Dunc's Fishing Adventures

Deck the Halls with 20-inch Cutthroats

2011-12-26T14:21:00.003-07:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.
Weather: Clear, calm, 30's
Moon Phase: 5% Moon
Location: Strawberry Reservoir
Bait: White tube jig tipped with meal worm or minnow
Who Went: Hunt and his cousin zack and uncle Darren, John, Newton, Me
My buddy Hunt came in town for Christmas and wanted to hit the ice like the old days, so I tried to make it an after Christmas party and invite the whole crew, but most bailed on me right at the end. We still had a pretty good turn out and had a lot of fun. We’ve had very little snow this year and were surprised to find the road going around Strawberry Reservoir is still accessible with only a few inches of snow.In my 10 years of ice fishing Strawberry I’ve never seen it where ice is capping the entire reservoir and this road is still accessible. We took advantage and headed around the lake all the way to Renegade Bay. It was my first time ice fishing there and we were excited to fish new territory. Once we had our gear set up, it didn’t take long for everyone to start catching fish. Hunt’s Uncle Darren had the hot hand to start the day catching 8 fish in the first couple hours.I struggled to get going, but as usual made my late push at the end.Bobber John was steady all morning pulling in a fish here and there.Hunt, Newton, and Zack had a tough time finding their groove, but all landed around 4-6 fish.We fished in 20-25’ of water using standard white tube jigs tipped with a minnow or meal worm. Both baits worked with similar success. We caught 3 cutthroats over the slot limit at 23 inches, and 3 rainbows in the 14-17 inch range.

We had a Bald Eagle that was watching us the whole time looking for a free meal. We placed oneof the rainbows that Darren took home for dinner out beyond us a ways to see if he would fly over and pick it up, but he never did. It looked like I was going to be the Fisherman of the Day (FOD) with a one fish lead, but John tied it up at the very end with 11, and then quickly took the lead with 12. Everyone was ready to go so I told him I conceded, but left my rod in my hole as we packed our gear. John showed great sportsmanship as I wasn’t even paying attention to my rod, and hesitantly, he let me know that my rod was bouncing. I grabbed it and reeled in number 12 and tied John for FOD. It was good to get old friends out on the ice and reminisce the good old days, when we were the fastest in our sport and held every manly record Jordan High School ever had. We had some good laughs!

Bluegill December

2011-12-09T10:06:00.003-07:00

Fishing Time: 10:00 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.
Weather: Partly cloudy, no wind, 40's
Moon Phase: 99% Moon
Location: Utah Lake tributary
Bait: Largemouth - Christmas colored curly tail, Bluegill - worm and hook.
Who Went: John, Me

I had a half day off yet again, and figured I would go on another fish hunt with Johnny Leach this afternoon. I was thinking we should try and find a few whitebass for the freezer this time since I’ve already got a shelf full of bluegill. We started on the Jordan River below the pump house at Utah Lake where I know a little spot that is fed by warm springs and usually attracts fish during the colder months of the year. The fish ended up being there, but so were the fishermen. I was disappointed to see so many people there and once again another secret is gone! The fishermen were catching tiny crappie one after another, but none were big enough to eat. I wasn’t in the mood to combat fish so we moved on to the Lindon Boat Harbor in search of some whitebass. The harbor is iced over with this recent cold snap and there were already a few holes pre-drilled for us when we arrived. We fished for 15 minutes with no bites, and that’s all it took to figure out the white bass were not active, so we left the harbor and headed back to our old reliable bluegill spot where we have been knocking them dead. This time I decided to make a sneak attack when we first got there and throw something that might entice a largemouth to bite. My first cast with my Christmas colored (no pun intended) curly tailed grub landed me a nice 13 inch largemouth!I casted a few more times and was able to land two more small ones. I guess the fish were feeling the Christmas spirit! They soon figured out we were there and the hits subsided. The bluegill fishing was the same as last week with one on almost every cast. I would try and pull my worm away from the smaller ones this time and patiently wait for a bigger one to bite. A couple times I enticed another largemouth bass to hit, and was able to land one more on a worm. We only kept about 15 of the biggest bluegill along with two largemouths, and it was a good thing, because John ended up leaving before filleting them and any more would have been a nightmare to do myself. I added three more zip loc bags of meat to the freezer for a grand total of eight large bags! I think it’s time to have a bluegill fish fry!

Deep Freeze on the Bear River

2011-12-04T16:25:00.002-07:00

Fishing Time: 8:30 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.
Weather: Snow, no wind, high teens
Moon Phase: 71% Moon
Location: Bear River
Bait: Spinners, rapalas, swimbaits, tube jigs, streamers, glow bugs
Who Went: Rick, Josh, MeRick called me and wanted to hit the Bear River as a last ditch effort to catch some big browns this year. He’s been there twice already during the spawn, but with the overwhelming flows on the rivers this year, both times he went were a bust. The flows were 3 times greater than average this fall and he said the river was high, fast, and really muddy both times he went. The rivers have finally settled down for the year, so we gave it a shot. It was snowing during our drive up and the high for the day was in the teens. With no wind it wasn’t too bad, but the river was feeling the cold and had almost completely iced over! The areas that had moving water looked good, but we never did see a fish.One of Ricks fishing buddies, Josh, came with us and even though the fishing was miserable, the trip was fun as usual with good talk and a lot of laughs! Hopefully we don’t get pounded by snow this winter and can actually fish some rivers next year. 2011 was crazy! The Great Salt Lake rose over 5 feet in 2011, which is a record, but just one of the many records that were broke this year. Don’t get me wrong, we need the water and I’m glad the lakes are full, but we could have spread it out over a few years instead of getting it all in one. It’s time to start looking forward to ice fishing.

Filling the Freezer with Panfish

2011-12-03T15:01:00.030-07:00

Fishing Time: Fri. - 1-2 p.m., Sat. - 9 - 11 a.m.
Weather: Cold, calm, clear, high 30's
Moon Phase: 62% Moon
Location: Utah Lake
Bait: worms on hook, no weight
Who Went: John, MeI had a half day off yesterday, so I talked to Johnny Leach and mulled over a few areas we could go to wet a line for a few hours and land some fish. I’m on a new kick to fill my freezer with fish after realizing that I eat more fish than any other meat and have always bought it from the store, all while releasing the fish I catch myself! Duh!

I was telling John about years past and how I’ve done really well at Utah Lake during this time of year for big bluegill and figured it could be a good start to filling the deep freeze with a few fillets. It didn’t take long to talk John into that idea, as bluegill is his favorite type of fish to catch. We decided to hit my secret bass hole I found this spring that ended up not being a secret at all. I tried to fish it multiple times through the summer only to find 4 boats smashed in there.I figured it might be full of bluegill this time of year and I ended up being right. We caught them almost every cast! They weren’t small either, measuring 7-10 inches!We kept 32 of them and hit the road early to make sure we had enough daylight to fillet them all. After filleting them, John asked me if I was down for round 2 the next morning. I thought about it and figured why not fill the freezer while the opportunity is there!

Today was more of the same. I did land one small largemouth which was nice for a change.We harvested 60 bluegill, which filled one 5-gallon bucket, and kept us busy with the fillet knife for about an hour and a half. When we were done we had 2 overfilled gallon baggies full of fillets. We divided them up equally and with all the fillets I got today, plus the ones from yesterday, I had enough bluegill to make about 6 large family size meals for the deep freezer!True to tradition any time I fillet fish at my house, we always treat Duke to one fish and watch him suck it down in about 3 seconds. That dog will eat anything!I told Cari my goal is to become a fish hoarder and have nothing but fish in our big freezer in the garage! She didn’t go for it!

Missed Opportunities in Arizona

2011-11-19T16:23:00.001-07:00

Fishing Time: night for catfish, morning and evening for bass and bluegill
Weather: Sunny, clear, highs 75-77, lows 55-60
Moon Phase: 50% Moon
Location: All American Canal, California and Arizona border
Bait: Live bluegill for catfish, jerk-baits for bass, worms for bluegill
Who Went: Jonathan, MeI had the opportunity to go down to the warm state of Arizona for work from November 13 through the 22nd. I flew into Phoenix then drove 3 hours southwest to Yuma, Arizona. The lucky part about this trip is one of our subcontractors (Jonathan) was local and an avid fisherman. His favorite target is the flathead catfish that are found in most lakes and rivers in the area. He doesn’t just go for any catfish though; his goal is to break the state record! Unfortunately I was there in the off season for big catfish, but he told me he still catches them occasionally. I tried to fit in some bass fishing after work the first week, but only had a couple nights where I actually finished work before dark and was able to get in about 15-30 minutes of actual fishing.I caught tons of bluegill and largemouth, but none of the bass were very big. My camera decided to crap out on me after 8 years so most my pictures are pretty poor taken from my camera on my phone. One spot I fished right after work was below the diversion of the Colorado River into the All American Canal. This canal sends what looked like 60-70% of the water in the Colorado River straight to California! The river above the diversion is impressive, but the river below is a third the size. The diversion ran down multiple concrete shoots before turning into one big canal.The next night of fishing I had about 30 min. before dark and fished further down on the All American Canal where you can literally just drive the canal looking out the window sight fishing for bass and bluegill. It was a lot of fun, but got dark way to fast. I caught a lot of bass, but they were all small in the 1 -1 ½ lb range.I was working at the Yuma Proving Grounds Army Base and they do not work Fridays, so Jonathan and I planned a 3 day straight fishing adventure for flathead catfish. The way Jonathon fishes for these flatheads is at night! He shows up to the canal Thursday evening just before dark and catches a few bluegill to use for bait. He uses live bluegill for bait! Then he fishes all night Thursday for flatheads until the sun comes up on Friday and he begins fishing for Friday night’s bluegill. Once he has a few bluegills he goes home and sleeps until just before dark. He repeats this process through Saturday night and then sleeps most of Sunday before waking up and dressing out the catfish he caught over the weekend. He told me he has done this every weekend all year long with the exception of only a few where he had other commitments. Dude is a freak and I loved it!

Thursday night came and Jonathon asked if I would go to one of his best bluegill holes and catch us some bait before fishing all night because he had a few things to take care of at home. I told him no problem, because let’s face it, I had nothing better to do besides sit in a hotel room. This spot was below another diversion they called Laguna Dam.

Jonathan warned me that this was a tough time of year to catch bluegill, but that this was a good spot. I fished hard during the hour of daylight I had left and caught channel catfish and largemouth bass, but was only able to land one measly bluegill for bait. Let me tell you, having the pressure to catch your bait before fishing is something that is very new to me and I loved it! I’ve never been more focused on catching a bluegill in my life! I would miss a hit and it was devastating!

