2017 Lucky Peak Reservoir Kokanee Fishing Report

[G3 longliner]

Likewise fish4kok!
It was nice meeting you as well.

We also did poorly yesterday. Only a few little chinooks but I forgot to get fuel so we had to leave early.
4oz. at 80 feet I believe is quite a bit deeper than we have caught them lately. I reckon that to be about 40' deep. We did not try deeper than 30' on the dw. Maybe that was our problem.

I long line with 1 oz out 100 ft should be about 18-20 ft down i went deeper but nada i dont like much more weight than that drags to much and no fight - see ya tomorrow

 

[KokaneeJoe]

I long line with 1 oz out 100 ft should be about 18-20 ft down i went deeper but nada i dont like much more weight than that drags to much and no fight - see ya tomorrow

Yup. That is about the depth we have been getting a few for a while now (15-25' dw)

 

[fish4kok]

Bag your limit early.

I long line with 1 oz out 100 ft should be about 18-20 ft down i went deeper but nada i dont like much more weight than that drags to much and no fight - see ya tomorrow

Sunny with blue sky and 78 deg. tomorrow. Best luck.

 

[G3 longliner]

Trout

Sunny with blue sky and 78 deg. tomorrow. Best luck.

Yesterday was my last day at LP no KOKS got 4 nice trout which i released I see a lot of boats headed for the Goose Neck bay area - any one catch there? time to gear up for waterfowling

 

[Physion]

lp still kicking out a few

I got two kok's, two rainbow, and two chinook yesterday. I caught fish opposite the north end of the nursery, near Birch Ck, and near Gooseneck. Just a fish here and there.

My record book from last year shows good fishing during the fall. Some limits were caught with 100 feet of line out and no weight, ie right near the surface. Most of the limits were caught from Gooseneck to the dam. We'll see how this year plays out.

 

[Pauli]

I will head up to LP Monday....which may very well be the last trip out this year. This has been a disappointing year for Lucky Peak. Although I had great success at Anderson Ranch this year. I'll make plans to return there next season. All of those who said that the Kokes would show up at Lucky Peak after the "plankton bloom".... .."after the water level drops" ... "after the water temperature rises" ....etc etc etc were just plain wrong. They never did materialize in any great numbers. Sure, there were days of very mediocre fishing, but the glory just wasn't there. Hopefully Lucky Peak is just following a 3 year Koke cycle.... I hope so.... Otherwise, this fishery could be in big trouble.

Time to turn my attention back to the Salmon in the Columbia river (which is another sad story).

Pauli

 

[F-Bomb]

maybe your not holding your "pole" correctly

Pauli...

You are right in that LP never did turn on to the traditional anyone with a Cinderella pole and corn nubbin can drag home a limit of 12" torpedoes but it was still really very solid. On average much bigger and more solid fish as well. Sure we had to put in more hours and often times run that extra pole or two that we didn't have to last year but it was still an excellent season. It ain't over yet either. If you had a disappointing season maybe it was technique?

 

[sturgeon8r]

LP turning into Arrowrock?

I have to agree with Pauli on a few of the points. We have been fishing up at LP for the last 5 yrs. Last yr and this yr were pretty disappointing. Spring summer fall. 10 feet or 30 feet. It was hit and miss. land a fish go back through and nothing. Never found the pockets of fish we use to see 3 yrs ago. Arrowrock NO one says anything about anymore. They draw it down yr after yr to about the same levels every yr. Maybe leave little more water so it does not get so warm late in the season? IMO....... That road has always been a BEAR!!!!!!. I hope Pauli is correct and it is the 3 yr cycle. Fishing is done for me this yr. Steelhead fishery is closed. You all have a great winter.

 

[Pauli]

Thanks Sturgeon8r, You have a great winter too. This will be my last hurrah at LP and then it's time to head to the Columbia and the coast for the end of the fall salmon run. By the end of November the road through the Blues isn't conducive to hauling a boat. Then it's bird season for me..... with a few days reserved for skiing with my wife. Hopefully LP will recover....regardless of what some folks insinuate on this site, the decline in the fishery is quite disturbing.

