2017 Lucky Peak Reservoir Kokanee Fishing Report

[Ntlost]

Semi stumped

OK. I want some feedback. We have fished Lucky Peak with huge success in recent years, but what gives this year. We've been 4 or 5 times...fish on the scope and we are lucky to bag a single kokanee and 2 or 3 planters. Fish four hours today and only found one kokanee...though it was a nice 16 incher. Is it the high water?

 

[Snakeriver]

Heading up now

I'll give a report on return. I know it's been slow to put it mildly. But the boys need something to do.

 

[Snakeriver]

Went up fishing this morning.

Not a bite trolling, my 11 year old has a bass on a senko worm along some rubble structure but lost the bass next to the boat. Very few fish on the finder. Some real deep ones that were hugging the bottom, likely suckers. Let's hope things pick up soon. Oh and today's water temp at surface was 65 degrees.

 

[DEALMKR]

Fishing Update Lately Please

Haven't seen much news on the thread.

Thanks

 

[Pauli]

I've made a few trips to Anderson Ranch this past week. Gets little spendy in gas coming from Caldwell out to Curlew...but at least there are loads of fish there. Had a blast there yesterday with the wife and the pup. We did well with orange at around 14 feet. Think Lucky Peak will be able to recover before the spawn??? Really starting to look bleak. It's one thing to deal with the wake boarders and the ramp traffic at Lucky Peak, but to deal with that crap.....and catch no fish..... is a big "Nope" for me.

Pauli

 

[fish4kok]

Sinking Wakeboat in June/04/2017 @ LP

I just run across this video on Youtube. That was a rough water on LP reservoir on that day. You can skip to 6:19 time line for saving your time..
luckily it happened close to the dock.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgn4l6j3OZw

 

[kokaneekevin]

Fishing Update

Went to LP yesterday (7/3). Fished from 10am to 3pm. A slow day but maybe things are picking up. The wife and I caught 5 Kokanees, 3 trout, and 1 perch. Landed all of them but only kept the 5 Kokes and 2 Trout. Kokes ranged from 12" to 13", so still pretty small. Fished the bay in front of the marina with no luck. Then went to the bay that is just to the left as you enter the channel heading to the dam. Caught all our Kokes there, long-lining with 1oz, 2oz, and 3oz weights. Using Ford Fenders and dodgers. The line with the 3oz weight with a Ford Fender and a chartreuse spinner did the best. Caught the perch on a Ford Fender with an orange spinner (2oz weight). Crazy, huh? Didn't mark many fish in the morning, but we marked plenty of fish in the afternoon. Just couldn't get them to bite with any regularity. We only had a few more bites other than the ones that we landed (so maybe a total of 12 bites between us for the day). Also tried Goose Neck Bay, but no luck there either. Anyway, we brought home some Kokes, so not a bad day. And believe it or not, it wasn't that crazy out there. Sure there were jet skiers and wake boarders, but it seemed we were all spread out and all were well-behaved. No issues at the docks. Heading to Deadwood next week for 5 days. Hope we do well there.


KokaneeKevin
16' Tracker (beige w/ green stripes, green canopy), 75hp, 4-str Merc

 

[goodclean]

Suprised

Fished Sunday 7:00 am till 10:00. Didn't catch any Koks. I did see and hear of a few landed. I did manage to land a 5.9 lb Chinook. I didnt even know there were any that large in there. I know that DFG stocked some recently.

 

[Pauli]

Thinking of headed up to Lucky Peak Monday morning...... Any more recent reports??

Pauli

 

[nepetbutler]

Kokes r biting

Thinking of headed up to Lucky Peak Monday morning...... Any more recent reports??

Pauli

pink squids. Anise/ krill pink Firecorn. 25' down . Halfway down towards goose neck on the left side. Hooked a bunch. Landed 4

 

[Pauli]

Thanks for the info sir. I'll give it a shot. thumbsup

Pauli

 

[JTM]

Great day!!!

On the water this morning at 7:00 am off at 9:30 with a limit, I was gone before the wakers woke. 25' and orange worked for me. thumbsup

 

[F-Bomb]

good not great today..but fun

Fished from the white pipe towards goose neck bay with orange wedding ring behind silver paper flashers white corn with canned tuna juice and blue herring juice. Two poles DR 20ft and 25ft. From 7am to 10am got the 6 but two were pretty small 12's and 14-15 that all went back. Did take a 17 & 19 and they were DELICIOUS! I've been filet then pan frying the chunks in olive oil with dill, lemon pepper, salt, and dried onion to a crispy brown.

Beautiful calm morning..pretty much perfect for a relaxing troll.

Quite a few boats out but everyone was pretty spread up and down the lake. I saw two fish get caught and people were really on the move so I suspect it wasn't red hot for anyone. The bite for me was pretty even with no big run our long dry spell. I normally fish all day (today I only had one license and thus two poles) and will usually hit a hot bite but today I wanted to get off the lake before the madness. By 10:30 it was ON! Once the Christians get up there and add to the Heathens there is just too much stupid for one area. Glad to get out of there as that is not relaxing or fun.

So summary is that you can now catch some kokes at LP but it isn't like last year (YET). The water is still murky and full of sticks and grass...I think another week or two and things will liven up.

 

[KokaneeJoe]

Kokes can be caught

Fished from 8:30 to 12:30 Between Spring Shores and Goosneck Bay. Caught a limit of nice fat kokes plus 2 nice trout. 25 feet Pink dodgers and hoochies. Beautiful Morning.

