A Longer Post About Squid Fishing Puget Sound

Since moving out to Washington from Nebraska, I have had many new fishing experiences, from steelheading in the S rivers to salmon fishing from Puget Sound beaches.  The most unique experience yet, however, is squidding.

Squid fishing is far different from the bass fishing in Nebraska, which we did under the sun on warm mornings, stalking along the edges of sand-pits and casting plastic worms to fish we saw cruising along the bank. The season starts to heat up in October, as the first large schools of squid start to make their way south into Puget Sound. Those brave and/or stupid enough (i.e, me) to pursue the wee cephalopods in the cold and damp must wait until after the sun sets to head out.  The anglers go and stand on a dock or a pier that has lights; squid like to hang around the fringes of the light, darting in to grab shrimp and small fish feeding on the plankton drawn to the illuminated water.  The anglers use long, whippy rods to lob their multi-pronged lures, called squid jigs, out into the water.

Some squid jigs.

The retrieve is a quick jerk upwards, a controlled descent of the rod tip, and a pause. Repeat as needed. When a squid hits, there is not much of a fight; the main goal is to maintain steady upward pressure to keep the squid speared on the smooth points of the jig.  As the mini-krakens are lifted from the water, they launch jets of ink and water, and are then usually dumped into a bucket.

It is not a graceful sport, or one that takes a lot of skill, but it is loads of fun.  I went out last Saturday to Shilshole Marina, not really knowing what to expect.  I'd only gone four times before, and only one trip had been successful. So I sallied forth at sunset, rigged up with two shiny new jigs, and stood next to a light pointed into the murky depths.

If you're into fishing for the solitude, don't go squidding.  This one light on the pier had me, a young couple on their first squid-venture, an old guy named Bob, and two old east-Asian fellows. Back-country Alaska, this is not.  It is, however, a good place to hear old guys toss insults and jokes back and forth in broken English. That's what Saturday started off as, since nobody was catching much.  I managed two little ones in the first half-hour, and the young couple got one, and the old guys got a few. After another half-hour with little action, the young couple gave away their lone squid and took off, victims to hunger and cold.  This, of course, turned the bite on.

At approximately 8:30 pm, a school of squid arrived.  They trickled in at first, a few here, a few there.  Then it started to get intense, with people even catching two at a time, the arrow-shaped bodies jetting ink and saltchuck as they whirled over the railing.  For about an hour and a half the anglers on the pier were very busy bringing in their haul of market squid; I ended up with 38. It was a glorious night, with even a mother and her young boys enjoying the sport.  At 10 pm, the squidding ended as the security truck drove slowly up the pier with its little amber lamp flashing. All the anglers scurried from their spots, afraid of getting locked on the pier for the night, and I walked back to my car with my bucket full of squid.

So now that you have some idea of what squidding is like, go out and try it yourself.  It's done from Japan to Italy, Australia to Seattle, by the young and the old alike, and who knows? It might just be the activity that makes you kind of appreciate that the sun is going to start setting before 5 pm soon.  At the very least it'll get you out of the house and outside for a few hours during the winter.