I took advantage of the break in WX and launched out of Ft Spokane. The drive was a little sketchy as the roads were snow covered and icy but I took my time and reached the launch at about 0715. Highway 25 is very narrow at several points due to snow drifts; its plowed but the entire lane is not available. Luckily we did not meet any traffic heading in the opposite direction. The launch was not bad; it has been getting plowed regularly (thanks DOT guys) but there was still 2 inches of snow on it. Thankfully there is a good layer of sand on the ramp and my buddy Jay had no problem launching me, we were the first boat. Only saw three other boats all day.

We headed out on to the main river and hit a couple of the same places that we have been working for the last month and a half. The water temp is right at 37 degrees so the bite was very light or all you felt was just weight. The air temp was 25 when we launched so once we started fishing we definitely had to chip ice out our rod guides. There was very little wind so boat driving was pretty easy.

We cast jigs for most of the day and ended up boating 13 eyes, kept 12. We probably had three times as many bites as fish caught but a lot of the bites were fish just hanging onto the tails of our swim baits and they let go once we got them off of the bottom. I probably should have been using a stinger hook on my jig. Green pumpkin with red metal flakes has out produced every other color so far this year. A chartreuse or red jig head has also been best. Most of our fish came out of 35-50 FOW. Not much of a jigging action is needed; we are basically just pulling the jig slowly over the bottom.

With the water dropping the bigger fish should start to move up the Arm around the end of the month; so will I.

MS

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