I met up with Jonathan at his favorite catfish hole with my one bluegill and he set up one rod with my bluegill and another with a frozen bluegill that he uses when he doesn’t have live ones.After that we sat there until 4:00 a.m. without so much as a nibble! It was all I could do to stay focused, but not Jonathan, I could tell that he knew what the possibilities were at any given moment. It reminded me of my lake trout fishing experiences where most people I take want to call it a day, but I stay focused as ever because I know it only takes one hit to catch the biggest fish of your life! Just after 4:00 a.m I couldn’t deal with it anymore and called it quits, so Jonathan did to. I went home and slept until my internal clock made me get out of bed at 10:00 a.m. Crazy as I am, I got up and went bass fishing all day, only to return to my hotel room and receive a phone call from Jonathan telling me he’s heading out to catch bluegill for tonight’s fishing! That said, I headed back to the canal where we fished for bluegill until dark. It was tough fishing again, but I was able to land two and Jonathan one, so we at least had a few bluegill for bait.

Friday night brought more of the same and we didn’t get a single bite! This time we stayed for the long haul and fished for bluegill and bass in the morning until around noon.By this time I was exhausted and Jonathon began talking to me about Saturday nights fishing. In my mind I was thinking, there is no way I’m staying out all night again to watch a rod that never moves. So I ditched out and drove to Phoenix instead, to visit my buddy Shain Jorgensen who moved down there a few years ago. When I woke up at Shain’s house on Sunday morning I had a new picture message on my phone from Jonathan that read… “why did you leave lmao!” with this picture attached…I couldn’t believe it! All that time spent with no bites and he lands a 25-30 lb catfish the moment I leave! This got my juices flowing again and I told him we had to try one more night! I left Arizona on a Tuesday, so Monday night before leaving I talked him into going out for one last chance. We started fishing around 5:00 p.m. for bait and were able to land a couple bluegills for the night. Once it was dark we threw two rods out hoping for one last chance. At 8:30 p.m. I finally had a bite.I grabbed the rod and it was bouncing vigorously. I asked if I should set the hook and he firmly told me no way! He directed me to free spool my line and let the fish run, so I did. I free spooled my reel and wow did the fish run! He must have taken 50 yards off the spool when Jonathan told me to slow him down with my thumb until bringing him to a complete stop. Once he was stopped we let him run one more time breaking him down to a stop with my thumb again. By this time I couldn’t stand it any longer and felt I had to set the hook. Jonathan told me to wait for one good tug and then to set it. I felt a few minor tugs and then my line just stayed taunt with no play. At first I thought the fish was just holding it in his mouth, but after 30 seconds I realized something wasn’t right. Jonathan shined his flashlight down into the canal and my line was heading straight down the bank into some big rocks! Still not worried with 80 lb test, Jonathan tried to get my line untangled until he fell flat on his butt as the strong line finally gave and snapped in half. My spirits were at an all time low, and to make matters worse, Jonathan began telling me that based on how the fish was running he felt it was a good catfish in the 30-40 pound range! I was in pure depression. We still had one pole left with a live bluegill and I patiently waited until around 1:00 a.m. but the next bite never came. I can’t get the big fish out of my mind, but with more work planned in Yuma next year, I don’t expect it to be my last chance! The bass fishing was fun and the bluegills down there are huge! All in all I had a good time, but can’t wait for another chance to join the 40 pound catfish club!

Musky Skunk

2011-09-21T10:43:00.002-06:00

Fishing Time: 5:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.
Weather: calm, clear, 70's
Moon Phase: 39% Moon
Location: Newton Reservoir
Bait: EVERYTHING
Who Went: Rick, Me

Hit Newton Reservoir tonight from shore with Rick. Arrived at 5:00 p.m. and fished until dark. I threw spinnerbaits, buzzbaits, swimbaits, tube jigs, mepps spinners, blue fox spinners, musky killers, jointed rapalas, rapalas in chartreuse, silver, gold and firetiger, storm perch swimbaits, and Rick even used his fly rod for awhile. I retrieved them at every depth and speed including dragging bottom, right on top, middle, lower, higher, faster, slower, and just plain deadsticking it, and none of it seemed to matter. Towards dark we started seeing musky's swirling around and I had two follows on a swimbait, but no bites for either of us. I was so depressed I couldn’t even pull the camera out to take a picture. I caught one 8-inch largemouth on a 6-inch swimbait. It seemed the swimbaits got the most attention, but still caught nothing! That makes a total of 4 trips to Newton reservoir with zero bites from musky. Flat out depressing!

Wiper Fishing Turned Adventure

2011-09-09T10:16:00.008-06:00

Fishing Time: 4:00 p.m. to 12:00 a.m.
Weather: Breezy, partly cloudy, 70's
Moon Phase: 93% Moon
Location: Willard Bay
Water Temp: 74 degrees
Bait: Kastmasters, curly tailed grubs
Who Went: Rick, Jason Willard, MeWe went to Willard Bay tonight in search of some boiling wipers and hopes that Rick could check them off his species to catch list. Jason Willard from Rocky Mountain Anglers joined us in our pursuit and we were on the water by 4:00 p.m. From the reports we read prior to going, the boils hadn’t been starting until right before sundown and that ended up being accurate. We spent the first 2 hours motoring around the north dike trying to find boils or fish on the finder. There wasn’t much going on anywhere other than two lonesome channel cats that Jason landed dragging a chartreuse jig with a worm.

We cruised out to the island to bounce some jigs over the top hoping for a wiper or walleye, and as we drifted over the edge of the island, the once blank fish finder suddenly went black with fish. There were fish everywhere and so I warned the others. I was the first to yell fish on, but after a quick zing on my line the fish was gone. Next it was Rick’s turn and he had his on for a little longer than I did before it decided to spit the hook. Finally after a long fight, I was able to put one in the boat and it was a nice one and my personal best at just under 5 pounds! We all had a few more hits while the mayhem was going on, but unfortunately no more fish were landed and they eventually moved away from us.It started getting close to dark so we decided to go boil hunting. We trolled the shorelines and found a few wipers surfacing for shad, but never could find a consistent boil to land any fish. It was disappointing as the sun went down and we were left with one fish and a bunch of missed opportunities. Rick will have to make a return trip to get wiper off his species caught list.

This is where the trip went south. Rick has always wanted to try fishing for musky after dark, and due to our failure at Willard he had an itching to prove his night time musky theory right. We made the jaunt up to Newton Reservoir at 10:00 p.m. Once there we threw topwater buzzbaits, spooks, spinnerbaits, but all to no avail. I told Jason that even though we caught nothing and won’t get home until 2:00 a.m., at least Rick can finally give up on this night time musky business and we won’t have to go through this again! To make matters worse, after I dropped Rick off at home, my pathfinder overheated and Jess had to come get me at 2:30 a.m. I had to replace my fan clutch, two belts, and my water pump for $500 bucks! That was one expensive wiper!

Another Monster Trout at Flaming Gorge

2011-08-26T15:53:00.007-06:00

Fishing Time: Thursday through Saturday morning
Weather: Calm mornings, afternoon thunderstorms, high 80's
Moon Phase: 8% Moon
Location: Flaming Gorge
Water Temp: 70 degrees
Bait: 7-inch tube jigs
Who Went: Rick, John, Me

My buddy Rick booked a guided fishing trip 1 year ago with Captain Jim up at Flaming Gorge and scheduled it for this August. The day finally came and since we were fishing with Jim on Thursday, we figured staying and fishing through the weekend was a must. Johnny Leach drove up late Thursday night and fished with us on Friday and Saturday.

Fishing on Thursday with Jim was tough to say the least. We had a few active schools on sonar in the morning that we thought for sure would bite, but didn’t. Finally by mid-morning Rick hooked the first bite of the trip and his rod went major bendo! Captain Jim immediately announced that this lake trout was probably over 30 pounds. Rick fought the fish for what seemed like half an hour before it finally gave up and Jim landed it. The lake trout looked as long as a shark, confirming our assumptions that it was well over 30 pounds. Sure enough Jim weighed the fish and the scale wavered between 36 and 38 for a final of 37 pounds! This is the biggest lake trout I have ever seen landed and Rick moved into the number one slot for biggest fish in our lake trout fishing crew!After releasing Rick’s fish, the rest of the day with Captain Jim did nothing but kick our asses! We fished for 5 more painful hours with Rick getting one more bite and that was it. Our brains were fried, and my back hurt so bad I thought I might crumble in half! We gave it all we had in our tanks, and for the first time ever fishing with Jim… I got skunked! Rick and I drove back to camp and sat in our camp chair for over an hour without moving. By the time we gained enough strength to get back on the water, an afternoon thunderstorm pushed us off the lake and we weren’t a bit sad about it. We were beat! We made a quick tinfoil dinner and hit the sack. I think my eyes were closed before my head hit the pillow, and when I woke up in the morning I heard the sweet sound of John sawing logs. He made it in around 1 a.m.We all jumped in my boat and headed out to find the fish on our own, but I have to be honest, Friday almost seemed like a wasted day for me. I was so exhausted from the day before that I just couldn’t get motivated enough to focus on fishing.After the morning was over and I still didn’t know what a bite felt like, my motivation fell to an all-time low. We decided to jump out of the boat and take a swim to rejuvenate our senses. After that we bass fished. The bass fishing is completely crashing at Flaming Gorge due to the burbot eating all their eggs and food. All we caught were 4-6 inch baby bass. We took a couple and put them in Ricks crawdad trap and threw it out on a rocky shoreline to sit overnight.By evening I finally felt enough energy to fish and Rick and I put in a good hour of focus while John ran to the marina for ice. In a span of 2 minutes we had fish all over us down on the bottom and started getting hits like crazy.I had 3 and Rick had 2, but we missed every one of them! The hits were very light, but we observed our jigs after the frenzy ended and sure enough there were teeth marks all over our new jigs. Now it was getting frustrating! We went and picked up John from shore and headed back out to the same spot.The fish were still there and within a few minutes John was hooked up. It wasn’t a monster, but any fish at this point was exciting! It was a good fighting 7 pounder that got John on the board.After landing Johns fish the sun went down and darkness was fast approaching, so we headed for camp and I showed John how to fillet his trout. We cooked some steaks and again my eyes were closed before my head hit the pillow. Woke up early on Saturday and the sun came out quick, and immediately stole our energy. Our motivation was down and our focus was slipping. The fish were still moody and we found ourselves taking more dives off the boat for a swim than dropping lures down to fish. By 11:00 a.m. we were physically and mentally exhausted! We collected the crawdad trap that was set out the night before and we had about 15-20 in there.We quickly cut off their tails and gave them to John as an appetizer to his lake trout dinner. Loaded the boat on the trailer and packed up camp. It was now official… I fished hard for two and a half days straight and got skunked! Mack fishing can seriously kick your trash, but once you know the feeling of having a 30 pound lake trout on the end of your line, it doesn’t matter, you just want to come back for more!

