Pardee 6/6-6/13

It was my first trip to Pardee. I liked a lot about the lake and the maintenance done to keep the place up. The fishing was spotty, with a lot of dink kokes and a few planted rainbows. The main thing I noticed was the water temperature. It was 75 F on the surface in the river and 73 F in the main lake near the dam. The trout were lethargic fighters. The kokanee often got dragged around the lake because they couldn't trip the DR release. I watch my pole tip pretty religiously, so I'm pretty sure that some of the kokes didn't even make it twitch. Main conclusion: water temperature cuts back on the oxygen content of the water and the fish don't like it. Kokes at 30 ft. OTW. They bit on just about every lure I tried. Local word is that they are not likely to plant kokes at Pardee any more because they have a pretty good natural spawn there and there are too many kokes to allow more growth.

Im surprized you said river temp was warmer than lake. Did you go all the way to log boom. Water is always coldest there and right now there could be a 10-15 degree difference from the lake cuz of all the snow melt. Pardee is sometimes hit or miss, but I have seen and caught many very nice fish from Pardee. Just lately it doesn't seem too good. Esp the kokes. 2 or three years ago Pardee had one banner year when we were catching limits of 14-15 inch kokes by 9:00.

Old School,

Yes, that's correct...the water temp in the river was 2 degrees warmer than in the lake near the dam...on the surface. Source: Lowrance HDS7 finder. I couldn't believe it. We did go all the way to the log boom. The two trout I caught were a couple pounds, but didn't fight very much. I'm thinking it was because of the warm water reducing the oxygen content.