For whatever reason, you mention macks and they say "stay on bottom" and "ring the dinner bell". Well maybe that has worked for some but the key to this lake in my opinion is active suspending fish and bait + speed. Yes i have caught them off bottom but have caught 5x the snags than i have fish, trolling so close to bottom.

If you have seen the lake at 10% capacity you will see it is a vary barren lake with some old forest that was cleared before filling the res. Some bushes up on the north end and a few higher water level stumps on the nw point. Which equals not much general cover. But this lake has a major river flowing its whole length and many major points.

With rising and falling res levels this river has carved many features in the north end of the lake at the tip of the major 80ft+ drop off(bout a mile north of the wishpoosh launch). Creating a sorta huge hand print in the sediment/sand which is really the many courses the river has flowed through. These channels or "fingers" are excellent spots for big macks. Even though the lake is full the cold water sinks and still creates currents which flow down these fingers and off the huge drop into the first main lake depression which hits about 260FT at 100% capacity. Those channels of water consistently pay off for us when the res is 80% or more. This area is about 120ft deep and the fingers can run as deep as 180ft as you cross them. The highpoints seem to be the sweetspots and as the water just levels off to 120.

When the res water is under 70%-60% the fingers and flats are pretty shallow and havn't been so good to us. So we move to the drop off, just a little south of the fingers/flats. The drop is sharp and sudden on the east side and more gradual as you move west. And creates a huge 3/4 mile long arch or crescent moon of drop off. Another excellent spot to jig or troll. Keeping your baits just off the edge of the drop off. Jigging right against the sheer cliff is good too.

We almost (key word almost) never go deep no matter what the lake simply because suspenders are active fish and more likely to take a bait. So for the most part, almost ever time we go we look for 120-130ft of water preferably paralleling the shoreline on a relatively steep slope and set our gear at 85 and 100. 85 on the pole closest to shore. And troll at idle speed which is barely 1mph on our gps. And i swear speed affects the fish in this lake the most. No joke, a breeze will come in or wind will change to a little stronger and your speed will change and they shut off like a switch. No idea why this is so critical but on days with no wind we absolutely kill them. One weekend we fished a day and a half and landed an estimated 147lb of macks. Sounds unlikely but it was our best day out. And every day that has been calm, no matter what part of the year, we have done well so speed is crucial.

Finally baits. We like plugs and spoons. Best plug so far has been rapalas and yozuri non diving/shallow type. Anywhere from a 4" pin minnow to the 12" jointed and ghost minnows. Size really hasn't made much of a difference. Color is the most important. The lake is dominated by kokanee and some rainbows, few cutts and some burbot. So we pick those colors the most except for the odd yellow/red combo in spoons and plugs that always work well. Also many macks have burped up 3-4" neon green and blue minnows in big quantities. Not sure if these are baby kokes, but i don't think they are because mostly the spring caught macks burp them up and kokanee spawn in aug sep. But could be.

Macks aren't really that easy to catch, they can be quite challenging, mostly the reason i like to fish for them so much and the very reason i have about 150 plugs/crankbaits and spoons, too addicting LOL. And conditions change so often there that you constantly have to change lures and colors until you find something they like. Then you can fine tune what they want and wind up having a really nice day or go home thinking of a different color or style of plug or spoon for the next time out. Yeah they might not fight the hardest or taste the best, but you always know they are there and they are big, its just a matter of how good a fisher you are to temp them into your net.

If you want crome bright macks that taste the best, fish in early spring through June. After that they start to change to the common brown look and their diet changes or something and the meat changes color.

BUT i strongly suggest releasing 99% of your catch. This lake drains very low every year and can have major kill offs with cold winters since it usually doesn't fill back up until spring. Although the fishing can be good at times, there are not a lot of macks in the first place and never will be. Mackinaw also don't grow very quickly. So if you have to harvest some, keep the 5 pounder and release bigger ones so we continue to have Cle Elum as we know it.

The wishpoosh launch is accessible down to 38% res level if i remember correctly. After that i would use the north end launch until about 32% then you will have to launch at the beach. No beach launch unless you have 4x4!
Good luck.
Hope that helps a bit.

FFF

Mike Carey

7/26/2008 8:41:00 PM

FFF first showed me this fishery I think what, 8 years ago? I was sworn to secrecy and I can now reveal that all my old secret lake reports that have lakers in them are from this lake. FFF has just written the bible on Cle Elum lakers. I can't agree more that we really need to protect this lake and not over-fish it. It has nowhere near the numbers that lake Chelan has. So if you want to keep lakers, go to Chelan where THERE IS NO LIMIT and WDFW would just as soon be rid of them (like that's ever going to happen!). But if you want to fish on one of Washington's jems then check out this lake. Thanks FFF!

FlyFishnFreak

7/27/2008 12:32:00 AM

Hey Mike, thanks. Been a pretty good lake to us for about 10 years now. Not as good as it was a few years back probably because of the very low levels the past few years. But still my favorite lake bar none. Our record still stands at 16.6 for me and 15.5 for my girlfriend and 14 for my buddy john. For some reason we haven't seen the 12+lbers lately or anything close to our records. Did see an 18 last year. And i have been noticing a few more boats but hardly anything to mention. So i figured since there was an extensive article on Cle Elum in a popular magazine i might as well give up some of my secrets also. So Mike we definately should try to have a redemption trip up there this spring for some cromers, and maybe drag along Carl too!
So drop me a line Mike and anyone else that has questions or would like some help with Cle Elum email me Spawn_out@yahoo.com

Mike Carey

7/28/2008 10:52:00 PM

Mike, With the actually wonderful Mac report on Lake Cle Elum, I thought that even though those Mac's might not have the contamination as those in Lake Chelan, it might be wise for you to post this web site. It's the State of Washington Dept. of Health. I retired from the Dept. of Ecology 4 years ago and worked with this sort of stuff and there are a lot of fish that have a lot of problems. This might be of "help" in making a choice of catch and kill or catch and release. It does me. Remember, the bigger the fish, the bigger the load of contaminents. Sometimes smaller is definately better!! http:www.doh.wa.gov/ehp/oehas/fish/consumpadvice.htm

From a retired Ecology employee.

Palmer

8/17/2008 4:49:00 AM

I've really enjoyed this lake for the last five years. There are some nice Macks and we usually only keep one. At an average of 8 - 10 lbs we don't need more than one fish and release the rest.

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