Was alerted by WDFW that 486 steelhead had recently been planted in Kress so I decided to make a short trip from Vancouver to check things out. One fellow reportedly caught and lost a couple of steelhead before I arrived at 11am. Saw several steelhead doing repeated jumping and others making splashes. I made myself comfortable setting up my kerosene heater on the southernmost pier. There was an old fish hanging on in the SW corner of the lake ... pretty beaten up. Saw one large steelhead near the end of my pier. Set one pole up with an unweighted nightcrawler (works well in weedy spots some times) and the other with a bright red Brad's Wee Wiggler. Got one hit then in 15-20 minutes nailed and lost about a 10 pounder. Solid but not overly zippy. Still using my 4# test ultralight setup is not the ticket dealing with larger fish but its fun and every now and then I'm successful. Another angler used his personal float and a black woolly bear with some silver highlight. He had a trout hit, but that was it. I left at 1pm. I'm planning to return with more wigglers and perhaps 8# test and my 10' Livingston and do some slow trolling. A method that works well on Battle Ground Lake. (Hope they drop several hundred steelhead there as well.) The water in Kress is up there making launching a car top convenient right from the asphalt. Somewhat of a drop off might cause problems with a trailered boat. Premises are cleaner than I've seen at times, but you might bring a bucket of warm sudsy water to douche out the toilet area if you are brings a female along. The litter is down as well, but definitely bring a garbage bag to do a little cleanup while your at Kress. Lets get this lake sparkling!

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