Lake "X"

2011-08-12T08:32:00.003-06:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m.
Weather: Clear, slight breeze, 80's
Moon Phase: 97% Moon
Location: Lake "X"
Bait: Weedless, weightless senko (green and white)
Who Went: Me The story behind Lake X goes back to a canoe trip that Hunt and I took 8 years ago down a river in Utah. As we were canoeing down this river we met a guy in a very tight area that I didn’t believe you could even access without taking a canoe like we did down the river for miles. He proved us wrong and the reason he was down there peaked my interest. He told us there was a pond not far from where we were that held a lot of largemouth bass up to four pounds. Since that time I have long forgotten about the area because I just couldn’t figure out an access point without crossing over private property. Then I started fishing with Innovative Rick (nickname) who I told about Lake X. Rick has a funny way of figuring out how to make things work, hence the nickname. He got on google earth and started searching and before long he had a route mapped out. A few months back we tried out the route and even though we had to cross a canal that went 1 inch below my waders along with parking in an area that could or could not be private property, and hiking over a few hills I finally made it back to Lake X after 8 years. Rick brought his pole and even though the weather was still cold in June (weird year), Rick had a largemouth bass landed on his 3rd cast.

So, now that you know the history behind Lake X, I went there for the first time armed with my rod and tackle today and had a blast.I didn’t catch a ton of bass, but the way I was catching them made it worthwhile. The shore access to this pond has become very limited with the growth of summer and I regret not taking my float tube. There are only a few areas to shore fish because the reeds are thick and surround almost the entire pond. The moss is thick on the waters surface, which is normal for August on most small lakes and ponds, but I could hardly throw anything into the lake without getting snagged. After fishing the shorelines with no success for almost 2 hours, I tied on a weedless, weightless, senko and started throwing it into the thickest areas of moss I could find. That’s when I finally figured out where the bass were. I had been wasting my time fishing the main body of the pond, the bass were tucked up underneath the thick moss beds that surrounded the shore. The biggest bass I caught hit the senko before it even made it through the moss bed, almost like a topwater bite.I was shocked at how shallow the bass were, but even more bewildered at how thick the moss was in the areas I was catching them. I made a couple casts into the thickest willow I could find and hooked two bass that I could not pull out before my line snapped. Next time I go I will be prepared with stronger line! Here is a picture of my most productive area. I was dropping my plastic worm right through the mossy mat surrounding the logs. Needless to say I had a blast and this won’t be the last time I go to Lake X, but I must admit it’s a struggle getting the motivation to cross that canal and all the other variables that come with fishing this place. It’s location will remain a secret and will be forever known as Lake X on my blog! I don’t want someone to find this spot and tell everyone they know about it. It could be fished out very quickly!

Catfish Quicky at Utah Lake

2011-07-30T16:25:00.003-06:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 10:30 a.m.
Weather: partly cloudy, no wind, 80’s
Moon Phase: New Moon
Location: Utah Lake
Bait: White bass and worms
Who Went: John, Johns brother in-law, MeMy buddy John was heading down to Utah Lake today to kitty cat fish so I thought I would drop in and surprise him and throw out a line for a couple hours. I pulled up to the lone tree on the west side of West Mountain at around 8:00 a.m. They already had one channel cat on a stringer. I rigged up two rods, one with a bobber and a worm using a 3 foot leader, and the other with an egg sinker and white bass meat. The bottom fishing with the egg sinker was by far the most successful method out-fishing the bobber 4 to 1. We caught about 8 channel cats along with a few white bass to mix it up. John took them all home to filet and eat. Catfishing from shore can be one of the most enjoyable and non-stressful ways to fish.

I drove by the “L” at Lincoln Beach on my way home and it’s almost completely submerged with water. I snapped some pictures to document it.I also snapped a few photos of the Lincoln Beach Boat Ramp because I’ve never seen it so high. The south dike is almost under water. I can remember only 6 years ago being in a major drought and people couldn’t even launch a boat at this ramp! Amazing how times change so quickly.

Devin's First Fishing Trip with Dad

2011-07-29T08:20:00.003-06:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m.
Weather: Calm, clear, 90's
Moon Phase: 2% Moon
Location: Utah Lake
Bait: Big Kastmaster (snagging carp)
Who Went: Devin, Yah-Yah, Me

Today was my Friday off and Cari gave me a hall pass to head to the lake, so of course I took her up on the offer. I wasn’t sure where to go or who to invite, but decided that my son Devin needed to get out on the water at least once this year. He’s still a little young to get the concept of fishing, but he loves anything and everything outdoors and especially loves his dad’s boat. I decided to keep it simple and take him somewhere close. American Fork Boat Harbor at Utah Lake is about as close as it gets and it ended up being a great choice as we were the only ones at the boat ramp at 8:00 a.m. Devin was really excited to get on the boat and absolutely loved the boat ride over to the bubble up near Geneva.I thought we could anchor up and throw out a couple lines for catfish keeping it very simple. I found out that nothing is simple with a 2 year old that wants his daddy to give him 100% of his attention all the time.Luckily Yah-Yah (my mom) joined us to help me out or it probably would have been a total disaster. She also took all these pictures to help us remember Devins first official fishing trip. So, after an hour of giving my full attention to Devin and only squeezing in a second here and there to rig rods, I finally had two ready for catfishing. I casted both rods out and thought okay now it’s time to relax, yeah right.Now Devin wanted to reel in the poles.He also took a liking to dad’s new rod and reel that cost him about $450. He started leaning over the boat and dipping the pole in the water and we all know the outcome of this fun game. I took the rod from him and you would have thought the world had ended.I realized that the only way Devin was going to see a fish was to snag a carp. They were all over the surface and the catfishing was obviously not going very smooth. I rigged up a big kastmaster and 5 minutes later I had a big ugly carp in the boat for Devin to look at. He thought it was pretty neat, but he wouldn’t touch it to save his life! Can’t say I blame him.After about an hour and a half on dad’s boat, Devin’s busy little mind was feeling trapped by the confinement of the boat, so we headed to shore and loaded it back on the trailer. Devin was my big helper as I loaded the boat and he supervised me the whole time.We spent the next 3 hours playing along the shores of Utah Lake and had a picnic at the campgrounds.Devin had an absolute blast playing in the American Fork River and throwing rocks into Utah Lake.While I was watching Devin play along the shoreline, I noticed these big black pods of minnow’s right next to shore. On closer inspection I noticed they had little whiskers and were indeed tiny little bullhead catfish. I couldn’t believe how dark black they were.I tried to catch one, but they would swim away when I approached them. This is the best photo I could get.After lunch and rock throwing Devin was worn out, so we called it a day. His eyes were closed before we could leave the marina. I can’t wait until my other two fisher buddies (kids) are old enough to come to the lake with dad!

Full Moon Tournament at Starvation

2011-07-15T15:40:00.002-06:00

Fishing Time: 7:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m.
Weather: Slight south breeze, clear, 50’s
Moon Phase: Full Moon
Location: Starvation Reservoir
Water Temp: 73 degrees
Bait: jigs tipped with worm, trolling crankbaits
Who Went: Rick, MeI finally had a chance to fish in one of the tournaments that my club puts on every year and it was one that I’ve always wanted to participate in, The Full Moon at Starvation Tournament. I’ve heard good things about Starvation during the summer on a full moon and now was my chance to see for myself. The tournament went from 7 p.m. Friday night to 7 a.m. Saturday morning. Rick was my partner and we both went into the tourney blind having never fished Starvation at night. We had about 2 hours of daylight after we launched so we scurried around to all the points and islands and marked them on my GPS making it easier to navigate once darkness hit. The full moon kept it pretty light outside and we had no trouble moving around. Rick got us started by landing the smallest walleye I have ever seen in my life. It was too small to count towards our tournament total, but it was a walleye none the less.After jigging every ridge and point from shallow to deep with minimal success, Rick got on the phone and called one of the guys from our club that was fishing the tournament to see if they were having any success. Of course they were, and it was doing something completely different than what we were doing. They were trolling crankbaits in 6-10 feet of water. Rick and I didn’t want to resort to trolling, but figured we better try just to put some fish in the boat. We ended up spending the rest of the night trolling the same shoreline with crankbaits and putting about 1 walleye in the boat on each pass… or should I say, Rick did! I hooked one walleye and got him halfway to the boat before he made a quick release. Rick landed about 6 walleye with the biggest at 15 ½ inches. The minimum fish you could count in the tourney was 12 inches. Rick had 3 keepers and we knew we had no chance of placing in the tournament.

I had a tough time finding a lure in my box that would reach the correct depth to catch them. We were trolling in 10 feet of water and I was either getting snagged on the mossy bottom with deep diving cranks or running to high in the water column with shallow diving cranks. Rick had two crankbaits that seemed to be running right in the strike zone. Pays to have the right gear I suppose. After the tourney Rick made phone calls to other Rocky Mountain Angler members to get there reports and feedback from the tournament. It seems we were the only boat that struggled in the tournament with most teams catching 30-40 walleye. After hearing their reports of successful tactics, I feel a little more confident that we might be able to go up there again and duplicate their success. The whole point of joining the Rocky Mountain Anglers Club is to fish with the best walleye fisherman in the state and learn from the experts about how to catch these elusive fish!!! I’m starting to gain a real hatred for these fish and the feelings seem to be mutual!

My Last But Definitely Not Least Fishing Partner Has Arrived

2011-06-27T10:18:00.008-06:00

Fishing Time (birth): 12:50 p.m.
Weather: Sunny, hot, high 90’s
Moon: 14% Moon
Location: IMC Hospital (Murray)
Bait (doctor): Dr. Calla Holmgren
Who Was There: Mom, Dad, Brother Devin, Sister Addison, Grandparents, Uncle Ronnie, Cousin DakotaMy last, but definitely not least fishing partner was born today at 12:50 p.m. His name is Dayton John Duncan and he weighed more than his older brother and sister by a few ounces at a whopping 3 lb 5 oz. He was also the longest of the bunch at 17 ½ inches long and already has more hair than his 1 ½ year old sister Addi. He was born at 34 weeks gestation, making him exactly 6 weeks early in arrival. He is doing great in the Newborn Intensive Care Unit and should be home in a couple weeks. He likes the the help of oxygen like his brother Devin did and will probably have to come home with it for a little while. Once he gains enough weight to hold his own body temperature and starts feeding from the bottle he can come home to his family. He has some tough competition at home that will take some getting use to, but he will forever be the baby of the family. Mom had her tubes tied so the fishing crew is complete at 3! Now it’s time to move on and raise our little family together, teaching them how to love the outdoors, and of course… fishing!

THE BOUNDARY WATERS!

