Hunting & Fishing
Ice fishing
It’s ice fishing time at scores of Washington and Idaho lakes.
Many lakes are covered with 4 to 6 inches of fairly solid ice. Ice on numerous Eastern Washington lakes, particularly in the Columbia Basin, still is too thin to support anglers safely.
Mild weather this week softened ice covers on many Eastern Washington lakes. Ice on some may not be thick and hard enough for safe ice fishing this weekend.
Most popular lake, despite the poor eating quality of the rainbows, is Fourth of July, south of Sprague. Anglers have been drilling holes in the ice for two weeks.
It’s been difficult to catch more than two legal trout at Fourth of July because so many 15- to 22-inchers take anglers’ bait and few of the 11- to 12-inchers are biting yet. The daily limit is five trout, only two of which can be more than 14 inches.
Hog Canyon Lake, usually one of the most popular winter lakes, still hasn’t produced more than a few rainbows. Indications are that large numbers of cormorants descended on the lake soon after rainbow fry were released. Cormorants are among the most efficient of the fish-eating birds.
Both Williams and Hatch lakes in the Colville area have been yielding rainbows to ice fishers. The lakes are covered with several inches of ice.
A few ice fishers have been catching perch at Sprague Lake. The ice is adequate in some areas but too thin for safe fishing in others.
In Idaho, most of the ice fishers have been after northern pike and perch. They also catch rainbows at several lakes.
Generally, the ice at Idaho lakes is a little thicker than at Washington lakes. Jeff Smith, owner of the Fins & Feathers shop at Coeur d’Alene, said ice ranges from 4 to 6 inches thick. However, he pointed out, there are thin spots and they’re difficult to detect because they are covered by several inches of snow.
Ice is good at Fernan, Upper Twin, Gamble, Avondale, Round and the lakes in the Boundary County area, he said. It’s still not safe at Cocolalla and at some lakes adjacent to the lower Coeur d’Alene River.
Fernan has been popular with ice fishers, who have been catching perch, trout and an occasional pike. The perch are 7 to 10 inches. Most anglers have been fishing jigs baited with maggots in 22 feet of water.
The perch in Upper Twin are 7 to 8 inches long and are so numerous an angler can fill a bucket with them. At Avondale, however, the perch population may be small. Smith said he caught 10 perch and a crappie at the lake a few days ago. The perch were 11 to 12-1/2 inches.
Ice fishers have been using as many as five tipups at Hayden, Thompson and Killarney lakes to lure pike.
Upland birds
Scatter-gun hunters in both Washington and North Idaho have only two more days to hunt pheasants and forest grouse.
Hunting pressure on both the species usually is light at the end of the seasons. Neither the pheasant nor grouse populations have been large this year in either state.
Idaho’s quail season will also end Sunday, but the partridge season will remain open through Jan. 15.
In Washington, you can shoot both quail and partridge through Jan. 15.
Largest pheasant populations in Eastern Washington have been along the Snake River breaks and in the Pomeroy area. Spokane-area hunters, hoping to hunt pheasants in 6 or more inches of snow, have been disappointed. There has been little snow on the breaks and hunters have encountered muddy hillsides.
However, pheasant hunting has been fairly good, especially for those who have good dogs. Some hunters have been taking limits nearly every time out.
Nearly all pheasant hunters have given up pursuing roosters in North Idaho, Smith said.
Quail hunting isn’t as popular in the Northwest as it is in eastern states. Consequently, quail hunters can have brushy draws and other good quail cover to themselves.
Pressure on Hungarian partridges has been light in both Washington and Idaho, despite the fact the birds are numerous enough on agricultural land near the Snake and Columbia rivers.
Few hunters have been going after grouse in recent weeks. In fact, interest in grouse has virtually died since the ending of deer seasons.
Waterfowl
If the weather continues relatively mild, ducks and geese are not likely to change their daily routine. And that means hunters may continue complaining that ducks don’t leave big water to feed until just before the end of shooting time. However, they’re likely to see lots of geese during shooting hours.
