Alan Liere’s Weekly Hunting and Fishing Report

Fly Fishing

Silver Bow Fly Shop reports good fishing on the North Fork Coeur d’Alene last week and says the mid to lower St. Joe is holding up very well. Morning hours should be subsurface with nymph or streamer rigs, but as things warm up, small mayflies will find fish.

There has been a lot of evening bug activity on the Spokane River. bobber rigs have been good, as have steamers.

Salmon and steelhead

There has been some excellent steelhead fishing on the Grande Ronde this week near Boggan’s Oasis. A few Chinook are also being caught. The Methow River is now open for mandatory retention of up to two hatchery steelhead.

The water level and temperature are both conducive to good fishing on the Snake River now, but a friend who fishes weekly near the Memorial Bridge with shrimp and bobber has had a number of skunks sandwiched between productive outings. Clearwater steelhead are spread out in the system. Don’t be afraid to move around until you find a concentration. Steelhead over Lower Granite are coming at an average rate of about 2,000 fish a day.

Chinook fishing in the Hanford Reach has been very good with the best catch rate at White Bluffs, Ringold, and Vernita. The fish seem to be glued to the bottom in deeper water this year. Overall, anglers fishing in the Hanford Reach are averaging two Chinook per boat with nearly eight angler hours per fish. Bank anglers are picking up a few Chinook each day at the Ringold Access area. The run is anticipated to exceed 200,000 fish to the Reach this year, so there are lot more fish to catch through Oct. 22, when the season ends.

The Chinook fishing below Wanapum Dam has died, but quite a few boats are catching fish above the dam on the west shore.

October is prime time for coho fishing in Western Washington where anglers should continue to find fish in the marine areas. Later in the month, the best action for coho likely will be in the rivers. These include the Nooksack, Skagit, Cascade, Stillaguamish, Snohomish, Skykomish, Wallace, Snoqualmie and Green.

Trout and kokanee

Five friends fishing above Hunters on Lake Roosevelt recently said they all caught limits of rainbow in short order, almost all between 19 and 21 inches. They were trolling muddler minnows with no dodger on five colors of leaded line. Elsewhere on Roosevelt, anglers fishing out of Lincoln also did well, but the majority of their fish were the smaller 14-inchers. A similar report came from the Seven Bays area, and at Fort Spokane bank anglers were even doing well on the smaller fish.

At Rufus Woods Reservoir, walleye fishermen are catching some quality fish and those dragging jigs near shore have seen a lot of 2 1/2- to 6-pound triploids.

This is a perfect time for fall action on Lake Chelan. Priest Lake macks are also on the prowl and a little easier for the freelancer as they aren’t as deep. Trolling is almost always necessary at Chelan, while Priest Lake anglers can catch fish by deep drop-shotting.

Lake Pend Oreille kokanee are still biting but they are entering their spawning mode. Kokes on Lake Coeur d’Alene are still bright and the bite has been excellent. The water needs to cool some before Chinook fishing takes off again.

The catch-and-release season on Amber Lake is attracting a lot of attention, but friends who fished there this week said they could only catch the smaller cutts. There are plenty of big fish in the little lake, though.

Spiny ray

Bass fishing has been good at most Eastern Washington lakes with smallmouth mentioned most. Lake Spokane is usually good for numbers, but the fish are generally on the small side. A number of good-sized northern pike have been caught there recently, however.

This should be the perfect time for Coeur d’Alene pike, but the bite has been off and on. The recent winds make things difficult and water temperatures are still on the high side. When things settle down and cool off, throw Rapala X Raps, big spoons or plastic frogs near the weeds.

The Pend Oreille River has come up quite a bit from low summer levels and smallmouth fishermen are taking some quality fish on a variety of plastics. In Idaho, the smallmouth population is booming in Priest Lake. Look for rocks and throw tube jigs into about 20 feet of water. Most of these fish will be less than 2 pounds.

Banks Lake continues to kick out limits of 13- to 17-inch walleye with the occasional larger fish in the mix. Most anglers are trolling a Slow Death rig with a nightcrawler, and adding a Smile Blade seems to increase the number of hits. The Barker Canyon area has been good recently.

Potholes bass are very active now – both largemouth and smallmouth. Crawfish colors in both plastics and cranks are taking a lot of fish.

Other species

Fall razor clam openings on Washington beaches have been indefinitely postponed due to increased high concentrations of marine toxins.

Hunting

Chukar hunters along the Snake River are striking out in some areas such as the Wawawai Canyon but finding birds near Penewawa. Quail hunters are finding good numbers of birds throughout Eastern Washington but the best hunting will be in December and January.

Grouse hunters in both Washington and Idaho are having their best season in years. Ruffed grouse are numerous down low around water, and the dusky (blue) grouse are at higher elevations. A friend hunting in the Curlew Lake area brought home a limit of the big blues this week. The Colville and Waitts Lake areas are also mentioned frequently.

The Washington State pheasant season opens Oct. 24. Senior hunters during the early opener reported seeing more – but not dramatically more – birds than last year. They did say, however, that there was a lot of cover and many of the roosters were still uncolored.

Most of Idaho will open for waterfowl hunting on Oct. 17, excluding Area 1 in southeast Idaho, which opened Oct. 3. The upcoming season looks to be excellent nationally with record numbers of ducks available for hunters. The regular 2015 Idaho pheasant season also gets underway Oct. 17 in Area 2 and 3, excluding Area 1 in North Idaho, which opened Oct. 10.

The Washington waterfowl and general deer seasons open Saturday. Prospects for ducks look good for the opener, but hunters will most likely not find water in some of the popular scab rock ponds in Eastern Washington. As always, Columbia Basin lakes and wasteways should be good.

The jury is still out regarding the effect of the recent blue tongue outbreak on deer populations in parts of Eastern Washington and North Idaho. On my own property, sightings of whitetail bucks have decreased dramatically since early September.

Contact Alan Liere at spokesmanliere@yahoo.com