Pauli

 

[fish4kok]

Hope you catch some Kok.

I will head up to LP Monday....which may very well be the last trip out this year. This has been a disappointing year for Lucky Peak. Although I had great success at Anderson Ranch this year. I'll make plans to return there next season. All of those who said that the Kokes would show up at Lucky Peak after the "plankton bloom".... .."after the water level drops" ... "after the water temperature rises" ....etc etc etc were just plain wrong. They never did materialize in any great numbers. Sure, there were days of very mediocre fishing, but the glory just wasn't there. Hopefully Lucky Peak is just following a 3 year Koke cycle.... I hope so.... Otherwise, this fishery could be in big trouble.

Time to turn my attention back to the Salmon in the Columbia river (which is another sad story).

Pauli

Hi Pauli,
How was fishing on Monday? I'll plan to make few more trips to LP. Last year I fished in LP until the end of Nov. and did well too.

 

[Pauli]

Hey Fish4kok,

We ended up delaying until Friday. Sometimes life just gets in the way....101thumbsdown101

 

[F-Bomb]

Today was fantastic

Three guys with four poles fished from 9am to 3pm. Thirty plus in the boat and about ten on and then off's. A wild smorgasbord of fish. Finally caught a decent sized chinook (20"). Kokes all nice 15" and solid. One 17" that was a surprise after the spawn. Healthy and acrobatic. Also caught about ten small chinook and a handful of pretty big trout. All in all very active and we had multiple hook-ups over and over. Found most of them in the white pipe area and heresie theresie to gooseneck. Lots of boats at the pipe and then they all packed up and went to gooseneck as if by design. Maybe we smell bad? We didn't cause we were nailing them over and over. On the troll back to the dam we got a real nice bit of action just before the overlook after a long half mile troll without a sniff. This was like the good ole' days of LP and we never circled back over a bite. I couldn't even relax and enjoy my cigar! Cold and windy miserable for the first hour then flat out gorgeous to the end. Wonderful day!

We used a giant red/white triple teezer with 1/2 ounce of weight that did surprisingly well. Then the other three were my standard orange/silver blade wr behind a 4 wing paper flasher at 12ft to start and by the end 18ft. Trolled 2.45mph was the best action speed once the wind died down and we could be consistent.

There was a red silver metal boat that got out the net a few times while we were around them. Other than that we didn't see another fish caught but like I said almost everyone in eye sight left our area for gooseneck. We just trolled through on our way home so it is hard to say how guys were doing.

 

[fish4kok]

7 trout, 2 chinook, 1 squaw, no kok

We fish from 11:00 AM 'til 5:00PM. We caught 7 trout 2 chinook and a squaw fish (all released) and lost 2 kok close to the boat. The most action pole was the long line pole at 100' and no weight. Later I added 1.5 oz and 55' line. The DR from 13' to 20" Ford Fender + Kokabow, WR...

My trolling speed was 1.4 ~ 1.7 MPH and that was much slower than F-Bomb. I saw a black pontoon passed by gooseneck toward the dam and that was you F-Bomb. Glad that you guys did very well.

There were about 13 boats trolling around Gooseneck bay, just wonder how the other boats doing?

 

[F-Bomb]

Fish4kok,

I didn't see any other black pontoon boats Friday so I'm sure that was me. Through the summer there was another one trolling around up there that looks similar.

Got the rare opportunity to take my Dad and Uncle on a day trip and it was a treat. My uncle is a fish catching machine. It's fun to get him kokanee fishing which is kind of an unusual science of techniques. He started out being pretty skeptical about my system but on our second or third double he got the idea. Most guys don't load the entire offering with the same setup but I have supreme confidence in my go-to system. You should have seen the look on his face when I filled my corn cup with this stinky blue goo. He started right in a story about his buddy putting some secret potion on at the sturgeon hole back in the day and it turned out to be sturgeon repellent. Well I assure you he is shopping for the Mike's blue herring oil as we speak!

