Fishing Report

Winter lakes

Anglers can launch boats at Hog Canyon and Fourth of July lakes.

Above-normal temperatures have erased the ice at both lakes, enabling anglers to fish the popular waters from boats several weeks earlier than usual.

It’s still possible, of course, for temperatures to plunge to near-zero levels, but the water temperatures are in the 40s and it would take several days to put an inch or 2 of ice on the lakes.

In past years, the lakes have been ice-covered into March.

Fishing was good much of the time at both lakes last weekend. Fly fishers reported hooking and releasing good numbers of rainbows 10 to 24 inches at Fourth of July. Bait and lure fishermen caught limits.

However, there have been times when the trout wouldn’t cooperate.

Fishing has been so good at Hog Canyon on some days a few greedy anglers exceed the bag limit.

Fourth of July holds the biggest rainbows, some 20 to 24 inches. There are two or three age classes in Hog Canyon. The yearlings are 9 to 10 inches; carryover trout are 11 to 14. An angler can occasionally hook a 17-inch-plus fish.

Ice on most of the lakes in the Coeur d’Alene area no longer is thick and solid enough for safe fishing, according to Steve Smith of the Fins & Feathers shop. However, most of the popular lakes near and north of Sandpoint still had enough solid ice early this week to safely support anglers.

Smith said fishermen have been catching 10- to 14-inch rainbows in open water at Fernan, although there’s still ice on the lake. Ice on Hauser is in poor shape.

Kelso, Round and Mirror still had fairly good ice early this week. Kelso and Round have been yielding rainbows and Mirror has been giving up brook trout and a few kokanee.

Spiny rays

Sprague Lake is ice-free, but fishing has been slow, Scott Haugen of the Four Seasons Resort said.

Water temperature was only 40 degrees last weekend. When it rises to 50, anglers will have a chance to hook perch, crappies and walleyes.

Anglers have been catching small perch through ice holes at several Idaho Panhandle lakes, Smith said. He said the ice on several lakes in Bonner and Boundary counties still is thick and solid enough for safe ice fishing. However, anglers should make sure it is solid before risking cold baths.

Steelhead

If tributaries of the Snake River are clear enough for steelhead to see lures and flies this weekend, steelheaders will have a good chance of hooking one or more.

Steelhead are leaving the Snake and moving to the places they’ll spawn in April and May. Most productive streams have been the Grande Ronde, Tucannon, Walla Walla, Touchet and Mill Creek. However, they could be muddy this weekend as the result of rain.

Lake Roosevelt

Fishing has been spotty in the lower end of Lake Roosevelt.

Trollers caught a few kokanee and rainbows in the Spring Canyon area. As usual, those who troll the lake frequently and know how and where to fish caught the most.

Walleye fishing is still slow.

Trout

Some anglers believe most of the hundreds of thousands of rainbows that were flushed out of Lake Roosevelt last year are now in the big reservoir between Grand Coulee and Chief Joseph Dam.

They’ve been catching large numbers of rainbow midway between the dams, guide John Carruth of Davenport said.

Fishing has been so hot some fishermen have been boasting they’ve been hooking and releasing more than 25 every time they fish the reservoir. The limit is two a day.

Some of the rainbows weigh more than 12 pounds. A few fishermen have bragged they’ve hooked rainbows weighing up to 20 pounds. However, most of the trout are 18 to 22 inches and so fat they don’t fight as hard as lean rainbows.

Because the best fishing seems to be midway between the dams, anglers who don’t have good-sized boats with big, powerful engines don’t like to make the long runs to the most productive fishing areas.

Anglers have been launching boats near Chief Joseph and below Grand Coulee.

Fly fishing has been fair to good at times the last couple of weeks along Montana’s lower Clark Fork River, Brooks Sanford, operator of the Clark Fork Trout and Tackle Shop at St. Regis, reported.

He said small black Nemoura stoneflies are hatching during sunny, fairly warm afternoons from Superior to St. Regis.

His clients have fished Nos. 8 and 10 bead head nymphs with black bodies under indicators. Leaders are at least 12 feet so the patterns can be fished several feet under the indicators in the deeper water.

The stoneflies usually start hatching about 4 p.m. and continue to hatch until dark. They almost never hatch if the air temperatures are much below 50 degrees.

Nearly all the trout fly fishers hook are 13- to 16-inch cutthroat. Occasionally, a rainbow is hooked.

The river is clear and running at 2,940 cubic feet per second, about normal for this time of year.

Most of the small lakes south of the Lind Coulee in the Columbia Basin either are ice-free or nearly wide open. The most productive time to fish the lakes usually is soon after the ice has melted. Anglers hit the lakes hard and take most of the trout the first three weeks after the ice is gone.

Smith said bait fishermen continue to catch big rainbow and brown trout by plunking in the Spokane River above the Washington-Idaho state line.

Salmon

Above-normal temperatures have been melting snow in the Wolf Lodge and Blue creek drainages, causing the streams to rise and turn muddy. As a result, the upper end of Lake Coeur d’Alene turned slightly off color last weekend.

Fishing for the chinook salmon has been spotty, Smith said, but could pick up as the result of off-color water. In the past, when the water has been muddy, the chinooks have moved up toward the surface, enabling anglers to hook salmon in the first 15 feet of water. Anglers have been trolling at depths of 80 to more than 100 feet.

Pike

Lake Coeur d’Alene rose more than 2 feet last week, so there now is some water in the bays where northern pike spawn later. Some pike have moved into the bays and many more are expected to be near and in the bays the next few weeks.

Fishing for pike still is slow, but a few have hooked fish by fishing smelt and herring under bobbers.

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