Alan Liere’s hunting and fishing report for May 16, 2024
Fly fishing
The Silver Bow Fly Shop crew closed up shop May 7 and headed up the North Fork Coeur d’ Alene River. As things warmed up, they saw some good hatches of March browns, pale morning duns and gray drakes. They had the best luck on salmon fly and skwala foam dries.
The St. Joe is seeing a bump in water levels this week that may complicate fly fishing for a while. Dry fly fishing has been great on salmonfly and skwala dries, along with consistent March brown, gray drake and blue-winged olive hatches.
The Clark Fork remains a solid option around St Regis. Flows have bumped and dropped a couple of times in the past week, but fishing remains consistent. March browns, blue-winged olives, gray drakes, skwalas and salmonflies should cover the dry fly options. This river can be a bit fickle on bright, sunny days, so try to schedule your trip during overcast weather.
Lake Lenore, which is known to produce Lahontan cutthroat to 30 inches, has been fishing well the past couple of seasons. At Dry Falls Lake, anglers are catching trout of 18 to 20 inches fishing with chironomids below indicators.
Trout and kokanee
Badger Lake kokanee fishermen are catching fish running from 10 to 13 inches by trolling at depths ranging from 20 to 40 feet with hoochies and small flies. Some decent-sized cutthroat have also been in the mix.
Clear Lake continues to be one of the best lowland lakes for trout with quite a few big browns and rainbow of about 13 inches being caught. Anglers I talked with said they caught a lot of their fish down deep by trolling orange and black Flatfish. Williams Lake still is producing, and the 15- to 16-inch carryover rainbow continue to show. Cedar, Rocky, Mudgett, Starvation and Waitts lakes all continue to provide good fishing this season. Trout fishing in the Little Pend Oreille Chain lakes is getting better with each sunny day.
At Sprague Lake Resort, Monika Metz said anglers aren’t getting big numbers of trout, but a lot of the ones landed were large – up to 5 pounds. She indicated the largemouth bass fishing has been good.
A friend spent Tuesday morning fishing for trout from shore at Hansen Harbor on Lake Roosevelt. He said there was an immediate bite early and he caught two trout, one a 16-incher and the other 18 inches. After that, there was no action until after 10 a.m, and he quit fishing at noon with two more – a 19-incher and one of 21 inches. He was throwing Power Bait 4 feet below a sliding sinker.
Lake Coeur d’Alene kokanee are a little bigger this year – 8 to 9 inches. Chinook salmon are smaller, but there are a lot of them – mostly sublegals. Let’s hope that bodes well for the future.
Anglers on Lake Chelan are doing well on large kokanee by trolling off Mill Bay and below Rocky Point.
Salmon and steelhead
The robust return of spring chinook salmon forecast to return to the Icicle River this spring is expected to be in excess of hatchery broodstock requirements. As a result, the Icicle River will be open to retention of hatchery spring chinook one hour before official sunrise on Thursday to one hour after official sunset on June 30. This fishery will be monitored closely and could potentially close at any time if the nontreaty harvest share is met or if additional broodstock are needed. Anglers are advised to check the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife website at fortress.wa.gov/dfw/erules/efishrules/ for updates.
Chinook fishing has been good recently at Drano Lake and Wind River.
Spiny ray
Bass and crappie are biting at Banks Lake. Reports of largemouth over 5 pounds and smallmouth up to 3 pounds have been reported, as well has some crappie more than 2 pounds. Walleye anglers are also beginning to score with bottom walkers and Double Whammies with nightcrawlers. Every indication is that the walleyes are coming off the spawn, so if the weather holds, the fishing should get good in the next few weeks.
A few reports of crappies being caught have come in this week from Potholes Reservoir. They are staging and beginning to move into the dunes to spawn. The best fishing, though, will be for largemouth bass on their beds back in the sand dunes and for spawning smallmouth on the rock piles around Goose Island and in Lind Coulee. Walleye fishing is fair on Potholes Reservoir and better yet in the north end of Moses Lake. Moses Lake smallmouth have been easy to catch, as have the ones on Lake Roosevelt. Successful anglers cast tube jigs in shallow water with a rocky bottom.
Long Lake has been fair to good for walleye in the vicinity of Willow Bay. Fish of 16 to 18 inches are most prevalent.
Eloika Lake crappie are biting in the shallows, but it is often hard to find a legal 9-incher. Small curlytail jigs in light colors have accounted for a lot of bites.
Diamond Lake anglers are catching rainbow trout, but some big perch are also beginning to show. Look for weeds in about 20 feet of water.
Good smallmouth fishing is reported at Crescent Bar on the Columbia River. Anglers are trolling crank baits below the cliffs in the channel that starts at the swimming area.
Fishing along these cliffs is protected even when there is a lot of wind, and there is a free launch on both sides of the channel by the bridge.
Other species
Lake Coeur d’Alene is about a foot below full pool. Trollers are catching pike, primarily on Rapala Husky Jerks and spoons that can be fished without catching a lot of weeds.
Hunting
The Washington State general spring turkey season closes after May 31, but in Idaho the season closes May 25.
Contact Alan Liere at spokesmanliere@yahoo.com