The waterfowl seasons of both Washington and Idaho will end in three weeks. The region’s hunters hope the weather doesn’t turn too severe; if most of the big lakes and reservoirs freeze over and if deep snow covers the harvested corn and wheat fields, the birds will move down the Columbia and to places they can live comfortably.
Hunters hope thousands of ducks will move to the Columbia River in the Ringold Springs area. Most ducks, however, have remained in the northern Basin.
Nevertheless, the Columbia, in the Ringold Springs area and in the Umatilla area, will be dotted with hunters’ decoy spreads this weekend. Although ducks have been slow to move to the Ringold Springs area, enough have shown up to provide mediocre to fair hunting.
Numerous gunners have had excellent shooting in fields adjacent to Long (Spokane) Lake the last couple of weeks. More than 10,000 Canada geese have been resting on the lower lake and flying out to fields to feed in the mornings.
Because all of the fields are on private property, getting permission to hunt is a must. However, a few hunters have bagged geese by pass shooting as the birds fly from the lake to the fields.
Nearly all launch areas on the lake now are blocked by ice. Smith said most of the mallards apparently have moved out of Idaho’s Panhandle. However, there are still enough geese in the region, especially on Lake Coeur d’Alene, for some hunting.
He said hunters haven’t been shooting limits. They’re bagging one or two each trip, if they’re lucky.
Steelhead
The relatively mild weather brought out fairly good numbers of steelhead anglers during the Christmas holiday period. Sitting in a boat for long periods wasn’t as uncomfortable at it was when the temperatures were in the teens.
As usual, anglers had fair to good fishing in some areas along the Snake River and along some tributaries.
Some Snake tributaries, including the Clearwater and the Grande Ronde, may be off-color this weekend as the result of snow melt.
Most productive spots should continue to yield steelhead. They include above the Little Goose Dam, the lower Tucannon, the confluence of the Snake and Clearwater, the lower Clearwater, mid-Snake from Asotin to the Ronde’s mouth and the Ronde.
The most productive steelhead fishing lately has been along the Snake’s tributaries. Biologist Joe Bumgarner of the Washington Fish and Wildlife’s Snake River Laboratory said that anglers averaged five hours per steelhead along the Touchet, three hours on the Tucannon, five hours on the Walla Walla and 12 hours along the Grande Ronde in the vicinity of Bogan’s and in the Oregon section of the river.
He said fishing near Little Goose Dam has been productive, anglers averaging 16 hours per fish.
Trout, lakes & reservoirs
A few fishermen, fishing from shore and boats, continue to catch 2-to 3-pound rainbows at Roosevelt and Banks lakes and at the Potholes Reservoir.
Surprisingly, Rocky Ford Creek, a fly fishing-only, catch-and-release lake north of Moses Lake, has been attracting a few fly fishers, mostly on weekends. The spring creek rarely freezes over.
Rock Lake about 50 miles south of Spokane is providing some of the hottest fishing in Eastern Washington. Trollers, dragging large Rapala plugs, have been catching limits of 12- to 15-inch brown and rainbow trout.
Rock remains ice-free except when temperatures dive below zero. The launch area is at the south end of the lake.
Salmon
Few anglers trolled for chinook salmon at Lake Coeur d’Alene during the Christmas holiday period, Smith said.
For most of those who did try, fishing was slow. Trollers caught a few salmon near Mica Bay and Driftwood Point. They trolled green flashers ahead of green minisquids in about 100 feet of water.
Whitefish
The Columbia River between Priest Rapids Dam and the Vernita bridge continues to be one of the most productive spots for good-sized whitefish in Eastern Washington.
Most anglers fish from shore, casting maggot-baited flies into the river and allowing the bait to drift along the bottom. They add split shot to their monofilament line to get the bait down.
Most of the whitefish are 12 to 15 inches long.