Puget Sound Fishing Report: Chasing Blackmouth and Coho as Winter Fronts Roll Through

This is Artificial Lure with your Puget Sound fishing report.

Down on the central Sound, that incoming morning tide is the play, with a decent push mid‑morning that’s been lining up nicely with the low‑light window. Work the first couple hours after daylight, then again on the afternoon ebb if the wind lets you stay out. Winter fronts are marching through, so expect gray skies, scattered rain, and a stiff southerly that can stack up a short, ugly chop once it gets above 15 knots.

Sunrise is landing in the mid‑7 o’clock hour, with sunset creeping in just after 4, so your productive window is tight and favors early birds and last‑light grinders. Cold surface temps and short days have pushed most action deeper; think 80–140 feet on the main basins, with fish pinned to structure edges and drop‑offs rather than roaming the top.

Resident coho and blackmouth (resident Chinook) have been the main story, with bonus flounder and the odd lingcod (where open and within rules) for folks working the humps and ridges. Catches have been modest but steady: a couple legal blackmouth per boat is realistic on a good tide, plus undersized shakers that keep rods bouncing. Squid are still around in the evenings off well‑lit piers, and crabbing effort is light, but folks dropping pots where open are scratching out enough Dungeness and reds for a weekend boil.

For lures, keep it classic and local: 3.0–3.5 green‑glow and Irish cream spoons behind an 11‑inch flasher are money for blackmouth, especially run tight to the wire at 2.2–2.6 knots. Coho have been chewing small white hoochies and needlefish‑style spoons, with a strip of herring or anchovy to seal the deal. If you’re soaking bait from shore, fresh‑cut herring, sand shrimp, or small strip baits on a sliding rig will pick up flounder and the occasional bonus feeder salmon.

A couple hotspots to circle on the chart: Jefferson Head has been giving up legal blackmouth on the morning flood, with boats working the contour line and staying just off the pack to find their own lane. Down south, Point Defiance and the Clay Banks continue to fish like home water—run your gear just off bottom along the ledge and be ready for that classic winter Chinook thump as the tide starts to move.

That’s the word from around the Sound—bundle up, pick your weather window, and fish smart around tide changes. Thanks for tuning in, and don’t forget to subscribe for more local fishing talk. This has been a quiet please production, for more check out quiet please dot ai.

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This content was created in partnership and with the help of Artificial Intelligence AI