2011-06-14T14:47:00.005-06:00

Fishing Time: June 11-18
Weather: breezy, 60’s the entire week, no rain
Moon Phase: Full Moon
Location: Minnesota Boundary Waters
Species Caught: Smallmouth, Pike, Lake Trout, Walleye, Rock Bass
Bait: Smallmouth and Rock Bass – drop-shot, Pike, Walleye, Lake Trout – rapalas, crankbaits
Who Went: John, Joe, Isaac, MeI was lucky enough to travel to Minnesota to fish The Boundary Waters Canoe Area from June 11-18. This is an area made up of thousands of lakes crossing over into Canada from Minnesota. My buddy John’s uncle lives nearby in Wisconsin and had all the gear packed and loaded when he picked us up at the Minneapolis Airport. We couldn’t have done this trip without him and his canoes and gear. Here's how it all went down…

Day 1 (Saturday) - Arrived in Minneapolis around 2 p.m. where we met up with John’s Uncle Joe and his 12 year old son Isaac. Loaded our gear into their trailblazer with the canoes on a trailer behind us and hit the road heading due north towards Canada. A few hours later we were in Duluth.Duluth is a really cool little town that sits right on Lake Superior. It’s a really pretty area with rolling hills covered in pines and aspen and a lake the size of an ocean. For the next 135 miles we drove north along the shoreline of Lake Superior and WOW! It really is a freshwater ocean. The scenery was absolutely gorgeous throughout the drive, and I even spotted a black bear hanging out along the road. We finally arrived in Grand Marais which is the last town with any services before heading into the boundary waters. We ate pizza at Sven and Ole’s to get one last hot meal before a week of dehydrated dinners and Carnation Instant Breakfast. Across the street from the pizza shop was this encouraging looking store with a big walleye sticking out the side.We reached our lodge at the boundary waters around 8:00 p.m., and walked down to Lake Saganaga and made a few casts. I snagged a turtle for my first catch of the trip, but the picture didn't turn out. Nothing else was caught, so we got our gear ready and went to bed early.

Day 2 (Sunday) – Woke up early to all you can eat pancakes and then loaded into a transport boat that took us with all our gear across Lake Saganaga to what they call American Point.There are no motor boats allowed west of this point so we were on our own with gear and canoes for the next 6 days. The transport boat was set to pick us up at 5:00 p.m. on Friday.

We loaded the canoes with all our gear, got out the map, and headed due west into a great big wilderness of Canadian Shield rock and crystal clear lakes.We hit the rowing hard the first day traveling 7 miles on water and approximately ½ mile on land where we had to portage all our gear and canoes over what they call monument portage. It wasn't easy, with uphill terrain for about a ¼ mile, but we made it through to the other side and launched the canoes onto Otter Track Lake.Otter Track was supposed to be the best fishing lake on our designated route and as hard as the rowing and portaging was, we decided that we had to make a choice… row hard every day to finish the designed loop that we planned with the guide at the lodge, or set up a base camp at Otter Track Lake and make it a fishing trip instead of a canoeing trip… I think you all know what we decided to do! We found one of the designated camp sites and set up camp at Otter Track Lake where we spent the next 4 days fishing.We got a little fishing in that evening, but the long travel took most of our day. I caught one small lake trout in Lake Saganaga as I trolled a rapala on our journey to Otter Track, but that was the only fish caught on our 7 ½ mile journey. At Otter Track we found a small cove across from camp where we got about an hour of fishing in the first night. I caught a few small pike and John landed some nice smallmouth in the 3-4 pound range. Little did we know that the smallmouth fishing was just heating up!
Day 3 (Monday) – We hit the water early and traveled in the canoe across the lake to the Canadian side. Otter Track Lake is divided by the border of U.S.A and Canada. We found out later that we were not supposed to be fishing in Canada, but too little to late as we spent half our trip in Canadian waters… oops! That morning the pike were going nuts and we had them following every lure we threw. We caught 3 or 4 of them, but they were all small under 30-inches.We started getting into smallmouth quite often and I was amazed at the size. Everyone seemed to be a carbon copy 3 pound smallmouth with a few going 4 pounds.If we would have known that the pike fishing was going to completely shut off after the first day we would have continued to pursue them, but we figured it would be that way the entire trip and they almost got annoying the first day. The canoe fishing was starting to wear on my back and butt, so we headed back to camp to rest for a couple hours.

That evening we hit it hard again from the canoe and instantly got into some awesome smallmouth up close to shore. They were picky buggers though and wouldn’t touch a curly tailed grub or crankbaits, but would hammer topwater baits or a robo worm on a drop-shot rig. We figured it out quickly and went solely to the topwater. It was a blast while it lasted, but we only had one topwater bait each and it wasn’t long before a nice smallie snapped John’s line ending his topwater action. Soon after John lost his, I made the dumbest cast of my life and my topwater bait became a tree ornament high up in a big pine where we couldn’t get it. It was a total bummer because topwater is one of the most exciting ways to catch bass, but nothing we could do, they were both gone. The drop-shot became our best tactic for bass the rest of the trip.

Day 4 (Tuesday) – We finally figured out that fishing from a canoe was not much fun and wore on the body pretty quick. It doesn’t help when you got a 330 pound dude in the back weighing it down and making it pretty unstable the whole time (sorry John), but it wasn’t a big deal because we came up with a sweet idea that made the whole trip! Shore fishing! We picked a good looking point across the lake and took our cooking and fishing gear and beached the canoes.We fished from shore all day and caught tons of bass. We kept five good smallmouths to eat and had fish tacos for lunch that were absolutely amazing!The smallmouth fishing continued to be unreal and we caught multiple bass in the 3-4 pound range. The bass were on their beds spawning and it made it really fun for sight fishing. The water was super clear down to about 20 feet so seeing them was easy. We would walk the shoreline and look for the biggest bass and cast right on top of them and their bed. It was instant action and as soon as you let the fish go they would swim right back to protect their bed and we would harass and catch them a second time. Funny thing was they never would fall for it a third time, instead they would start tail slapping your bait away from the bed. I caught the biggest smallmouth of my life at 4 pounds and I caught her twice! She had just spawned so she didn’t have as much weight as you would expect and was kind of skinny, but her length and depth was huge! Below are two pictures of the same bass caught a half hour apart.Later on that evening we started throwing rapalas into deeper water hoping to hook up with a walleye or big pike and Joe soon caught the first walleye of the trip with this nice 20+ inch walleye.I set Isaac up with the drop-shot rig and he was in seventh heaven and kept telling me how he was going to be the coolest kid in Rice Lake, Wisconsin when his friends saw his new fishing technique. It was pretty cool helping a 12 year old kid master the drop-shot technique and watching him consistently land 4 pound smallmouth.Isaac was quite the kid and you can tell he has grown up in the back country with his dad and knew his way around camp. He filleted all our fish, and tried to kill every living animal he ever laid his eyes on. You gotta love 12 year old boys! He tried to murder our camp host (squirrel) the whole trip but never did succeed. Here is a picture of him trying to burn the squirrel out of his hole so he could stab him with the filet knife!He also harassed a loon that tried attacking me after getting to close to her nest. I took a photo of the bird as she came after me trying to protect her nest.I was scared to death of this big bird, but Isaac crawled over to her nest and as the loon was biting a stick he was waving at it, he would pet her with his other hand. I’ve got to hand it to you Isaac, you got some brass ones! That evening was just like the rest with beautiful calm water and an amazing sunset.

Day 5 (Wednesday) – We picked out a different point with shore access and made another day of it. We continued to pummel big smallies and had another shoreline lunch with fish fried in a flour and seasoning salt concoction that I brought. The fish lunches were one of the highlights of the trip. There is nothing like eating fresh fish straight from your hook and into the frying pan.This time we cooked up 8 or 9 bass and pigged out big time! It was an all you can eat fish buffet and it was pretty tasty, but it wore out of the big fella and shortly after lunch this is how I found him...That evening we fished a little deeper again in hopes of catching a walleye and just like the night before Joe landed another nice one.I was still blanked for walleye at this point and everyone was sick of hearing me whine about it, but the truth is, that’s why I traveled 2,000 miles to Minnesota was to catch these elusive fish.

Day 6 (Thursday) – Joe and I woke up early and each took out a canoe on our own. I worked the entire shoreline with jigs tipped with leeches trying to entice a walleye, but it never happened. I did catch a rock bass which was a new species to add to my list. They are small and don’t get very big and almost have the same look as a bluegill. It's always fun catching new species of fish.I put on a pike bait and had a follow on my first cast, but didn’t see another one the rest of the morning. I met up with Joe on the Canadian side of the lake and we found a rocky outcrop that produced 5 nice smallmouths for that day’s lunch. We headed back to camp and Isaac filleted them for us and we enjoyed yet another good lunch eating fish tacos. This day was very calm and overcast and the only day we had with no wind.We decided that instead of chancing a strong headwind on our journey back to American Point the next day, we would make the long haul back that afternoon with calm water and camp near our pick-up spot where we were meeting them the following day. It ended up being a good idea because a storm moved in and we would have had a strong headwind the next day.

We slowly made the journey back over monument portage and 7 miles of rowing only stopping if we saw something that looked fishy, or to take a picture of the beautiful scenery.We did stop at a lake named Swamp Lake, which was really shallow, but filled with small pike. I caught a few before we continued on to American Point.We found a great camp spot at American Point and set up camp for the night. John and I headed out in the canoe for some evening fishing and found a cove filled with more hammer handle pike in the 18- 25 inch range. We caught a few along with a couple smallmouths, but that was it.

Day 7 (Friday) – We woke up early and hit the water for one last morning of fishing. We fished pike bay once again and they were everywhere, but none with any size. We caught a few before burning out on catching little pike. There weren’t many other areas to fish at American Point so we went back to camp and slowly started packing gear. We met up with Voyageur Outfitters at 5 and they loaded our canoes and gear and we headed back to the lodge. We unloaded our gear and ate a big old bacon cheeseburger out on the patio of the lodge. After 5 days of dehydrated food it seemed like the best burger I’ve ever had! I pressed the locals for some walleye information, still not giving up hope that I might catch a walleye before I left Minnesota and I got some great inside information on where to go. Everybody reluctantly loaded into the truck to satisfy my walleye quest and we headed down to the supposed honey hole with a couple hours left of daylight to catch me a walleye. The area was tough fishing from shore, with limited access and ticks everywhere, making it hard to concentrate on fishing. Needless to say I left Minnesota with a walleye skunk smell on my hands! It was a tough one to swallow.

Day 8 (Saturday) – Got up early at the lodge and put a dent in the all you can eat pancakes. Hit the road stopping in Duluth to ship our rods back to Utah and ate some lunch. Then we headed straight to the airport in Minneapolis where John about got arrested for leaving his Leatherman in his carryon bag. He had to leave it at the Minnesota Airport. After one layover in Denver we arrived in Utah at 11:30 p.m. and the rest is history.

