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[halcyonguitars]

On the Cap today, saw a noob pull a mighty fish.

There are but three fish retainable presently as far as I know. Pink, coho, and chinook. Each of these have pretty distinguishable markings, even though they look different in real life than on the internet.

1) white mouth with black towards the snout, big oval spots all over tail = pink
2) white gums black tongue spots on top of tail = coho
3) black gums, black tongue, black mouth = chinook

If you can't identify your catch with reasonable certainty, it should go back.

The guy caught it and didn't know what it was. He called me over to see, I told him I thought it was a steelhead, white mouth, white gums, white tongue, lightish green with fairly even spots (not that I've ever seen one), no indicators at all of the retainable fish. I told him he should put it back, his buddy argued that the pelvic fin wasn't the right shape for steelhead and that it's adipose was clipped and bonked it, then they bagged it and disappeared.

I wasn't going to get aggressive about it, but it's a bit of a let down for sure.

Point of the story I guess, if you don't have a strong case for identifying your fish, put it back in the river please. You'll catch another one one day...

[mikeyman]

Well there goes 10 % of the steelhead in the cap.

[~IvAn~]

If you're fishing in the river you cannot retain any pinks...only coho and chinook.

[halcyonguitars]

IvAn...

You are totally right! How fast things change!

[silver ghost]

disgusting. guys like that with no respect for the resource need to be reported.

[RalphH]

I know that it's difficult for folks who haven't seen much of the various species but beyond what you list, there are many subtle differences between the several species of salmon and trout that make identification very easy. This includes shape of the snout, smell, the shape of the spots ans their pattern on the body, size and distribution of scale and how easy they can be removed. For the most part size will cancel out chinook in most cases. As far as I know only steelhead and coho in the Cap would have a clipped adipose - if it was indeed clipped. Steelhead will probably look far more trout like relative to coho - the spots, a rounded snout and a red lateral rainbow stripe are things to look for.

I really think peole need to focus on more factors than the simple ones typically listed because you can make mistakes and I've seen people with dead wild fish they thought were some other species that some retention was allowed on.

[Fish or cut bait.]

P.S.  All Steelhead whether it's clipped or not must be released in the Cap!

Also a bait ban till the end of October though it seems there are a lot of folks ignoring that regulation.

[halcyonguitars]

I was under the impression that the mouth was one of the most reliable indicators...

[Silver]

Doubt it was a steelhead from your description...probably looked like this.

[RalphH]

Halycon, steelhead coho and chinook in this photo - can you see in the mouth? Which is which?

[Silver]

Here's a close up...



This fish landed at 5-6 lbs, greenish color back, fairly even spots with medium density, initially presented with white mouth, gums, and tongue...to make it even more complicated, the tongue darkened significantly later on.

[halcyonguitars]

RalphH...

Getting a 404 error

Silver, would that be coho with the white gums/black tongue?

[RalphH]

RalphH...

Getting a 404 error

Silver, would that be coho with the white gums/black tongue?

fixed it.

The gums don't look white to me or it's easy to confuse if the are white or dark gray or black. It's something the id guides don't tell you that the mouth of a coho gets darker once it enters freshwater and starts to transition to spawning colours.

[Silver]

It's a Coho. However, I'll admit that I initially thought it was a jack spring...thus showing the ease of misidentification between Springs & Coho...have not had the pleasure of catching a larger Coho too date.
I was certain it was not a Steelhead...there are usually many juvenile in the fish ladder windows to see. And to me although smaller, always have a distinct trout like head, and are peppered with bold leopard spots.
I'm figuring out this system more...the first light thing is not necessarily true.
Check out this play...

[RalphH]

sometimes called blackmouth in the States.

I can id a salmon (all 5 species), steelhead, cutthroat when it's in the water once I get a decent look at it. Kind of ensures I don't have spend time picking it up to peek in it's mouth once I land it and that's plus with species that have to be released.

I have at least once checked out a dead wild coho caught by an angler who was convinced it was a spring because 'its' gums were black'. The fish had very faint spots on the top of the tail - sure sign it was a coho. Shape of the jaws the spots and body shape are all different between the 6 salmon species and cutthroat. They also behave differently when hooked.