My Dad has been fishing LP forever and has always been a fan of the triple teezer. We bought everyone we could ever find and they quit making them so over the 30 years the supply has dwindled down to a few. Somebody started putting them out again and he bought another bag full and showed up for fishing with them. Of course I want to catch fish and want to use the system that I know works but he's my Dad and it's simply proper to respect his wishes so when he comes we always drag one triple teezer. Surprisingly this time that double sized thing actually kept up with the other poles. You do have to troll pretty fast to keep the action up (which is how I discovered that faster is better with my WR spinner lures as well).

I need to issue a public apology to whomever was in the neighborhood yesterday when we got an epic three pole tangle and I unleashed a tirade of profanity. We did land the fish but the half hour of re-rigging my perfectly setup lure/flasher combos on three poles was not worth it. When you tangle spinner/multi-blase flasher on braided line it's a real problem. It's always cut everything apart and start over! GRRRRRR

 

[fish4kok]

F-Bomb,
That's was a good fishing time with your Dad and uncle and there were many fishing stories to tell and laugh.
For myself that I believe everyone has some favorite lure or and rig setup to catch fish and they often stick with it. My kokanee fishing technique? change from time to time but my best favorite was the Ford fender 1/2 x 1/2 and the WR. Last 3 years I caught kokanee in LP with the dodger and rubber squid. But that didn't do well last couple trip at LP. I remembered that your post about the speed and the flashers the WR at trolling speed above 2 MPH. I'll try on my next fishing trip, not with the dodger for sure.

Last Friday there were couple old fishermen showed me the big kok that he just netted. I asked him how deep that he fish. He said: leaded line 75' line out and they caught 7 fish. I haven't use the lead line long time ago but they did better with it on Friday As I watch his boat moving sure his trolling speed was faster than mine.

Talking about triple teaser, I have couple in my tackle box but haven't try them yet. Two year ago my uncle gave me his big Plano tackle box for kokanee when he had cancer. His tackle box is very organize and ton of lures, if he caught kok with some lures that hot then he bought whole bunch of them, there were many tripple teaser, kokanee king, kneedle fish...and ton of WR.

 

[Tripleteaser]

long leaders

Hi F-bomb are you still having luck with the long leaders in front of your wedding rings? I know you have had some teasing about them in the past but if it works don't knock it. How long are they again and did you use them long in front of the triple teaser also last week. Thank you for sharing your info and I enjoy reading your blogs. In my book you are the Ted True blood of the Kokanee blog site. You ought to write an article for Field and Stream.

 

[F-Bomb]

...continuing

Fish4koke....
I wonder what depth 75' with leaded line actually equals? With lure and speed variables it has to be pretty hit and miss.

I only run two down riggers on my boat and when we are fishing with more poles I usually throw on 1/4 ounce at a time until we get action. It's slow and painful and seems like production is far below the DR setups. Once about every four or five trips the non-down rigger setups will be active. Way back in the day I used to be a tester for Bottom Line Fish Finders and when Armstrong bought them out they brought along Cannon and I got in on some of that action as well. Hard to ever go back once you've operated with a good DR setup. Last year the fishing was so good you never needed more than two poles and two down rigger setups but this year they were harder to come by most of the time so we have put out the extra long line setups in an effort to improve the odds with shear numbers. On the days when things are really hopping I can't keep up with more than two setups plus I don't really care about actually "limiting". We used to also do a bit of line stacking with the DR but that just became a general PIA hassle. I'm there to fish and enjoy the day and want it to last like a fine cigar! A couple of these tasty critters per week is really plenty. That leads me to another little bit of comedy from our Friday trip. Pretty early in our day we had a really good bite and fight but when it got within eyesight there was no silver flash and I lamented. Once it was netted I instantly released the 22ish" trout. My Uncle was actually somewhat put out and his face was saying WTF! I had to explain to him that we consider those non-edible and that isn't really what we are here to get.