Conclusion: One of the most fun fishing trips I’ve ever had. Joe and Isaac are awesome dudes and John had us rolling on the ground every minute with his witty sense of humor. He knows every line to every movie I could think of and can recite them perfectly. I felt like I watched the movie “The Edge” and didn’t even need to have a TV there to do it… "We luuuuure him Charles!" He fell out of the canoe once, and ripped his only three pairs of pants by the second day (picture below).Because he tore all three pairs of pants and fell out of the canoe soaking his only long sleeve hoodie, he was forced to wear his last T-shirt with his long johns over the top for most of the trip. It was quite the sight and looked like he was wearing a dress (see below). Definitely a trip I will never forget!

Where are the Wipers at Willard Bay

2011-05-14T22:52:00.009-06:00

Fishing Time: 7:00 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.
Weather: cloudy, cold morning reaching 60 by afternoon
Moon Phase: 89% Moon
Location: Willard Bay
Water Temp: Morning = 52.8 degrees, Afternoon 55.8 degrees
Bait: Bottom bouncing worm harnesses, trolling crankbaits, casting curly tailed jigs
Who Went: JJ, MeAfter landing a few wipers last year I have been itching to get back up to Willard Bay and catch more. They are without a doubt the hardest fighting freshwater fish I have ever had on the other end of my line, so I decided to give it a try this week with the weather forecast calling for temperatures in the high 70’s, hoping the water would cooperate and warm up a few degrees to get the fish active. JJ and I headed north and arrived at the North Marina of Willard Bay around 7:00 a.m. We began the morning by joining the masses of boats and shoreline fisherman inside the harbor where the crappie are currently spawning. We watched a guy fishing from the shoreline fall in the lake, but besides that, not much more excitement fishing for crappie.

We left the marina and motored back into the northeast corner of the lake where I set up two bottom bouncing rigs with worm harnesses and two separate rods for trolling crankbaits. My thoughts were to bottom bounce two rods for walleye and troll the other two crankbait rods for wipers, killing two birds with one stone. I think we needed a bigger stone! We trolled at all speeds from 0.8 mph to 1.3 mph with no success. We tried deep diving cranks and shallow diving cranks, but no luck. We trolled all the way from the northeast corner southward through freeway bay and all the way to the island! I tried drifting and casting jigs all around the island without getting a single bite or seeing any fish on the finder. Then the bugs came out in full force and tried to make our life miserable.We relocated over to the north dike where we saw quite a few boats trolling and again tried our 4 rod set up, but still couldn’t buy a bite. The most frustrating part along the north dike was there were fish everywhere! I don’t know if they were carp, wiper or walleye, but they were there and wouldn’t touch a thing. I never saw any of the other boats land a fish either. Frustrated, I started hunting down fish with my fish finder and dropping a curly tailed jig right on their heads! Unfortunately, this only scared them away as they would quickly disappear once my jig reached them. Suddenly a wall of wind hit us with no warning and we were forced to get off the lake.We bottom bounced, trolled, casted, and jigged a wide range of depths from 12 to 23 feet with the most effective depth for seeing fish being 20-23 feet. The fish were all over in the water column with some hugging the bottom and others as high up as 5 feet below the surface. It was frustrating to say the least and I am ready for some warm weather to get these fish active. It’s approaching June and the water temps are still holding in the mid 50’s! Unfortunately I think flooding is going to hit us hard this year. We still haven’t reached runoff this year and the mountains continue to gain snowpack reaching record levels in many places. It could be scary!

Utah Lake - Bad Fishing But Good Eating

2011-05-07T15:43:00.003-06:00

Fishing Time: 9:30 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.
Weather: Clear, no wind, 80's
Moon Phase: 18% Moon
Location: Utah Lake
Water Temp: Main Lake - 57, Harbor = 60, Bass Hole = 63
Bait: Walleye = jigs, Bass = jig & trailer, drop-shot, Catfish = bobber and worm
Who Went: JJ, Dad, MeMy dad wanted to go fishing this Saturday before he heads back to work after recovering from heart surgery, but unfortunately most his favorite trout waters are still under a thick layer of ice. He said he was willing to go anywhere so I gave him 4 options… Willard Bay, Pineview, Deer Creek, or Utah Lake. It surprised me when he said Utah Lake, but I happily obliged and that’s where we headed.

We got there bright and early around 9:30 (early for my dad) and began the day drifting jigs just north of the dikes at Provo Boat Harbor to see if we could get lucky and pick up a walleye, but it didn’t happen. We headed over to my new secret bass hole and found that it wasn’t a secret at all! There were multiple bass boats in there and they all acted ticked off that everyone else new about the spot. I talked to most of them and they were not having much luck. One guy said he got there early that morning before everyone else and landed 4. I caught one largemouth and that was it. My dad spent his time trying to catch a carp! Don’t have a clue why, but in his mind a big carp has more allure than a largemouth bass, weird! It looks like my honey hole is an early in the year location because it was more than annoying having all those boats in there. I waited in line behind another boat to try the inlet where the fishing is usually best, but didn’t even get a bite. It looked as if it had been hammered all morning. One fisherman said there were 3 boats trying to fish it at one time earlier in the day! No thanks, I’m done with that spot!

With perfect weather and not a ripple on the water we cruised out to Bird Island to see if any kitties wanted to play and were greeted by 8 other boats. Sat there and fished for about 2 hours and didn’t even get a bite. Never saw any other boats land a fish either and they all left before we did. Obviously it’s still too early for the kitty cats.

Best part of the trip was the spread that my dad brought for lunch. When he showed up to my house, it took us 10 minutes to load the grocery bags full of goodies. He had everything from peanuts and snickers to my new favorite candy... sweet and sour twizzlers! We sat out by Bird Island while my dad made us the best sandwich that has ever graced the presence of my boat! Marinated steak and chicken with all the fixins from fresh sliced tomatoes, pickled peppers, horseradish and sprouts. You name it and he had it. The fishing was bad, but the eating was good, just like always when I'm with my old man! I don't know if he would admit it, but I think that's his favorite part of the trip, making and serving good food to me and my buddies. Well done dad, and I wish I could have returned the favor by being a better guide and helping you land a fish!

On our way in from Bird Island we did some scoping around down the shoreline along the airport dike road to see if I could find those clear open holes that Rick and I found last week. Really tough to see from the lake so I gave up quickly. Headed back to the harbor and battled 8 other bass boats to fish along the rocky dikes inside the harbor for bass. Again didn't catch any fish or see any landed. One interesting note was that the dikes are about 1 foot from being covered in water. In one spot the water has already made it over to the other side. The lake is already past full pool and it’s becoming evident that flooding this year is inevitable. We loaded the trailer and went home disappointed in the fishing, but any day on the water with the old man is a good day.

One word for this trip… BUSY! There were boats everywhere. Probably due to the fact it was the first nice day in May for people to get their boat out. It was a warm day pushing 80 degrees. Water temp at the bass hole was 63 and the main lake was 57. Inside the harbor was 60. The lake should go bonkers next week for white bass!

Bass Not Quite Ready For Spawn at Utah Lake

2011-05-05T12:18:00.007-06:00

Fishing Time: 3:30 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.
Weather: Sunny, no wind, 70’s
Moon Phase: 5% Moon
Location: Utah Lake (Provo Boat Harbor)
Water Temp: Bass spot = 63 degrees, Main lake = 52 degrees
Bait: Bass = jigs, drop-shot, spinnerbaits, tube jigs. Walleye = curly tailed grubs
Who Went: Phil, Rick, MeWith warming temperatures and sun in the sky, bass fishing became too tempting to pass up, and replaced our planned trip to the middle Provo River for walleye. Instead we ran down to Utah Lake to assault the largemouth bass. We arrived at Provo Boat Harbor at 3:00 p.m., unhitched the boat at the marina and drove down the airport dike road to see if we could find any open patches of water that held bass. We found one good pocket with visible bass swimming around and Rick easily plucked a couple dinks out before we moved on down the dike. We didn’t see any more holes that were irresistible so it was back to the boat ramp to launch. My cousin Phil met us there, jumped in the boat, and we were off to our new bass honey hole. When we arrived we were greeted by 3 fly fishermen that were pounding our spot for carp from the bank and completely ruined our spirits. It’s a small area and once it’s been fished it quits producing. Discouraged, but hopeful, we fished the areas around our spot where we have still had fair success for bass, but for whatever reason, it wasn’t meant to be. The weather seemed perfect along with the water temps, but the bass just didn’t seem to be there. Rick and I missed a few hits and Phil caught one chunky 2 pounder that at least made the trip bearable, but it was disappointing to say the least. Just before dark we ran over to the inlet of the Provo River and tried our luck for some post-spawn walleye. The fishing was slow, but I did luck into one small walleye that got me off the snide and Rick had a walleye hit, but didn’t get it in the boat.

Walleye Spawn - Provo River

2011-04-28T14:07:00.016-06:00

Fishing Time: 5:30 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.
Weather: Cloudy, windy, low 60's
Moon Phase: 18% Moon
Location: Provo River (near Charleston Bridge)
River Flow Rate: 608 cfs
Bait: Curly tailed grubs, Rapalas
Who Went: Rick, Me
Rick and I went up to the Provo River just above the Charleston Bridge in Midway to see if the walleye spawn has began yet. I can confirm that it has started, but may not be in full swing quite yet. The real issue is the amount of water running through the middle provo right now. This year has been one of the wettest winters on record and they are predicting major flooding when it finally decides to warm up. April has done nothing but rain and snow! I checked the flow data for the river on the date we fished it and I was shocked when I saw that according to the Bureau of Reclamation it was flowing at just over 600 cubic feet per second (cfs). I backdated the flow data log to last year on the same date and saw that it was 200 cfs. That means the river is 3 times the flow rate that it should be based on an average year!The river was flowing so fast that it made throwing any type of lure or jig almost impossible. I found one small spot that seemed fishable and began throwing a rainbow pattern rapala. I Caught 4 small rainbow trout, but no walleye and was ready to give up. Rick talked me into driving down to the Charleston Bridge to see if the flow was any better there, and it was. We had about 45 minutes left of daylight so we started casting curly tailed jigs into the main channel and bouncing them back down along the rocks towards us. We lost a lot of jigs to a submerged tree that wasn’t far off shore from us, but I was lucky enough to land one small walleye on a fire tiger colored curly tail with a ¼ oz jig head. The small male walleye was spraying milt, confirming that spawning is in process. No more walleye were landed and the fast flowing river was frustrating to say the least. We will hit it again next week to see if we can beat our one walleye outing.

