Lucky Peak Kokes

[kodiak1]

We fished Brownlee a few days ago, around the cemetery, and couldn't buy a crappie--OK, a couple, but that was it. No one else could connect either. They were in there, but nothing would work.

 

[King Tut]

Don't give up on L.P.

fishing early today and caught 9 in three hours. Kept 5 koks that were 16" plus. It was in a spot I never fished before. Maybe I need to quit going to the old fished out spots and find new.

 

[F-Bomb]

Same here... once we dialed in pretty consistant...they were busiest at 15ft and trolling speeds up. Spinners with as much yellow corn as you can get on it and some steelie stink. (the stink and corn combo seems to be the magic..because it was on with several of our regular offerings..but super hot with the spinner combo and more hook ups) Did the best blasting along windward. Also suffering a weird rash of releases without hookups. Can't get my buddy to swim down there and see what is up! We'd be done in a few hours most days if we hooked 90% of what hits. Weird

 

[TrackerTX17]

The Bite Is Back

Fished LP from 7 to 11 this morning hooked 11 and landed 7. All 14 to 18" in front of Sping Shores. Used green/red wedding rings and white hoochies with red fire corn. No downriggers, used dipsy divers and leaded line down 15-30 feet. Unfortunately won't be back until the end of July because of work commentments.

 

[luckykoke]

Fished Lucky Peak Saturday July 3. Hit it early and had two newbies on the boat that are now hooked on Kokanee fishing. We landed 16. Threw back 6 and had these by 11am.
Lucky

 

[F-Bomb]

5th of July...Fishing is officially HOT at LP.

Two limits of nice, bright, fired up chromers right at 15" plus. Half that many wiggled off at the boat. 20 ft and up all colors of triple teasers with stink and corn going 2mph-2.3mph. They are on to the larger size spoons now. Equals better bite and hook rates. Finally got dead calm and it was really ON! FUN

 

[diatonic]

Still HOT!

July 16th. Kokanee are still hitting hard at Lucky Peak. Fished this morning from about 6:30 am til 1:00pm. Trolling near Spring Shores where everyone else was . Doing about 2 mph, using beer cans, a snubber, and a Rocky Mountain Tackle Assassin I was hitting them hard. Live worms for bait on both hooks. Wedding rings seemed to do well too. Worms were bringing in bigger kokes than the fire corn. A great morning.

Trolled about 15 to 20 feet down. Got a couple 17 inchers, some 15", some 13".

One of the 17":

 

[Blueback]

Thanks for that report. Might have to get up there. We fished Anderson last weekend and had a field day. Didn't get any over 13' but man, that Reservoir is just full of 12-13' kokes. They wouldn't touch my Dodger/Squid set ups on a downrigger but my gal was just killing them on a lead line & beer can with a green/red wedding ring - no scent and double corn. I finally switched over to her set up when the ratio was about 7 to 1 and we filled the cooler. Hooked most at 15-18 ft. They were biting just as well at 11am when we left as they were at first light just after 6am. We launched out of Curlew ($5) and fished straight across just off shore in about 90 ft.

 

[kodiak1]

Just got back today from L.P., and had to work for a limit a bit more than last week. The big guys were all coming from 25'. The 20 and the downrigger caught all smaller fish. Caught on 19" lunker, my first 19 of the season, and he was getting fairly pink. More so than I have seen with the big guys. The clock is ticking!! Mike

 

[Blueback]

We hit LP at first light Sunday morning off Spring Shores and did really well until about 8:30. Found a really nice concentration of fish but I guess the net was coming up too often and enough boats horned in and they dispersed. We moved further down toward the dam and found another little pod about 9:30 but my gal was snake bit all morning and shook off a few more at the boat.

We hung it up about 11:00 but got out of there with three nice 16"+ and given how pink they are getting I gotta agree with Mike and say there ain't much time left for the big guys. One of the bigger hens had well developed eggs. Still looking for Mr. 19" this year.

We hit all the big guys at 25-30 ft off the downrigger and a lot of the 11-12"
up around 15 feet, on the lead line especially before sun-up. Only one hit off the dodgers and squid - everything else on the beer cans and wedding rings. Nothing on the Apex either. Same pattern we found at Anderson last week. I've just about given up on kok-a-nuts in LP. Usually fish them behind a Sling Blade but LP fish don't seem to excited about 'em. Anybody else have any luck with those things? Nick

 

[kodiak1]

Interesting about what you were catching them with. Our experience was just opposite. All the big ones except one came off a sling blade (UV) and a micro hoochie with Pautzke Nectar soaked shoepeg. The one exception was with a Jack Lloyd and w.r. However, now that I think about it, the sling blade was at 25 and the pop gear was at 20. But, they sure seemed to like the sling blade. Go figure, huh? Mike

 

[Blueback]

Most were hooked on "medium sized" pop gear with a silver bladed wedding ring, double shoe pegged with Pautzke's Gel Krill. This is the gear we had on the first two hours of daylight and did well. When things slowed a bit, I started mixing things up and experimenting like I usually do (Purple Haze Hot Spot flasher/uv Apex, straight triple teaser/Berkley maggot, straight mini flatfish no maggot, etc).