All summer long there was one small metal boat that had two older guys in it and they never left the mouth of robie and spring shores area. I saw them get plenty of action most days. I think they were leaded line experts!

I've tried a bunch of various triple teaser sizes and colors but pretty universally the red orange outside and white inside has been our number one color. We used to fish them no bait but with this berkley powder and spray on dw40. It created a goo that was horrible to get off of your boat but the fish loved it. Then I started putting a corn nub on the single hook and if you kept it small the action was still good and we still caught fish. Friday we used this 2 1/2 inch long thing that had a huge single hook. Corn didn't hurt this ones action! I still put things back quite a distance on my leaders from the swivel. Minimum 48" and I have also had great luck clear out to 60". It's kind of challenging to land the fish because they are way off still when you've run out of space with the pole and lure. It's kind of a practiced madness between fishing and netting on my boat. It looks like a disorganized cluster but there really is a technique and when the fisherman and the netter all perform properly we have a pretty high land rate. Good Lamiglas poles and treble hooks with barbs are also a contributing factor. The yelling and scrambling is all part of the fun!

Tripleteaser...Thank you for the very kind comments. I am glad you enjoy the posts and I have a lot of fun telling stories and comparing notes with people in this format. I'm no Ted Trueblood but I do understand and very much appreciate his perspectives and your compliment. I believe that a calm fall day on LP with friends and family is exactly what he was talking about concerning nature. A buddy of mine calls it "living well to be well". I'm really working at it!

 

[crappieslayer]

Fished Lucky Peak this afternoon for 2 1/2 hrs. Caught my first trout in less than 3 minutes. Ended up catching 2 trout, 1 Chinook and missed or lost 3 other fish. Caught them on 3 different rigs but all were 8 to 12ft deep and my speed was 1.8 to 1.9. Stayed pretty close to the dam area.

 

[fish4kok]

Thanks

F-Bomb,

I have no answer for the depth of 75’ leaded line, I agree with you “with lure and speed variables it has to be pretty hit and miss.” Leaded line dyed with color, each color is 10 yards (30’) so 75’ long is two and half color. In mid ‘90 we fished at Dworshak reservoir, a fishing boat with couple old fishermen passed by us, old fisherman told me :”one and half oz. sinker and 2 color. After we follow his setup, we caught kokanee. Then we fished in Deadwood reservoir we always use 1.5 oz. banana sinker and start from one and half color (45') and later slowly release the line until we get action, often we caught fish in 2.5 color and seldom we fish more than 4.5 color. Until now I’m not sure how deep of the 2.5 color line + 1.5 oz. sinker. Some old friend told me “if you use the protractor measure the angle of the line then I’ll tell you how deep our lure is…” Yeah! Sure he can use trigonometry function for the depth solution but that not accuracy because “with lure and speed variables it has to be pretty hit and miss.” After we use the DR I really like it because I know what depth my lure at...

Thank you for the info. that how you use tripple teaser. Next trip I’ll take my uncle's tackle box and try the tripple teaser, needle fish, kokanee king etc…I’ll let you know the result when I change the setup and trolling speed. Hopefully my wife will stay up fishing rather than take nap on the boat...

Last year the fishing was so good and I fished until Nov. 30th. It’s good because LP is not very far from home so a day fishing on the boat was a bless. Other fun was listen to the talk show radio about the poll, the nominee, the debate, the racing between Mrs.Hillary and Mr. Trump to the WH. But most of all it was a good fishing last year at LP.

 

[crappieslayer]

Fished Lucky Peak yesterday near the dam. Barely got my line in the water and caught a trout. Fished for two hours and ended up with 2 trout, 1 Chinook, and missed or lost 3 fish. All were caught between 8 and 10 ft at 1.8 to 1.9mph.