Go ahead and go fishing in the chilly waters from Port Townsend to the Port Angeles area and Hood Canal — but be careful about eating the king salmon you catch.
The big, fatty kings swimming in Puget Sound, the eastern Strait of Juan de Fuca, Hood Canal and off the San Juan Islands — prized by sport fishermen, tribes and endangered orcas alike — are so polluted with PCBs and mercury that the state Health Department is advising consumers, especially pregnant women and young children, to limit how much they eat.
The department said people should restrict their consumption of king salmon, also known as chinook, caught in the greater Puget Sound area to a single meal a week.
A meal equals 8 ounces of uncooked salmon.
“Resident”‘ chinook, also known as blackmouth, should not be eaten more than twice a month.
Blackmouth salmon, which never migrate to the open sea, had higher contamination levels than the ocean-going kings.
The advisory does not include king salmon caught in the western half of the Strait, including Clallam Bay, Sekiu and Neah Bay, or off the coast.
It also does not apply to other salmon stocks — chum, coho, pink and sockeye — all of which are safe to eat more often. King salmon accumulate more toxins than other species of salmon.
Kings caught in North Olympic Peninsula rivers such as the Elwha, Sol Duc and Bogachiel on their spawning runs are not addressed in the health advisory.
