Fishing

It’s time.  The sun has started shining in San Francisco.  The clocks have been sprung forward.  We’re coming out of warming meat eating season and heading into cooling meat eating season.  It’s time to go fishing.  Growing up with an avid fly-fisherman for a father, I’ve been fishing.  I’ve waded through numerous streams and rivers throughout Oregon, Idaho and Montana.  I’ve caught rainbow trout, cutthroat trout, brook trout, and brown trout.  I went steelheading with my father last August, but we didn’t manage to catch anything—other than the food poisoning my husband got that left him vomiting by the river’s side while I lamely attempted 50-foot casts and showed off my horrific mending skills.

In theory because I’ve caught trout, I could eat salmon.  After all, they’re all part of the Salmonidae family, which includes trout, salmon, char, whitefish and grayling.  This is something that’s lost on most people, including myself frankly.  Until today I had no idea whitefish were in the Salmonidae family.  This is interesting because I think it means that if I catch a salmon on the pacific coast, I can totally eat New York Jewish deli whitefish salad.  Although I’m not totally sure about this because Wikipedia, which purports to contain actual information, says here that the Atlantic Whitefish, which I’m just guessing is the kind of whitefish in the delish desired bagel shmear, “is a freshwater salmonid fish inhabiting the northwestern Atlantic ocean around the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, as well as some freshwater lakes within Nova Scotia.”  Last time I checked (which was two seconds ago because I was all like, wait what, I’m pretty sure I got an A in science but maybe I’ve misremembered all these years and there isn’t actually salt in the Atlantic Ocean) freshwater means no salt/low salt and ocean means salty, salty, salty.  But whatever, I digress.  If you want to learn more about the Salmonidae’s maybe this information is a little more trustworthy.

The point is, I’ve drawn a distinction between fish caught in rivers versus fish caught in the ocean because I think there’s a distinct difference in the process of catching each and that’s what I want to experience.  According to Sole Man, during the spring I can catch king salmon and rockfish on the SF coast and striped bass, halibut, and shark in the bay.  Sadly, my weekends are full for several weeks, but mid-April it is going to be on.  The only question I have is whether I can fish the coast and the bay in one day.  Actually, wait, I have another question: How do you cook shark?

P.S.  If you care about fish that are sensitive to environmental changes, as the Salmonidae family is, you should totally think about supporting Trout Unlimited.