Navajo Lake June 6th & 7th

[OCF]

Fished Navajo Lake on both Saturday and Sunday.

Saturday - arrived on the lake around 7:00 a.m. and started out fishing for Kokes. Three of us hooked around 20 kokes and kept 10. Fished straight out from the dam on the cliffs between the San Juan and Frances arms of the reservoir. Graphed some fish on the finder, nothing like you would see at Flaming Gorge. All fish were caught at a depth of 25 feet and the best lure was a green & white Luhr Jensen dodger (large) with a white RMT squid. The boys wanted to try for some bass, so we stopped the koke fishing at 10:00 a.m. and went fishing for Bass until noon. Ended up the day with 10 kokes, one brown and one LM bass. All of the koke were between 1.25 & 2 pounds. Nice fish, considering that you can keep 12 of these per day.

Sunday - the Boys wanted to try for something else so we went up the Pine Canyon arm and fished for crappie - I am not sure how many we caught, but it was a bucket load. For the most part they were all good sized. We fished until noon for crappie and then went koke fishing. We caught 4 Kokes fishing the last 1.5 miles of the Pine Canyon arm before getting to the marina. Stopped fishing at 2:00 p.m. Used the same tackle today as the previous, fish were at the same depth. Probably graphed fewer fish in this stretch of the reservoir.

 

[HiTechKoke]

Now that's a full range of fishing covering all of those species. I hate to think how much more tackle I would be forced to buy if I got into bass and panfish! Tks for the report.

 

[Flyguy55]

Thanks for the report . My wife is bring the grand kids 11 and 8 with her from Fla today . I'll be doing some panfishing too .
I'm curious , were there very many boats trolling for kokes ?

 

[OCF]

There were maybe one or two other boats in the area we were fishing that were trolling - they were a little further out in the middle. I did not see anyone else bring in a fish, so I am not sure what they were trolling for?

 

[Flyguy55]

OCF Next time your down you might try for northern pike after the Kokanee.
this is a report from another forum


Re: Lake Navajo in New Mexico
We troll up pine river for the pike but I'm pretty sure they are in all the rivers. Just troll a bomber B about 30 feet from shore in fairly shallow water. We usually keep the bot in 15 to 20 feet of water and just hammer them. We catch 20 to 30 of them a day.
We fish for the kokes in the morning. We troll 35 to 50 feet down but only about 30 to 50 feet back. We use koke killers and uncle larry's spinners tipped with corn. ext time your down you might try for northern pike .

 

[OCF]

Very good info - thanks. May make another run down there this fall.

I was amazed for the first time on the lake we were able to catch four different types of fish & 1/2 of them in fairly good quantities. This could turn into my second favorite fishing hole - Flaming Gorge being the first.
To bad it is a six hour drive to Farmington for me.

I noticed alot of big fish laying on the bottom - is there Lake trout in the reservoir?

 

[Flyguy55]

I caught a 12" trout one time fishing for kokes. It was kind of bluegrey with spots . I thought it might be a lake trout or brookie. It was not colored like either that I'd ever seen.I've onlycaught Lake trout in the Artic . I released it and later talked to F&G . They didnt think Lakers had ever been planted in the lake. But the Pike hadn't either . They came down the river from CO.
I've seen them too.
Divers talk seeing huge catfish . But I've marked big fish very deep.
Next time your down maybe we can try and find out .

 

[Flyguy55]

Lake trout in Navajo

I saw a couple F & G biologists today at the lake. I asked if Lake Trout were ever planted in Navajo. They said some were planted in the 60s but they thought it was not successful
I think the big fish we mark down deep might be lake trout that some how survived .
Might be worth some jigging to find out