Fishing Time: April 25-29 (Thursday – Monday)
Weather: Adventurous with rain, wind, cold, warm, and
sun. Thursday – Saturday we had constant
storms rolling through. Some hit us and others slid by us bringing breezy
conditions. Sunday was the warmest sunny
day. Temps ranged from 50s to 70s.
Moon Phase: 85% Moon
Water Temp: 64 – 69 degrees
Water Level: 3,559 ft amsl
Mudline #1 (mud to green stain): Mouth of Ticaboo
Mudline #2 (green stain to clear): south end of Good Hope
Bay near floating restroom
Best Baits: Largemouth – Jig and trailer fished in
brush as they were starting to bed, Smallmouth – Keitech swimbait on islands
with brush, Crappie – Keitech swimbait and grub in the back of canyons near
large boulders or brush, Walleye – Keitech swimbait on islands, Stripers –
trolling deep diving crankbaits in 15-30 ft of water in Good Hope Bay
Who Went: Rick Everson, Josh Newton, Dunc (Zengers
boat was Mike Zenger, Zack Zenger, Phil Bringhurst, and Mike Duncan)
We entered this years Lake Powell trip knowing we might be
in for an adventure. The weather forecast
called for a stormy weekend across the state, but Lake Powell was just on the
edge of the storm. Would we get lucky or
not? Turns out a little of both. We launched Thursday morning to great weather
and made it to our camp spot, which was the same spot my boys and I stayed at
in Red Canyon a couple weeks prior. This time we had a few cow friends to keep us company. The
storms were scheduled for Thursday night through Saturday.
After camp was setup, we hit the water just in time for the
wind to start picking up. We hid in the
back of Red Canyon and found a great little crappie honey hole at the end of a
small boulder lined cove. We also caught
some nice smallmouth off a couple islands near camp. With the wind staying
strong through the night, we let all our fish go and ate our mountain house
dinners and went to bed.
After the storm passed, we assessed the damage and found tent poles snapped, rain fly’s ripped, and torn pieces of tent. We salvaged parts from both tents to make one working tent and kept on fishing. We ended the night back in crappie cove and slayed them including a monster that Newt caught taping at 16-inches and just under 2 pounds!
We transferred them to the filet table and ate them up the next few nights for dinner. Friday night it rained all night but wasn’t a big deal as we were sleeping. Saturday was a continuation of Friday minus the Wind event. We did land some walleye and Rick and Newt landed a couple stripers. I also landed a couple largemouth bass.
It ended up being the big fish of the tournament, but after Everson’s good run it turned into a grind. The smallmouth bite was completely dead and crappie canyon quit producing. Towards the end of the day, we found a nice bedding largemouth bass that we knew would carry us to victory. I made a good cast with a roboworm on a dropshot rig, but the bass was nestled in the brush and my line caught one lone stick as it landed perfectly on the bass bed. The bass took the bait immediately and I set the hook. Fish on! Instead of trying to horse the fish in through the brush, we tried to take the boat to the fish, but before we got there the line snapped right at the stick it was caught on. Man, that one hurt! It hurt even worse when we went to weigh in and lost the tourney! That fish would have won the tournament and taken big fish honors. Dang! We ended up splitting the pot though as we won the crappie/walleye portion of the tournament and the big fish, but they won the 5 best bass, which let’s be honest, was the part everyone cared about.
Conclusion:
Lake Powell is changing. With low
water levels the canyons are small, and the mudline moves south quick so some
of the canyons we like to fish were blown out with muddy water by late April. We should either go earlier in April, or fish
further south to avoid the muddy water and get into the green stain that we
know produces consistent fishing. The
back of Red Canyon wasn’t too muddy, but a little more stained than we
like. We had to move to the south end of
Good Hope Bay to find the green stained water we like to fish.
The Keitech Swimbaits are a new favorite. They seem to have replaced the curly tail grub as the go-to bait on the boat. The jig and trailer put bigger fish in the boat on average, but the Keitech caught more fish and all species. The crankbait and spinnerbait bite were non-existent. I threw topwater every morning and evening without a bite. This was probably due to the inconsistent weather.