Lake Powell 2011

2011-04-16T13:17:00.037-06:00

Fishing Time: Thursday-Sunday
Weather: 70-80, clear, low wind until Sunday
Moon Phase: 90% Moon
Location: Lake Powell
Water Temp: Morning- 52-54, Afternoon-56-60
Bait: Every plastic bait ever made
Who Went: Rick, John, Me

A couple buddies and I were lucky enough to fish God's gift to all anglers (a.k.a Lake Powell) last weekend and man was it awesome!
Thursday: We launched at Bullfrog and headed 25 miles north to Good Hope Bay where we set up camp on the south side of Blue Notch.After unloading our gear, we got on the water and started pounding the banks near our camp working spinner baits, curly tail jigs, and drop shot plastics. We hammered the smallmouth, but mostly small ones under 2 pounds.We also caught a few largemouth bass, a few nice crappies including one 15-inch beast, one striper, one bluegill, and one nice walleye.It seemed like you could hit all the species with a curly tail on a jig, while spinnerbaits were bass-only. The water near Blue Notch was slightly stained, but more on the clear side compared to some of the other bays. Afternoon water temps were around 58 degrees and the action was non-stop from about 2:00p.m.-dark. We ended up taking a mixed bag of all species back to camp where John filleted and cooked them for us to enjoy around the campfire. We worked the shorelines after dinner on foot near camp before we went to bed trying to find the walleye, but it never happened.

Friday: We started the morning bottom-bouncing the east shore of Good Hope Bay in 20-30 feet of water. Didn't mark many fish, nor did we get a bite. Gave up on that after about 2 hours and went over to the south shoreline of Good Hope Bay where there are some big boulders that come down into the water. Water was very clear and water temp was between 54-56 degrees. Picked up a few smallmouth on jigs but action was slow. Decided maybe the clear, cooler water was the problem so we headed way north towards White Canyon. Water turned chocolate-milk colored about a mile north of Blue Notch. Kept heading north and went into Two Mile Canyon and fished it for a while. We threw crankbaits and spinnerbaits, but didn't even get a strike. Water was extremely milky and our thoughts were that the fish were holding in the slightly stained water. We saw temps in Two Mile Canyon at just over 60-degrees. We stopped in Scorup Canyon, or ULTRA Canyon as we nicknamed it, on the way back south towards camp. Water was in the slightly stained category so we thought it should be good, but only had two strikes picking up one dink largemouth. A little discouraged at this point, we trolled cranks in the main channel near our camp and picked up some quick stripers to get our spirits up. I hooked up with a striper and low and behold Rick doubled up with me and lost his virginity on Utah walleye while trolling. A tiny little guy that was suspended at about 20' in the main channel! That was one of Ricks main goals of the trip… get on the board with a Utah walleye!After trolling, we went into Ticaboo Canyon, but the water was crystal clear and we didn’t give it much hope. We did catch a few small bass, but the real excitement came when Rick pulled out his fishing bow and arrow! There were carp everywhere and it didn’t take long for Rick to slay his first victim.After the seaside burial, Rick lost one of his arrows and we were down to one left. I only got a few shots in before it was gone! No more carp funerals were performed. After that we cruised over to one of the small canyons in the northeast part of Good Hope Bay and things started picking up, at least for Rick and John. They started nailing smallmouth, largemouth, and crappie from about 3:00p.m.-dark.I caught a few, but missed and lost more fish during this stretch than the rest of the trip combined. Water was right around 60 degrees and slightly stained. Most exciting part is when we saw big bertha swimming around some sunken brush. I'm talking a 7 or 8 pound largemouth! She was huge and uninterested in anything we put in front of her. It was awesome just to observe her for a while.

Saturday: The wind was on and off throughout the day, but air and water temps were up and we had more consistent success throughout the day. You couldn't go wrong with working a weedless plastic from shore, out to about 15 feet of water. Curly tail grubs had the most action with earth-colored working best in the morning and pearl or chartreuse working better in the evening. The morning started off hot for all species near camp at Blue Notch, but soon began to slow down.We ventured back into Ticaboo Canyon across the channel from Good Hope and temps were up as high as 63.5 degrees. That got us excited and we absolutely dominated the bass. Mostly smallies, and most under 2 pounds. Got a few of them over 3 pounds, but generally smaller.Highlight of the trip: In the far back nook of Ticaboo Canyon we got on a school of monster crappie hanging out around some large dead tree stumps that were sticking out of the water in about 7-10 feet. Literally every cast we got hit, with most of which were over 11 inches and some breaking 15 inches! Caught and released about 40 of them pigs. It was incredible!Suddenly that action shut off so we headed back out working the banks and continued to slay the bass. We saw a few people trolling that canyon and were hooking stripers, crappies, and walleye left and right. None of us were in the mood to troll, plus there isn't a ton of room for multiple boats to troll, so we opted out of that. The best producing bait of the night was the jig and trailer. I have always had my doubts about them, but figured there was a reason all the diehard tournament bass fisherman used them, and that evening it proved them right. It helped me land the biggest bass of the trip at over 3 pounds.Just before dark we talked to a group of guys camping in Ticaboo Canyon and payed them on the water pricing for some extra gasoline. We were a little worried that we might not have enough to make the 25 mile jaunt back to Bullfrog the next morning. I think it came out at $6.00 a gallon, but was well worth it! We worked the shorelines one last time before bed, but once again the walleyes were nowhere to be found.

Sunday: We packed up early in the morning and headed back to our Crappie honey hole, but the fast action was over and they didn’t want to play, so we continued on to Bullfrog. Unloaded all our gear into Rick’s jeep and re-launched the boat. We fished Bullfrog Bay for awhile, going all bass-tourney style working jig and trailers. Hooked a couple of nice largemouth and then the wind picked up and blew us off the lake. Ended the trip earlier than desired but the wind was miserable. Not a lot of structure to fish in Bullfrog anyway due to the current water level.The trip was incredible and I wish that one of us could have hooked big bertha swimming around, but oh well. It ended up being a numbers trip with a ton of fish being caught and mixed bag of all different species. Best Crappie trip I’ve ever had down there and the most walleye as well. Next year it’s big Bertha that I’m after! Just for fun here is a list of all the species caught; Largemouth Bass, Smallmouth Bass, Striped Bass, Crappie, Bluegill, Walleye, and a carp.

Good Bass - Bad Walleye

2011-04-10T08:29:00.002-06:00

Fishing Time: 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Weather: Cold, windy, snow, 40's
Moon Phase: 41% Moon
Location: Utah Lake
Water Temp: Bass spot - 55 degrees.
Bait: Drop-shot with green/black and red flaked zoom worm
Who Went: Jason Willard, Rick, Me

With walleye still on my mind this spring, Rick and I met up with Jason Willard down at Utah Lake for round 3 of our attack on these elusive fish in 2011. We pulled up to the Provo Boat Harbor at first light and found the weather to be more like January rather than April. The wind was whipping, the waves were big, and light snow flakes were in the air, so we decided on Plan B instead... get breakfast at the local Cracker barrel and see if the conditions get better. When we returned from breakfast the conditions were a little better, but not great, and we made the decision to put the walleye fishing on the backburner and try to find some wind protected areas on the lake to bass fish until conditions improved. Jason told us he found a new secret spot where he's been catching big laremouth bass despite the cold spring conditions, so Rick and I were excited to see what it was all about. As we made our way to his secret location we were cruising along the weed edge of the lake, when Jason suddenly started heading right towards the cattails and phragmites that covers the shoreline! I couldn't believe it when Jason took his boat right through the thick cover and 20 feet later we popped out into a long corridor that looked like a river surrounded by stick-ups! We continued to cruise up the marshland river channel until we made it to the end where there was a small culvert with water entering the lake. The water temp was a few degrees warmer than the main body of the lake and it started making sense why the bass might be here. Needless to say the fishing was awesome and even though we didn't land a lot of bass, we managed to put 10 in the boat on a day with 45 degree air temps and on and off snow throughout the day! The best part is that almost all of them were pigs, with a couple pushing four pounds, like this one Rick caught. I didn't come very prepared for bass fishing due to the fact I planned on spending the day walleye fishing, and my 6 foot medium light rod with 8 lb test reel wasn't ideal for dragging bass out of the thick cover. I lost two big bass with one that I felt would have been the big fish of the day. There was just no way to keep him from going into the stick-ups with my light rod and reel, and when I tried to force him out anyway, it resulted in my line snapping! Frustrating, but fun all the same! After a few hours we all felt we had beat the area to death and decided to go back to the Provo River Inlet to see if we could top off the already successful trip by landing a walleye. When we arrived at the river inlet two fishermen showed us two very nice walleye they landed earlier in the day and soon after we talked to them we watched them land another. We also saw two shore fishermen catch a couple nice fish. This boosted our confidence and Rick and I felt that with a little work we were finally going to land a few walleye! Unfortunately, the curse continued and we casted for 3 straight hours without even getting a bite! I'm still scratching my head and can't figure out why! Jason has had many good days on Utah Lake catching walleye, and after two fishless trips with Rick and me, he finally admitted that we must be cursed! It was still an awesome trip and I will definetely be fishing that bass spot again, but I think the pro walleye tour at Utah Lake is over. Supposedly the walleye will begin spawning at Deer Creek soon and I will probably shift gears and try my luck up there. Someday the stars will align and I will catch a decent walleye in this state!!!

One Walleye on the Board in 2011

2011-03-15T09:06:00.005-06:00

Fishing Time: 1:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.
Weather: Perfect, no wind, partly cloudy, 60's
Moon Phase: 80% Moon
Location: Utah Lake
Bait: Tandem rigged curly tailed grubs in all colors
Who Went: Rick, MeMy six year drought for Utah Lake walleye ended today, but was still one of the most frustrating fishing trips of my life! First of all, my boat has been in the shop since January 2nd and I just found out it won’t be fixed until early April due to some parts that the shop is waiting on to be shipped. That will make 4 months being in the shop! So my walleye chasing this spring just became a little more limited! Luckily Rick was as eager as me to get back on Utah Lake after our skunking a week ago and willing to provide his boat in order to do it. We took off from work around noon and hit the road for Lincoln Beach. As we pulled into the harbor I was in shock at how many trucks and empty trailers were sitting in the parking lot. As we launched our boat and drove around the corner to the “L” which is the popular place to fish, I counted 13 boats all huddled in the same general location. Rick asked me where we should go or what we should do and I just smiled and said “join the masses”.

