Early September Columbia Kings

Journal Entry: Columbia River King fishing near Bonneville Dam

Date: Sept 4, 2026

Gear: Trolling rods rigged with 50-pound Probraid W40 in hi-vis yellow, 14 oz of lead

Lures: Brad's Super Bait loaded with scented tuna

Weather: 55 degrees, rainy with light wind

Today, I went fishing with my good friend and guide, Dave Eng. Dave called me the night before, mentioning he had an opening and asked if I wanted to join. I eagerly accepted, and we agreed to meet at 6 AM at a boat launch called the Fishery on the Oregon side of the river, just below Bonneville Dam.

I arrived at 5:50 AM, and Dave already had his boat in the water, ready to go. We were soon joined by Phil, another friend of Dave's, and we set off.

We motored down the river a bit and set up for our first troll. We got the gear down and started trolling, and almost immediately, we saw salmon on the live scope inspecting our gear. Dave said, "Be ready, that one's going to bite," and just then, my rod bent over with the pull of a salmon. I landed it quickly; it was a hatchery king, about 25 inches, just a little too big to be considered a Jack. I tagged it on my Oregon card, and by the time we were back fishing, only about 20 minutes had passed since we left the dock. The day looked very promising.

A nice little Chinook to start the day.

After that red-hot start, we spent the next 5 hours without landing a fish. We had a couple of bites and lost two fish, but nothing in the boat.

We made one last run to see if we could get one more fish. We had a bite and marked a lot of fish on the live scope, so we decided to make one last run...again. This time Phil's rod doubled over and he had a nice King on the line. As he was reeling it in, it came to the surface and ripped across the river with its dorsal fin out of the water. We could clearly see that it was a big fish.

Phil did a good job fighting the fish and soon Dave had it in the net. We estimated that this mint-bright king weighed in around 18 - 20 lbs!

Beautiful chrome bright King caught at the end of the day

After catching a fish, we naturally decided to make another attempt. Unfortunately, we couldn't catch a third fish, so we decided to end the day.

Nice red filets from this beautiful Columbia River King

We cleaned the fish at the dock, bid our farewells, and set off. It was an another amazing day in the Great Pacific Northwest.