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King salmon (chinook)
Kenai River, Inside Passage hold Alaska's biggest sportfish
Alaska.com
The king salmon is the largest fish found in Alaska's fresh water, ranging from the southernmost Inside Passage to the Chukchi Sea of Arctic Alaska. It is immensely popular with anglers, especially in Southeast Alaska and on the Kenai Peninsula's rivers and bays.
Description
Kings have irregular black spotting on their backs and dorsal fins and on both lobes of the tail fin. Kings also have black gums. Seagoing kings are deep-bodied fish with bluish-green coloration on their backs.
Spawning kings range from red to copper to almost black. Some kings run all the way up the Yukon River into Canada.
The hook-and-line record is 97 pounds, and the largest king ever caught was a 126-pounder was caught in 1949 in a fish trap near Petersburg in Southeast Alaska.
Kings are also known as chinook, quinnat, tyee, tule and blackmouth salmon.
Alaska record
97 pounds, 4 ounces, caught in 1985 in the Kenai River by Les Anderson of Soldotna.
Tips for fishing
Kings run between May and July, and anglers pursue the kings extensively in Southeast and Southcentral. Like all salmon, they stop feeding once they reach fresh water, but they do strike out of (it's assumed) annoyance or habit.
Trolling with herring bait is preferred in salt water, and lures (spoons and spinners) and salmon eggs are used in fresh water.
Sources of information include the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
More on this topic
 Red salmon (sockeye)
Silver salmon (coho)
Pink salmon (humpback)
Chum salmon (dog)
Rainbow trout
Steelhead trout
Cutthroat trout
Brook trout
Dolly Varden
Arctic char
Arctic grayling
Northern pike
Lake trout
Sheefish
Whitefish
Burbot
Halibut
Lingcod
Salmon sharks
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