Fishing heats up for silver season

MAT-SU — Expect waterways crowded with both fish and anglers this weekend as the silver salmon are finally here.

“Everything has picked up the last week or so,” said Steve Runyan at 3 Rivers Fly and Tackle. “Pretty much everywhere you can expect to catch silvers is pretty good.”

The numbers were good last weekend at Fish Creek, he said, but this fishery is only open on Saturday and Sunday.

Dave Rutz, biologist for Alaska Department of Fish and Game, added Wasilla and Cottonwood Creeks to the list of hot, weekend-only fisheries.

For weekday fishing, try the Parks highway streams like Willow, Montana or Sheep Creek, Runyan said. On the other side of the Valley, Jim Creek and the Eklutna Tailrace are producing some fish.

Boats should head to the mouth of the Deshka River or Lake or Clear Creeks, Rutz said. The Yenta River sloughs are producing fish as well.

“We’re seeing really good numbers on the Knik Arm waters,” Rutz said. “There are only mediocre numbers on the Susitna drainage, but the fishing seems to be very good.”

The traditional silver salmon rigs of eggs or spinners are working well, Runyan said. It doesn’t seem like one type or color of spinner is working the best, he said, and the best type of eggs depends on the person you’re talking to. Runyan prefers juicy, half-matured king salmon eggs and said tight red salmon eggs work the poorest as they turn to skin the fastest. Egg-sucking leaches in purple or chartreuse seem to be the best fly pattern.

Runyan said the red salmon are starting to become scarce as the run nears its end, but a few are being harvested from the Little Susitna River and Cottonwood Creek. Rutz said the boat launch in Talkeetna is still reporting decent red numbers.

As for pink or chum salmon, Rutz and Runyan both said anglers can expect success anywhere in the Mat-Su.

Runyan added rainbow trout fishing is good until freeze-up and pike are always biting.

Contact Todd L. Disher at todd.disher@frontiersman.com or 352-2252.