Northwest Fishing Reports

Are there any active lakes for catfish on the westside of washington?

ResQ wrote:Are there any active lakes for catfish on the westside of washington?

I thought you ment felines and I was going to say any urban neighborhood. I suggest .177 pellet guns.

Fish, Catfish, I don't know of any other then some with Bullheads up north of Bellingham.

hmmm. Im looking for somewhere south sound type of lakes. I have heard of some down here with bullhead browns and fished them, but have not had any luck. I would love some fish and chip style channels, but Im thinking an eastside trip is in order for that. Just curious if anyone has had any luck over this side....

http://www.aa-fishing.com/wa/washington ... shing.html

http://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=AiC ... on%20state

Try these past threads:

http://www.washingtonlakes.com/forum/ya ... tfish.aspx

http://www.washingtonlakes.com/forum/ya ... -cats.aspx

There is a ton more info, just search the forum. Maybe we can get a catfish discussion\topic created and move some threads to where they can be more easily found.

For south sound lakes,theres plenty that hold bullheads but Harts Lake is probably one of the better producers of quality size.
Checkout the reports for Pierce County,Harts Lake
Also some big bass too for an added bonus

I've got Swofford Pond which can produces 20+ lbs. nice looking cats. I've got Kress Lake which also produces nice fish. And Vancouver Lake has blues (a bit rare, but seeing more and more) and channels that are of a nice size too.

stace

Thanks all! I will more than likely visit some of these lakes in the next month!

i fished harts lake a few times last year caught some "nice" sized bullheads but no "cats" 'n i wont eat no bullhead....heard they were "ok" to eat...if ya soaked 'em in milk for 3 or 4 days ewww....fished a couple others targeting cats that were rumored to have been planted with channels from the pet store a decade ago but nada...i HAVE done realllyy good targeting cats at the local fish monger lolol ..he doesnt have them all the time but when he does get some in theyre fresh farmed (not pre frozen) and taste pretty good...just say'n...if your jones'n

20 POUNDERS ???....WOW Stace sounds like i'll be come'n down there and bring'n my big boy tools..'n BLUES !!??!!....best taste'n cat IMO

20 pounders ???....havent done battle with something like that since the 70s in Tx...DOG

Come on Dog, Bullheads are Cats, and if taken in clean cold water in early spring, they are great to eat. I use to catch them all the time in Southern Idaho and near Colorado Springs, and Bullheads were super good.

Now, Channels, Blues, Flatheads, that is just flat fun fishing.

One thing to keep in mind is that your Channels, Blues, and Flats need pretty warm water to spawn, so we do not get a LOT of reproduction. Case in point, Sprague Lake in Eastern Washington. They grew/grow large, fast, but the population remains low. I suspect that it is a put and take fishery from them and I know of no one who has caught one after the re-hab. Hauser Lake in Idaho has some natural reproduction of Channels, but again, the population remains fairly low so I don't know how many there are.

The slews on the Columbia and Snake do on the other hand seem to have good reproduction.

We get pretty good spawning in Swofford and I know there is some in Kress. Definitely a lot in Vancouver.

Here are some pictures. The first is a Swofford Cat:




Kress Lake Cat - this is about 6 months after we stocked them:



This is a picture of Kress Lake for those that haven't seen it. It has a VERY primitive boat ramp and non-combustion motor reg. This pic shows the boat ramp - so you can see, mostly meant for car top boats, rafts, float tubes etc.



stace

Pizza hut lake in Centralia had a nice population of bullheads when I lived there. Bullheads are good eats, they are just like smaller catfish, I used to like 'em better than trout.

MAANNNN looks like the archer has 1 of his pins set on me...

"come on dog" ???? bullpucky mud fish/bullheads aint cats...YUUKKKK...other thing is i live (and we were talk'n about)on the westside of Wa....and it aint nuthin like the eastside or sth Id or Col Springs or Tx or La or the mid west or east of the Ms ect ect...we live in a cold wet hole over here where if surface temps hit 80 deg in most of the lakes i fish for more that a few weeks in a year...well the world will probabley be come'n to end so that dont matter...ya'll have 4 seasons over there...we have 2 ...the wet and the "sorta" warm season....most of our "lowland lakes" are mud puddles where over 20ft is a deep lake!!!..u gut a bullhead over here 'n their gut is full of black/green nassssty stuff..."cats" are predators that's why a good piece of FRESH cut bait or a live minnow is the bait of choice IMO and i NEVER used nasty 'ol stink bait...<shrugs>..
"i dont know what you mean by that"...from ydays post...looked like you made some assumptions about what i meant and felt the need to tell me how cool your wife is...lololol..."girly girls"...i aint got nuthin against 'em...the 1S that i've "encountered" over the years....there's been a few went away pretty quick(picture a gal with both hands full of hair theyre try'n to pull out,run'n away scream'n)...i MEANT...she didnt seem like the kind that would be pish'd off all day cuz she broke a nail..might not gag if'n she had to stick a hook in a worm....now my 'ol woman(been together go'n on 35years)she could gut/clean/cut'n wrap most any critter(better than most in here i bet) lolol...anywayssss chat ya soon im sure..DOG

Pizza Hut Lake? Are you talking about Plummer or Ft. Borst?

N/C on the broken fingernail thingy huh??...lolol

Are you talking to me?

did a while ago...

so i did some check'n and looks like i'll need my electric boat down there....is there anywhere to bk a trailer upto Vancouver?? ....i can manage without a ramp if i'm close enuf...DOG

I don't have any comment on the breaking nail thing - I'm not sure really what you are talking about.

At Vancouver Lake there is the Felida Boat ramp that charges a small fee to launch from.

OGD, do you have brown bullhead confused with 'bullhead'?

Brown bullhead are indeed a catfish. The common 'bullhead' which I think you are referring to as being something you don't want to eat is actually a sculpin.

Brown Bullhead

Sculpin

List of many fish all called "bullhead"