 

[AlbacoreShuffle]

Fished from the white pipe towards goose neck bay with orange wedding ring behind silver paper flashers white corn with canned tuna juice and blue herring juice. Two poles DR 20ft and 25ft. From 7am to 10am got the 6 but two were pretty small 12's and 14-15 that all went back. Did take a 17 & 19 and they were DELICIOUS! I've been filet then pan frying the chunks in olive oil with dill, lemon pepper, salt, and dried onion to a crispy brown.

Beautiful calm morning..pretty much perfect for a relaxing troll.

Quite a few boats out but everyone was pretty spread up and down the lake. I saw two fish get caught and people were really on the move so I suspect it wasn't red hot for anyone. The bite for me was pretty even with no big run our long dry spell. I normally fish all day (today I only had one license and thus two poles) and will usually hit a hot bite but today I wanted to get off the lake before the madness. By 10:30 it was ON! Once the Christians get up there and add to the Heathens there is just too much stupid for one area. Glad to get out of there as that is not relaxing or fun.

So summary is that you can now catch some kokes at LP but it isn't like last year (YET). The water is still murky and full of sticks and grass...I think another week or two and things will liven up.

Fished from 8:30 to 12:30 Between Spring Shores and Goosneck Bay. Caught a limit of nice fat kokes plus 2 nice trout. 25 feet Pink dodgers and hoochies. Beautiful Morning.

Sounds like things are picking up.
I have been catching ditch pickles at lake Lowell. I am so ready to catch some kok's !
Probably give it a try Wed or Thurs on this week.

 

[Pauli]

Fished Lucky Peak with a friend from 0900 to 1400. Only 1 trout boated between the 2 of us. Started at the dam, hit Goose Neck, Silver pipe, Across from the marina, abeam the park, Mack's creek and then up closer to Arrow Rock Dam. Not a heck of a lot of fish marked. Tried lots of colors, baits, shoepeg, maggots... at lots of different depths. LOTS of fishing boats out too..... Didn't see any nets flying at all. Lucky Peak is really turning out to be a bust.

Pauli

 

[F-Bomb]

re-adjust

The fish don't just disappear and if there was a major kill you would see them as floaters and would have heard about it through the grapevine. There are lots of fish in LP not any different than years past. Not marking them means the masses of fish are not schooled and are holding in the top 10ft. You pass over and they scatter away from your boat plus your fish finder only marks about three feet of area at that depth so you never actually see much of the shallow fish. Now all of that doesn't actually mean the shallow fish are on the take. They are not yet for some unknown reason. I think it is water clarity and sub surface temp consistency in that first 15ft of the water column that relates to the plankton activity. I was dead on with my WAG of when LP would start to get active and now I'm telling you that in a week as the water settles in and clears up now that the flows have been lower and steady we will see it happen. IE "it happen" is when everyone catches kokanee regardless of presentation and with a wide variety of depth. Those days are when you see the boats tightly grouped and the nets out.

Pauli, You posted that you fished what is described as pretty close to everything on LP ("damn" dam to dam including up the arm!) in 5 hours. I think that I see the problem. You must be trolling about a minimum of 10 mph to cover that much area in 5 hours! At "1.84" mph I can only fish 9 miles of LP in that time allotment. thumbsup So as Simon and Garfunkle say...slow down you move to fast...you've got to make the moment last!

oh I almost always forget......internet must say LOL

 

[F-Bomb]

forgot to ask

The biggest fish from Saturday (male) had a hint of pink on just the ends of the ventral and anal fins. Maybe just a very slight hint of his jaw forming. The smaller ones 17 and under did not at all. I wonder if the spawner year fish are starting to turn or if this was an anomaly. The big fish we caught at Anderson last week showed no signs of turning yet. Anyone else seen this so far?

 

[F-Bomb]

re-adjust

The fish don't just disappear and if there was a major kill you would see them as floaters and would have heard about it through the grapevine. There are lots of fish in LP not any different than years past. Not marking them means the masses of fish are not schooled and are holding in the top 10ft. You pass over and they scatter away from your boat plus your fish finder only marks about three feet of area at that depth so you never actually see much of the shallow fish. Now all of that doesn't actually mean the shallow fish are on the take. They are not yet for some unknown reason. I think it is water clarity and sub surface temp consistency in that first 15ft of the water column that relates to the plankton activity. I was dead on with my WAG of when LP would start to get active and now I'm telling you that in a week as the water settles in and clears up now that the flows have been lower and steady we will see it happen. IE "it happen" is when everyone catches kokanee regardless of presentation and with a wide variety of depth. Those days are when you see the boats tightly grouped and the nets out.

Pauli, You posted that you fished what is described as pretty close to everything on LP ("damn" dam to dam including up the arm!) in 5 hours. I think that I see the problem. You must be trolling about a minimum of 10 mph to cover that much area in 5 hours! At "1.84" mph I can only fish 9 miles of LP in that time allotment. thumbsup So as Simon and Garfunkle say...slow down you move to fast...you've got to make the moment last!

oh I almost always forget......internet must say LOL

 

[Pauli]

Good Morning F-Bomb.

No.... We didn't troll to those area. We spent about 40 minutes or so at each location, then jetted on to the next. Since the reservoir has been such a poor producer, we thought a little "prospecting" was in order. I think what was is going to happen is that the fish in the reservoir are going to start to turn (develop for the Spawn) before they ever school up and produce the action that we have all enjoyed over the past several years. The timing of it all may leave many disappointed. But who knows?? I think that, more than likely, we are going to have a killer of a time in the fall.....after the Spawn.... with next year's fish. Smaller....yes, but should be abundant.

We talked to several guys and gals out on the lake yesterday. The reports were mostly the same. A lot of bewildered anglers. Kudos to those of you few who are managing to boat the elusive critters. I just haven't seen much myself...or talked to anyone out on the lake who was having success.

Pauli