Just plunking around

FISHING CHUMS Dennis Cook and Darrel Gadbois settle into their shack and target chum salmon on the Skagit River. Many anglers consider the chum to be the toughest fighter in the salmon family. However, skeptics criticize the looks and taste of the `dog' salmon.

SEDRO-WOOLLEY--An old farmer's rule states salmon bite in the rain--because it's the only time he can get out to fish.

The advice proved poor, however, on this gray, blustery day that left flags snapping to attention in a town with a greasy spoon that brags "great grub, lousy service."

Welcome to the Skagit River, where the chum salmon is king in late fall and bank-fishing camaraderie is thick--even when the fish aren't.

"Just throw out an old sand shrimp and let it rot," said Dennis Cook, who spends a good portion of his retirement in a slipshod "plunking" shack targeting salmon with fellow Sedro-Woolley angler Darrel Gadbois.

Indeed, the angling technique isn't complicated--20- to 30-pound line and a three-way swivel; the sinker line holds 4 to 10 ounces of weight, and, at leader's end, tie on a 2-0 bait hook below a winged bobber. Add salmon roe or sand shrimp, plunk the line into the drink and you're ready to serve.

There will be little doubt when a chum, or dog salmon, takes the bait.

"When you got a dog on, you know you got a dog on," Cook said. "They like to get out there and sit sideways in the current and sulk. You won't believe how they will wear you out."

Many anglers agree the chum is the toughest fighter in the salmon family, particularly when stout gear is employed; just as many believe it to be the ugliest and least appetizing of the bunch.

Out here, however, it's all a matter of taste, according to Cook, 50, and Gadbois, 60, who recently served 22 chum fillets to some folks who thought they were dining on king salmon. When prepared correctly and barbecued or baked fresh, it's considered a delicacy; it's usually can't-miss when smoked.

Urban legend has it the dog salmon was named for the pronounced canine teeth males develop during spawning season to compete for females. Alaskan Indians fed their dogs chum, preferring other species for their own palates. Today, dog salmon often are likened to dogfish, a small shark considered a pest by saltwater sport-anglers.

It's a shame the state's most abundant naturally occurring salmon doesn't get the respect it deserves, said Jim Ames, program manager for chum, pink and sockeye salmon at the Department of Fish and Wildlife in Olympia.

"If we didn't have the other types of salmon, we'd be writing poems about chum salmon," said Ames, who notes the National Marine Fisheries Service is reporting chum are at or near historic abundance. "They are a wonderful fish that might be the prettiest salmon in the spawn colors, with vertical bars in various shades of maroon."

Gadbois has an appreciation for the chum handed down from his forebears. His family has fished the Skagit for six generations; his 1-year-old great-grandson will represent the seventh soon enough. Gadbois' late father--who cultivated strawberries before switching hats to dairyman--authored the farmer's angling edict.

"My dad could tell you every bank hole from Concrete to the mouth, what you'd catch in it, in any given season," Gadbois said, "and he thought dogs were the greatest fish in the world. He didn't give a rip for a king."

The stench of tobacco filled the anglers' plunking shack. Pieced together with wood salvaged from countless shacks before it, the pint-size shelter featured tattered plastic windows, a wood stove and a squeeze bottle of mustard. A bell clipped to his fishing rod sounds the alarm when Gadbois snoozes on a recycled sofa cushion. "We're uptown here," he said.

Fishing logs suggest chum--also dubbed fall or autumn salmon because it is the last salmon to make its spawning run--on the Skagit is among the hottest fisheries in the state at present, especially between Rockport and Marblemount.

However, their numbers are beginning to dwindle, especially downstream. The daily take limit through Dec. 31 is two chum between Mount Vernon and the Cascade River near Marblemount; all other salmon fisheries here are closed to sport-angling.

To locate pools likely to hold chum upstream from Sedro-Woolley, look for well-worn riverside pullouts along roads spurring from Highway 20 or along the South Skagit Highway. "Where there's a pullout, there's a spot for salmon," Cook said. "Get out and explore."

Watch for private property or "no trespassing" signs, and, when in doubt, fishery biologist Ames said, knock on a neighboring resident's door to seek permission to fish.

The state freshwater chum record is 27.97 pounds, taken on the Satsop River in 1997. Ames holds the freshwater fly-rod world record for chum on 20-pound tippet with a 19-pound, 2-ounce specimen from the Satsop in 1991. The all-tackle record for chum is 35 pounds, hooked at Edye Pass in British Columbia in 1995.