Now for the frustrating part… We began fishing 20 yards away from the last boat on the right in the picture below.It was a couple Vietnamese gentlemen that were landing walleye left and right. At first it excited us because we knew there were walleye out there to be caught, but the hours passed with no bites, and these two Vietnamese guys just kept reeling them in. The only reason I’m calling attention to their nationality, is because for whatever reason, their culture just flat knows how to catch walleye! I see it every year and it continues to amaze me, and we were forced to watch them land 15 walleye right in front of our face! Then, to put us completely over the edge, another Vietnamese guy to the west of them, landed a monster female that was probably pushing 7 pounds! I have never been so frustrated while fishing! We were using the same jigs and technique that they were, but for whatever reason, they continued to catch them and we didn’t! We finally gave up on the area and tried a little shallower and that’s when Rick finally yelled fish on! It was soon followed with disappointment as we realized it was just a white bass!As the sun began to go down, the two Vietnamese guys moved in a little shallower and we instantly boated over and took their old spot. It wasn’t long before I caught my first walleye of the year at Utah Lake ending a 6 year drought! The little male walleye was spewing milt all over me assuring us that the spawn was beginning!I began thinking that the two Vietnamese guys just lucked out and had the right spot, but unfortunately that was the only walleye we landed. We continued to cast for another hour or so and caught a few more white bass, but that was it.Just as it was getting dark we ran over to another popular walleye spot at the inlet of the Spanish Fork River. There must have been 15 guys wading the entrance of the river and they didn’t seem too fond of us pulling up in our boat to join them on their annual walleye spawning rituals. They started casting right at our boat and told us that we were in their "casting zone". Funny because before we got there we could see them all casting in a different direction! Needless to say we didn’t stay long, but we did hear a lot of splashing fish in the darkness and I assume there was quite a bit of catching going on near the mouth of the river. The walleye spawn has officially begun, but without a boat I am at the mercy of going in my float tube or hoping someone with a boat is willing to take me! The best part about the trip was the beautiful day with no wind and the amazing sunset! Hopefully I can get back out there and catch some more walleye this year during the spawn at Utah Lake.

Walleye Woe's Continue in 2011

2011-03-05T22:43:00.005-07:00

Fishing Time: 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
Weather: Overcast, no wind, 50's
Moon Phase: New Moon
Location: Utah Lake
Bait: Curly tailed grubs, crankbaits, minnows, worms
Who Went: Rick, Jason Willard, Me

Rick Everson and I joined the Rocky Mountain Anglers Association for one reason only... because they are the supposed experts at walleye fishing. Today we put them to the test by going with the president of the club Jason Willard to his backyard playground, Utah Lake. We knew it was a little early in the year for great success, but figured we might have a decent chance with Jason as our guide. Unfortunately that wasn't the case! Jason did get two hits and I pulled in the only fish of the trip with a 6-inch tiny mud cat, but that was it! We drifted jigs, casted jigs, trolled crankbaits, and even baitfished all with no success. My frustration for walleye continues into 2011, but Jason assured us that if we put in the time the bites will come. I sure hope so because I can only take so many walleye skunked trips in a row! Below is a picture of Jason at the helm with a couple guys closing in on our spot. Walleye fishing can get crowded with only a few spots on the lake that give up any real success. Rick and I have made it a personal goal to hit the walleye hard this spring and not give up until we catch one, so stay tuned!

Tail Slapped by a Lake Trout

2011-02-11T16:00:00.016-07:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.
Weather: Sunny, clear, no wind, 40’s
Moon Phase: 50% Moon
Location: Flaming Gorge – Brinegars Ranch
Bait: 7 inch tube jig, burbot green
Who Went: John, Me, (un-invited old man)

Just when you think you have the big lake trout at Flaming Gorge figured out, they wind up and tail slap you right in the face, and remind you who’s in charge! I ran up to Flaming Gorge on Thursday night with my buddy John for a one day fishing event on Friday. We were on the lake before sun up, but forgot one of the fish finders so I had to run back to the car and get it. As I was walking from the car back out to our fishing holes, this beast of a machine pulled up and offered me a ride!I declined at first but the friendly old man driving insisted I jump on, so I did. Little did I know I was getting duped by a little old man on a 4 wheeler! He dropped me off with my gear and told me how this was his favorite spot to fish, but he didn’t want to intrude and we were already there before him. I told him sorry, but thanks for the ride! He continued to drive circles around us for about 10 minutes before parking 30 feet from me. He told me he couldn’t find another spot to fish and thought his generous ride out on the ice made up for the fact that he was going to fish right on top of me all day! As he began setting up his gear I walked over there and nicely told him that he was a little close for comfort, but just like an old fuddy duddy, he played it off and acted like we were best buddies and felt I wouldn’t care! Problem was, I did care, and I knew our fish finders would interfere with each other all day long, which they did, and I wasn’t happy about it. I only had one morning to fish and I didn’t want anything to screw it up, but it was too late! To make matters worse, the old man hooked up with a fish almost instantly after dropping a jig and landed a 19 pound lake trout right in front of my face!

I had a total of three good hits all day long and missed every dang one of them! John missed one hit, and together we went 0-4. It was hard to swallow, but we were certainly humbled by the Mighty Gorge on this trip, and to kick us while we were down, the old man hooked up with another lake trout and it was a total rod bender! John and I walked over there to watch the show and I helped land the fish of this guys dreams. It wasn’t as big as I thought it was going to be, but that’s because he had the fish snagged on the side! Even after seeing the fish the old man thought it was well over thirty pounds, and I knew it wasn’t, but he was very excited and said his scale was not working and asked to use mine. I weighed the fish for him and the scale topped out at 26 pounds, but I told him it was an even 30 just to make his day. He had me take pictures of him holding it and as nice as this guy was, I was still ticked-off about him fishing that close to me! Oh well, I guess we at least got to see a big lake trout on this trip, but it sure as hell wasn’t mine. I put on a miss clinic and if I would have landed those three fish the trip probably would’ve had a whole different story! It was a bummer deal, but at the same time that’s why I'm addicted to lake trout fishing, because you can’t plan on landing trophy fish on every trip, but when you do they are well worth the wait! Above is a picture of my fish finder and the top line being shown is my jig and the bottom line a big lake trout. If you understand how to read a fish finder you can see that the fish followed my jig from the lakes bottom all the way up to about 65 feet before losing interest and heading back down. You can also see that I dropped my jig right back on his head, but just like the rest of the lake trout that day, it didn't want anything to do with me! If the bottom line would have come up and touched the top line then I probably would have experienced a bite. I like to call this method, "the ultimate video game," because chasers like this will keep your interest for hours!

After accepting lake trout defeat, John wanted to go burbot fishing before we headed home, but when we arrived at our burbot fishing hole, the ice had vanished from two weeks ago when we were there, and we saw nothing but open water. We found one small area that was still iced over and gave it a shot for about an hour, but didn’t even get a bite, so that made it official… we got skunked! The drive home felt just like coming home from a Wendover trip after you’ve lost 500 dollars and it suddenly sinks in what just happened! It’s not a good feeling, but it just gives me more energy to get back up there and get back at them! I definitely have a serious lake trout fishing illness!

The Famous Fish!

2011-01-15T22:15:00.013-07:00

Fishing Time: Saturday- 7:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., Sunday- 7:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.
Weather: Partly cloudy, no wind, warm, 40’s
Moon Phase: 80% Moon
Location: Flaming Gorge Reservoir
Bait: 7 inch tube jig, burbot green
Who went: John, Rick, Me

John and I arrived in Manila, Utah around 6:00 p.m. on Friday night and checked into the glorious Flaming Gorge Inn Motel, yeah right. It was a dump, but good enough for a few fishermen to lay their heads for a couple nights. Our buddy Rick was meeting us up there but didn’t arrive until midnight. In the meantime John filleted his bluegills from Pelican Lake on our TV table and I watched espn. Once Rick arrived we hit the sack, but I only got about one hours sleep that night after listening to all sorts of interesting noises that came out of John’s mouth! You might as well have stuck an air horn in my ear and rang it off every half second it was that loud! Rick got about the same amount of sleep, but either way we were mack fishing so we were happy as a kid on Christmas! We met up with a local mack expert that I had been talking to on-line, and he took us to his favorite spot to fish through the ice. We fished there all morning with Rick, John and I all landing lake trout from 15-25 pounds. We then ventured out onto some thin ice (2 inches) trying to be the first ones to fish one of the best areas. John was a little sketch about being the biggest guy on the ice and it got to the point where every step he took cracks would form around his feet. We laughed a little at his expense! I was the big loser at the new spot missing 3 fish in the span of one hour! After a few cuss words and finally settling down, the fishing completely shut off, which is normal for lake trout, so we gathered up our gear and prepared to move to another spot in search of the dreaded burbot. To fish for burbot your best odds are at night, so we loaded up the ice shack and heater and hit a rocky outcrop and fished in about 20 feet of water. We finally got the technique down after someone fishing the same area showed us that aggressive jigging was the key to catching these ugly things. Most of them were small, but Rick did land one decent sized one. The excitement for burbot wore off pretty quick so we called it a night. John had to work the next morning so he grabbed a rockstar and hit the road for home while Rick and I went back to the motel and got what felt like the best sleep I’ve had in years! We woke up early the next morning and were on the ice before light. The fish seemed a little more moody than they were the day before, but I did luck out and land a 17 pound fish when he hit as I was dropping my jig to the bottom (complete luck), but besides that we had a rough morning. I finally got fidgety and decided to move out to another hole close by, and man I'm glad I did! On my second drop down I could see a fish on my fish finder racing up to my jig. As soon as it hit, my pole doubled over and line started racing off my reel. I instantly knew this was not the same size fish we had been catching previously and yelled over to Rick to come over. The fish went on three long runs lasting about 15 minutes before I was able to get him up to the ice. Then we spent another 5 minutes trying to get his head out of the ice hole so that Rick could land him. Once we pulled the fish onto the ice I just sat there in awe!

We weighed him quickly and took some photos and then slid him back through the ice and off he swam to live another day. It was a trip and a fish I will never forget, and meanwhile this fish has now become famous. Rick submitted it to the local outdoor TV show Roughin it Outdoors and they will be airing it on January 29, 2011. It will also be in the Salt Lake Tribune in the "Away" section as the Hook Shot of the week on February 6, 2011. The tribune outdoor writer, Brett Prettyman, posted the fish and story on his Salt Lake Tribune Outdoor Blog site on January 28, 2011, and an editor from BoatU.S. ANGLER magazine took notice and emailed me saying they loved the picture and want to put the photo and story in there April issue. The recognition for this fish just keeps pouring in! The editor for the magazine told me she would enter the photo into a national contest and if I win they would mount the fish for free. This is by far the most famous fish I have ever caught!!!