I'm usually not surprised when I don't hook much during experiment time because the fishing is usually pretty slow. I usually have on the tried and true pop gear or mini hotspots or Sling Blades with mini squid or hootchies when the bite is hot. My question wasn't so much about the Sling Blades which I know are effective, but more the Kok-a-nut and Sling Blade combo and why they don't seem all that excited about it. I know Kok-a-nuts are good in other places - just don't know why they seem ineffective @Lucky Peak. Maybe it's me.

At any rate - will be out there tommorow morning straight out from Spring Shores at first light. Maybe Friday morning too. 14 foot yellow Mirror-craft with a black 25 horse Merc/electric trolling motor. If you're out there swing over and say Hi/compare notes. Might be alone if I can't convince my neighbor to rack out at 4:30. Thanks for sharing your tips/tackle-helpful. We found fish at roughly the same depth at you but did have a little success at 30ft as well. Thanks Mike. Nick

 

[King Tut]

We did good on Kok-a-nuts up to about three weeks ago. Ever since then I have been catching them on squid. Saturday the 17th we caught 18 nice ones and Sunday 10 big ones 16" plus and then it turned off at ten. We fished till the ski boats started playing lets see how close we can get to your boat. Those guys are either jerks or don't know any better. This weekend is probally the end for L.P. Are the fish in good shape at Anderson?

 

[Blueback]

Maybe I'll hang on to the Kok-a-nuts for another year. We hit Lucky Peak Friday morning. Fished from about 5:45 too 9 a.m. We picked up one 17', a 16' and about a half dozen in that 11-12' range on squid/flashers and pop gear w/ wedding rings. The seventeen's jaw was kyped and he was somewhere between pink and spawning crimson. Yeah, there ain't much time left.

We fished Anderson two weekends ago and they were dime bright. We were thinking of trying to get back there one more time too. If it's the same conditions your going to ice a cooler full. Hooked most @ 15-20 ft.

Yeah, those idiot boats really push it sometimes. Had a boat load of kids rip by our bow, full throtle last season. Could of touched them with a spey rod. Lucky I was armed with Lamiglas and not Ruger. Morons.

While there are still a few people reading this thread - does anybody know anything about crappie in LP? I've heard rumors they are in there and we've farted around a little looking for them but no luck. Heard they hang in one of the creek arms. Any info would be welcome.

 

[kodiak1]

Never heard of crappie. I have another puzzle. For the last few years, I have been graphing large schools of fish in the narrows, close to the big bend area, at approx. 150 feet in about 160 175 foot depths. No, I am not picking up bottom stuff, because I have watched them move to other areas. Thely are typically close to the sheer drop-offs, but I am not picking up dual readings either. Any clues?? Mike

 

[BorntoFish01]

I've never heard of crappie being caught in Lucky Peak, and the only warm water specie stocked by the state since 1968 are smallmouth....

Couldn't find any data to indicate if they'd be native to the Boise River but I doubt that.

 

[Blueback]

Guess crappie was a longshot. I don't know Mike. I graph a lot of stuff hanging just off bottom all over that res. and we spend half the day wondering what it is. What would hang at that depth and suspend off bottom like that? If memory serves, F&G has tried planting Chinook in there and some other large salmonid hybrid - Splake? I think you can go to the IDFG website and see what they have tried in there over the years - a few of them failed - or did they?

I know my buddy nails big whitefish fishing deep in Pend Oreille. Would NPM's hang that deep? I hear there are channel cats in there but then again, I believed there were crappie in there too. I was thinking of pestering a biologist and picking their brains about these deep dwellers are. If I find anything worth reporting I'll pass it along.

I did catch a koke last year that was raked pretty good by something that had some decent teeth. Looked a lot like a cut-plug herring that comes back after getting hammered by a big ocean spring with no hook-up......Makes you wonder.

 

[Mojo]

When I was a kid we used to catch perch in LP. Just a thought...

 

[kodiak1]

I'm sure some of the deeper blips are Northern Pike Minnows, and perhaps trout, but I can't imagine either of those hanging at 175'. They did plant lakers years ago, but it was not successful. Oh well, nothing like a good mystery! Well Blueback, I guess we have to have something to think about while trolling out there. Mike

 

[kodiak1]

L.P.

Trolled LP this AM and limited by noon. Had to work for them a little harder. Seemed to be all over. A couple of boats were doing well on the surface, we caught most of our fish at three colors on lead core, and the two downriggers were slower, but the 25 outproduced the 20. When we arrived the kokes were jumping like crazy between the two docks. Must have been 50-60 breaking the surface at any one time. Then they just shut down. Obviously gathering at the spot where they were planted, but it seems earlier than last year. None of the larger fish caught this morning had any color to them, as they did last week. Go figure. Mike