the image), beach wheels would have been nice.  mid to high tide, no worries, water is at the sand right near my traps.

also, that stretch of the Siuslaw is being absolutely carpet bombed with crab traps!   and boats.  cheers, roger