Fishing Report

Trout, Washington

With winter fishing lakes closed, the region’s anglers are trying to find spots in the Columbia Basin where they can catch a few trout.

Rufus Woods Lake, the long reservoir between Grand Coulee and Chief Joseph dams, is popular with anglers who hope to catch one or two slab-sized sterile rainbows.

Most fishermen launch boats either at the upper end or just above Chief Joseph Dam and make long runs to fish near net pens. Some launch car-top and pontoon boats and float tubes at a primitive access area near the pens.

Trollers use large plugs, worm baited Muddler Minnow flies and big spinners. A few still-fishers have been using worm-baited jigs. And a few fly fishers are using fast-sinking lines to get big streamers and leech patterns down to the fish.

It’s a little too early to expect good fishing for the big Lahontan cutthroat in Lenore Lake.

Fly fisher Jim Randall of Coulee City said there have been only sparse hatches of midges at the 7-mile-long lake since it opened to catch-and-release fishing March 1. Only a few fly and spin fishermen have been fishing the lake.

Good hatches of midges usually start in mid-April.

Rocky Ford, a fly fishing-only spring creek north of Moses Lake, has been attracting several fly fishers a day. There are enough rainbows in the upper end of the stream to provide fair-to-good fishing during midge and Blue-Winged Olive mayfly hatches.

Fishing has been slow at Lenice and Nunnally lakes, selective gear waters along the lower Crab Creek channel. At least 50 anglers fished Lenice, usually one of the better producers, last Saturday and nearly all were skunked.

A few of the small lakes south of the Lind Coulee have been yielding five-fish limits of rainbows. Among the most productive have been Virgin, Susan, Katey and the three Windmill lakes.

The Hamptons don’t seem to have big trout populations, but there are some big rainbows in Upper Hampton.

Spiny rays

Anglers have been wondering where the perch went at Sprague Lake. Some were filling buckets with 8- to 12-inchers two weeks ago. Then the perch vanished.

It’s unlikely anglers caught most of them. Schools were so large anglers often hooked two on a two-hook set-up; occasionally, they couldn’t avoid snagging a few.

Mike Mielke, co-owner of the Sprague Lake Resort, said a few anglers have caught good numbers of perch, but most have left the lake without enough to provide a meal. Fishermen are catching bass in shallow areas of numerous Columbia Basin lakes. Water temperatures are in the low- to mid-50s at most lakes and veteran anglers are taking advantage of the increased activity of the bass.

Several North Idaho lakes have been providing fair-to-good fishing for bass and crappies. Among them are Hauser, Fernan and the lakes adjacent to the lower Coeur d’Alene River.

Whitefish

This weekend might provide the last chance to catch a few huge lake whitefish at the upper end of Soda.

Large numbers of the fish have been concentrated near where the Potholes canal flows into the lake. They move away from the moving water soon after the flow is cut. Most anglers use small flies baited with worms or maggots.

Kokanee

Kokanee fishing was fairly good along Lake Roosevelt from Keller down to Spring Canyon last weekend, according to Lennie Mayo, operator of the J.L. Fishing Guide Service.

He said three of his clients boated 13 kokanee near the mouth of the San Poil River on Saturday. They also lost several.

All the kokanee were 12 to 17 inches, he said. Only one of the 13 had clipped adipose fins. Effective May 1, all kokanee that don’t have clipped fins must be released.

Guide John Carruth of Davenport said he and a friend trolled for the kokanee last weekend and hooked nine during 3 hours of fishing. A few were only about 8 inches long, he said.

Salmon

Chinook salmon apparently are starting to move into the bays around Lake Coeur d’Alene, Ross Fister of the Fins & Feathers shop at Coeur d’Alene reported.

“It happens every year about this time,” he said.

For example, a woman who was fishing for pike in a shallow bay last weekend caught a salmon that weighed 12 pounds.

However, salmon fishing is still too slow for most anglers.

Pike

Lake Coeur d’Alene’s water level is high enough for big northern pike to move into shallow bays to spawn, Fister said.

Most of the pike caught at the lake last weekend weighed 5 to 6 pounds, but Wayne Kirk of Coeur d’Alene caught one that weighed 19 pounds, 12 ounces.

Fister said lots of big pike are expected to move into the bays the next few days to spawn. Most anglers will use smelt or herring under bobbers to attract the fish.

Swan and Black lakes, adjacent to the lower Coeur d’Alene River, are producing fair-to-good pike fishing, Fister said.

Steelhead

A few tributaries of the Snake River are continuing to provide fair-to-good steelhead fishing. The steelhead have moved into the small streams where they will spawn in a few weeks.

However, the lower Clearwater provided fair fishing last weekend, the Idaho Fish and Game Department reported. Anglers averaged 19 hours per steelhead.

Average for the Clearwater’s South Fork was 15 hours.

Although the Little Salmon was off-color last weekend, anglers averaged nine hours per steelhead.

Anglers averaged 2.4 hours per steelhead along the Touchet River and 5.4 hours along the lower Grande Ronde during the week ending March 31, Jerry Deadloff of the Snake River Laboratory reported.

Trout, Montana

The Clark Fork River has dropped and cleared considerably, enabling anglers to hook trout on various fly patterns, Brooks Sanford of the Clark Fork Trout & Tackle shop at St. Regis, reported.

He said fly fishers caught a few trout Saturday on dark stonefly patterns tied on Nos. 10 to 14 hooks. Sunday, fly fishers who floated from Dry Creek to St. Regis caught several trout each on size 13 Black Stimulators and sizes 14 to 20 Blue-Winged Olive mayfly patterns.

Sanford expects to see skwala stoneflies on the river this weekend.