Previous Next

Sunday I had planned to fish Lake Stevens with my good buddy Tony but as luck may have it a trip that far south was not in the cards. Then after an on again off again on again (kids…) plan to fish Lake Samish I headed out of the driveway, boat in tow early Sunday morning. Arriving at the Lake Samish around 5:30 I was the 3rd or 4th rig to hit the water but the others appeared to be bass boat trailers so it looked like I was going to have the lake to myself.

After launching and getting the boat into fish mode I decided to fish a solid band of meter marks that was showing just off the ramp. One rod down and before I could get the second in the water the first rod goes off. The fish, a bit on the smaller side put up a serious fight and in the end remained free. The net not being ready I figured I would bounce the fish instead of netting it. Oh well, more fish in the sea but just in case, before I redeploy the gear I dig the net out and place in its place of honor. This time to help assure I get both rigs in the water I bait both and have everything ready to go before running them back out. As soon as they were at depth it was wham whamo and I was into a double. After a brief but intense fight both were netted and put on ice. Fishing just 10 minutes I’m thinking that even though I had only a few hours to fish Sunday morning I didn’t want to drop a limit and have to go home early; it was time for a change.

Although it is nice to go home with a box full of fish at the end of the day, I love to be on the water trolling whether I am catching fish or not. That said; I was out of the house, on the water and I was going to stretch my time on the water out as long as possible. I decided to fish a different set of gear as to eliminate any trace of scent and also fish without bait. Assuming I could interest the fish in my less than smelly offerings I would be able to C&R, extending my much needed time on the water. It took me a few minutes of cycling through gear before I found the magic combination of dodger and lure but once I did, with the exception of a brief tour of the little lake I went a solid 4-5 hours hooked up. A number of fish were short releases, most were shaken off while still in the water and a few were put on ice for the ride home. I have fished for more years than I care to admit and Sunday’s koke-fest was the most consistent sustained action that I have ever had.

I went through a lot of gear figuring out what would work baitless. In the end the two rigs I settled on were a gold plated dodger, UV on one side and green/red prism mylar on the other followed by a custom green and red small bladed spinner. The other rig was a copper orange tractor tire dodger followed by a custom orange and green small bladed spinner. While I normally favor shorter leaders for kokanee fishing Sunday the fish wanted a longer leader, a 14-16” leader did the trick. Nothing fancy about my trolling speed, I was running 1.2-1.4 mph or my boat’s at idle speed. The water temperature was 71-72 degrees. Although I played with the depth, the fish were most active at 28 feet. I was running the gear approximately 25-30’ behind the clip. Regarding location, that is a tough one because the whole main lake is loaded with fish. For the most part Sunday morning the active biters I got to play with were in the bay north of the WDFW launch.

For various reasons the last couple years my time on the water has been very limited. Sunday was a gift from the fish gods. With the beautiful weather and awesome fishing it doesn’t get any better. I am not 100% sure how many fish I caught. But as stated earlier for the most part I caught and released kokanee for 4-5 straight hours with doubles being the rule. As my fishing window came to a close I put the last of my 5 fish limit in the box closing the books on one heck of a morning. As a side note: while in route back to the on the launch I decided to pull a stick bait along the shore and found a huge school of perch. I kept one and let a few others go but the key here is that the perch were 7-9” fish. I was out of time but a mental note has been made and I see a little bobber and jig action coming on soon. My morning on the lake was over and I had to head back to the real world but what a morning!

G-Man

8/25/2014 4:31:00 PM

Great report as always, thanks!
PS - have you tried using perch, whole or just the carcasses, as hanging bait in your crab traps? If not, give it a try.

Whatcom Angler

8/25/2014 6:36:00 PM

What size dogger did you use?

rseas

8/26/2014 6:58:00 AM

WA, I was using typical trout/kokanee dodgers. Depending on manufacture they are 4-5". In this case the gold plated dodger was a 4.5" Skagit Tackle dodger and the orange tractor tire a 3.75" dodger. My trout/kokanee attractor box has an extensive selection of both dodgers and swing blades. With the finicky nature of kokanee being what it is you never know quite what the fish will key in on on a given day. While fishing Samish I usually do best with the 4.5" swing blades paired with a mini squid on a short leader but on Sunday they wanted a long leader dodger/spinner combo. Hey good luck and keep changing gear until the fish come out to play.

Mharri333

8/26/2014 8:02:00 AM

Sounds like a great day. I live 10 minutes away and fish Samish often. This year the fish have been plentiful but a tad on the small side compared to the last couple of years. As you mention, I find they like a longer leader than most places I have fished and some days speed doesn't much matter. On other days you have to dial it to exactly 1.1mph. I have had luck on tons of lures there but the best producer is a red wedding ring. Pink hoochies early will do well too, but I have more hook ups on the micro hoochies than the larger. If the fish are small you can drop down deeper and usually pick up bigger fish. Late in the year on the deep end of the lake you can pick up some exceptional Kokanee. Great place to fish.

Surprisingly, Lake Whatcom was putting out some better sized Kokanee this year early in the season. I usually avoid it with the pleasure traffic, small fish and mercury warnings. This spring I did what you did, pulled bait and just had a hay day. Pretty epic day all around.

Hope to see you out there sometime. Thanks for the great report as usual.

Leave a Comment:

Login

Flag

×

Why is this comment inappropriate?

Close Submit

Delete this comment? Provide reason.

No Yes

Edit

×

Cancel Save