I know what you mean. I went out yesterday and could not find one cutt. However I caught and released 10 kokanee. I'm not sure the reason you can't keep them but I'm sure someone has thought it out. It's hard to let a nice fatty go but maybe it will increase it so they can be retained. I do agree any fishing is a fun day.

perhaps the koks will make a comeback enough to allow retention someday. That is a good sign.

yea, they're lots of koks in the lake. me and my wife caught 6 of them 2 weeks ago in 2 hours of not-too-serious-fishing. fun to catch and release. they sure like to jump.

Stop fishing spinners and hoochies and you'll drastically reduce your bycatch of kokes. The cutts in Sammamish will take small spoons and mini plugs like hot shots and wee tads. Thanks for posting!

I fish that lake like twice a week and have found that the koks in there are stacked ! They will hit anything and every thing you put out and they are in the top of the water down to 45ft and will hit flat fish , spoons , brads mini cutt plugs ..............even when trolling at 2.0mph !

Go Barbless on the hooks anyway man....The lake is receiving a lot of pressure on the trout these days. Just because the fishing is good, doesn't mean we should retain our limits all the time..... I've seen a lot of trout coming out of Sammamish this year and it would be nice if we keep the populations going in there. The water quality has gone down drastically in recent years.... what we are seeing now is the result of good ocean conditions in 3 straight years. There are 3 groups of Kokanee in Lake Sammamish. There are 2 winter runs and a summer run of Kokanee. I believe the endangered run is the summer run. I have no problem catching fish when using barbless hooks. Hell... just keep pressure on the fish and they aren't going to get away too often. Even if they do, it's not like Steelhead fishing whereby you'll only get two hits a day. Have fun fishing and let the fish go. Thanks for your report.