Something for everyone

Eastern Washington has hundreds of fishing waters with various mixes of fish species to suit the taste of any freshwater angler.

Trout priority lakes, such as Badger, Fishtrap, West Medical and Williams, are treated every 10-15 years to kill competing species such as sunfish so generous plants of trout fry will thrive.

Selective fisheries, such as Amber and Coffeepot, have gear restrictions and reduced limits aimed at maintaining fisheries of trophy size fish. Usually these are trout fisheries, but there are exceptions, such as Stan Coffin in Grant County, Eastern Washington’s only catch-and-release bass lake.

Mix-species lakes, which include Clear, Silver, Waitts, Potholes Reservoir and the vast majority of the region’s waters, have something for everybody, including annual plants of several thousand catchable-size trout large enough to escape the jaws of bass, panfish and other spiny-ray fish that provide angling diversity.

Spiny-ray-only lakes, such as Shiner-Hutchinson lakes in the Columbia National Wildlife Refuge, are dedicated to species such as bass, crappie, bluegills and perch.