First Stop Pelican Lake

2011-01-14T22:09:00.003-07:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.
Weather: Clear skies, no wind, 30’s
Moon Phase: 71% Moon
Location: Pelican Lake
Bait: Ice flies tipped with wax worm
Who Went: John, Me John and I had a trip planned up at Flaming Gorge to fish for lake trout, but decided we might as well head that way a little early on Friday and get in some bluegill fishing at Pelican Lake first. I left my house at 4:00 a.m. to pick up John before making the 3 hour trip with only a few minor stops and arriving at the lake around 8:00 a.m. We had the lake all to ourselves the whole day, and by noon the ice looked like swiss cheese after we drilled hole after hole trying to locate where the bluegill were at. It was interesting because once we found the depth where they were holding (20 ft), every hole we drilled had fish below. Problem was it seemed like we fished out every hole after 4-5 fish, so we’d have to move and drill another hole to find happier bluegill. We ended up repeating this process all day long and kept about 25 of them for John to fillet, but the final tally was much higher than that. It was a perfect day with blue skies and no wind. This was my first time ice fishing Pelican Lake and it was fun catching bluegill, but I would be lying if I said that Flaming Gorge wasn’t in the back of my mind the entire time. John loves his bluegill though, so he was happy. We hit the road around 2:00 p.m. and continued onward towards Flaming Gorge, but stopped to look at the impressive Flaming Gorge Dam before reaching the small town of Manila, Utah where we were staying. Story to be continued…

Quest for Pulling a Pike Through the Ice at Yuba

2011-01-08T11:52:00.006-07:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
Weather: partly cloudy, no wind, 20’s
Moon Phase: 17% Moon
Location: Yuba Reservoir
Bait: Anchovies on tip-ups, ice flies and wax worm on rods
Who Went: Rick, Me In another attempt to land a pike or musky through the ice, Rick and I headed to Yuba Reservoir. Yuba is a lake we have successfully fished for big pike during the summer months, but are eager to land one of these big fish through the ice. We arrived at the lake a little after sun rise and were excited to see that the lake had just recently froze, and even though we have had record snow fall this winter, the ice was covered with only a skiff of snow on top. This makes walking easy, and for us it meant that every corner of the lake was accessible by foot, with a little work. We looked at our map and pointed out a few areas that have produced pike during the summer and we decided to make the trek. According to the map we were looking at approximately 2.5 miles each way! The journey wasn’t bad, but I would be lying if I said I wasn’t sore by the end of the day. Once we arrived at the pin-pointed location, we set-up some tip-ups baited with anchovies and sent them down near the bottom in 20 feet of water. We used our fishing rods and tried to entice some perch out in the deeper areas (25’-30’) using ice flies tipped with wax worms. After close to an hour of fishing one of the flags on the tip-ups popped up and it was game on! We ran over there and Rick carefully took the line in his hand and set the hook! At first it seemed as if he had missed the fish, but then he told me there was definitely something there, but it didn’t feel very big. He was right and we were very disappointed as he hoisted out a 12 inch perch! That’s a big perch, but not what we were looking for. We re-rigged the tip-up and sent another anchovy down thinking the perch was a fluke. After another hour with no bites on the tip-ups or our rods, we went exploring a few other points with only a fish finder and ice auger in hand, hoping to find an area with good pike holding structure. Unfortunately with the lake being so low during the winter, it was almost as if Yuba was like a big bathtub and gradually just got deeper as you made your way from shore to the middle of the lake. The structure was all the same, making it hard to pin-point any areas that would seem more productive than the other. After drilling multiple holes and unsuccessfully finding any structure, we headed back around the point and into the bay we were fishing. As we made our way around the point we noticed that one of the tip-up flags had been tripped so off I ran. When I got there I grabbed the line but the fish was gone. Now we were kicking ourselves thinking we missed our chance at a pike through the ice! We re-rigged with an anchovy and sent it back down. Shortly after re-baiting, the same tip-up tripped and I ran over and set the hook on a fish, but again was disappointed when I realized it was another big fat perch, and no pike. Now we knew the first perch wasn’t a fluke and were discouraged thinking no pike were even around. The tip-up flags began popping up regularly now and every time it was another big perch. I landed one perch on my rod, but the rest were all on tip-ups rigged with a full 6-inch anchovy and being inhaled by 12 inch perch! We moved the tip-ups into shallow water (10-15 ft) and tried there for around an hour before packing up and making our way all the way back to the car. We stopped and fished at the dam for a few minutes hoping to find some perch in the deep 45 foot water, but all we found were a few non-biters. We dragged the sleds up the hill, packed the car, and left Yuba discouraged, sore and tired as we drove home depressed that we will never land a pike or musky through the ice. I don’t know anyone in Utah that can consistently land musky, pike, or walleye through the ice and the weirdest part is that it is very common on the lakes back east and up north. What makes Utah so different? I don’t know the answer yet, but I do know that my next ice fishing trip will be somewhere I can catch a fish!

The Last Trip of 2010

2010-12-29T10:55:00.007-07:00

Fishing Time: 5:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.
Weather: Blizzard, breezy
Moon Phase: 32% Moon
Location: Newton Reservoir
Bait: Small ice fly tipped with wax worm
Who Went: Rick, his buddy Chad and 13 year old son Zack, Me The forecast for Wednesday called for snow, snow and more snow! Unfortunately for me it was the only day that I could get out and go fishing over the holiday break, so we braved the storm and headed north to Newton Reservoir in search of some hungry crappies and maybe even a bonus Tiger Musky. As we drove north on I-15 passing Brigham City the rain turned to snow and a semi had lost control and sat off the side of the road jack knifed. We slowed our speeds and the hour and a half drive became closer to three. Once we got there we noticed that the edges of the reservoir was a little soft looking and realized after hiking down the boat ramp that there was a ten foot perimeter of slush and no ice around the entire lake. For the next hour we made a make-shift plank out of any logs and branches we could find. It wasn’t pretty, but it got us from shore and onto safe ice. Rick pulled each of our three sleds over the slush with a rope and off we went to find our crappie honey hole.It was already 4:30 and we left ourselves about one hour to get the ice shanty’s up and settle in for the evening. Rick caught a little 5-inch largemouth bass before we were even set up to fish and little did we know that there would only be one more fish caught all night! Soon after we were settled and finally began fishing, Rick landed the last fish of the night with a wiry looking little crappie. No pictures were taken as I was sure there would be better opportunities to take pictures, but I was wrong. We wasted a good 4 hours sitting in our heated tent catching nothing, with little motivation to clean up all our gear and drive home in the blizzard that awaited us. Around 9:00 p.m. we couldn’t take it anymore and cleaned up our gear and left. One interesting thing did happen to me while we were packing up our gear that I've yet to experience while ice fishing. As we were breaking down our ice shanty my right foot slipped into one of the holes we drilled and I went straight through all the way to my crotch! My right leg was completely soaked and to make matters worse my left leg went in the water while crossing back over our branchy plank from ice to land. I got to drive all the way home in a blizzard with two wet legs. It took us a good two hours to get home and I finally crawled in bed at 12:30 a.m. All said and done I should have stayed home and watched the blizzard of 2010 from my window!

White Bass Bonanza at Utah Lake

2010-12-03T15:56:00.013-07:00

Fishing Time: 9:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.

Weather: Clear skies, slight breeze, 40's

Moon Phase: 4% Moon

Location: Utah Lake (Lindon Boat Harbor)

Bait: Small hot pink jig tipped with worm

Who Went: Johnny Leach, Me

John and I both had the day off work today and wanted to wet a line, but a lot of the lakes are beginning to get that hard icy layer on top so our options were limited. I saw a report late last night about the white bass hitting like crazy down at Utah Lake and supposedly there was a solid 6-inch layer of ice to fish on. The report had us sold and we switched our thoughts from fishing soft water to fishing the hard deck. We arrived at the pump house at Utah Lake around 8 a.m., only to find a parking lot full of cars. The secret is out! The ice was covered with fisherman and I guess we weren’t the only ones reading fishing reports late last night. After talking to a few fishermen and getting reports of slow fishing, we decided to ditch the masses and try a different location.

We headed over to Lindon Boat Harbor where there were no fishermen in sight, but the ice looked very sketchy. Sure enough the ice was not solid, but the docks were still out and we just fished through the sketchy ice while standing on the docks. John landed the first white bass of the day, but the action was not on track to produce 100 fish days like the reports were saying.We landed a few more here and there, and then like a light switch it turned on! We started yanking them out one after another. The instant you sent your jig down the ice hole you were bringing it right back up with a fish on. The size of the white bass was average, but we did get two bonus crappie and one bluegill and perch. About half of them went home as fish tacos and the other half went back to repopulate the lake. This would be a great place to take your kids as they would have a blast catching white bass all day long. The only problem is the white bass bonanza doesn’t last long and then they become very tough to locate. So get down there!

The Good,The Bad and The Ugly

2010-11-26T12:12:00.005-07:00

Fishing Time: 8:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
Weather: morning fog, -8 degrees at launch, clear afternoon, no wind, and single digit temps
Moon Phase: 73% Moon
Location: Strawberry Reservoir
Water Temp: 36.9 degrees
Bait: White tube jig tipped with minnow
Who Went: Rick, Me Rick and I went to Strawberry in hopes of sneaking one more trip on the boat before putting her away for the winter. Let’s just say, we were pushing the limits. The day started out with a flat tire on the boat trailer, so bad that the tire un-seated from the rim. We were also pulling the boat with my new Yukon and had too low of a receiver hitch to get the trailer off the jack wheel. On the drive up, we watched the temperature steadily drop down all the way to 8 below zero by the time we pulled up to the ramp.The boat ramp was icy and covered in snow. Luckily, the other die-hard fisherman that was up there had a plow on the front of his truck and took care of the snow so we only had to deal with the ice. Finally with the boat launched, Rick was able to crawl my Yukon off the icy ramp, and it was time to set off into the thick fog for some fishing….or not.

The water intake on the motor froze somewhere between the intake and the discharge point so we weren’t cooling the engine. Neither of us had experienced that before so we weren’t sure on an easy fix.What we ended up doing was just running the engine until the overheat beep warning sounded, then let it cool for a few minutes and did it again. It cleared after about the third time. Went to drop the thrust motor in the water, and the shaft was frozen to the collar where you adjust the height so we were without its services for awhile.It finally thawed after a couple hours, but up until then we relied on a little icy wind to give us a drift. We started our day by fishing in Strawberry Bay over near the visitor’s station.

After getting all the bugs out, we finally had our lines in the water and the first fish of the day ended up being my long awaited big cutthroat from Strawberry. I have caught a thousand cutthroats up there waiting for this moment to happen and it finally came. The fish measured out at 27.5 inches long and weighed in at 7 pounds! We took a couple pictures and let it swim away.Soon after catching the big one I noticed I had some thick ice at the end of my line and when I went to chip it off I took the tip of my pole with it. Just add it to the list for the day. We continued fishing around the lake hitting various spots including Renegade and the mouth of the narrows. The mouth of the narrows ended up being the most productive area with each of us landing close to 10 fish each. Using the classic white tube jig tipped with a shiner, and dragging it along the bottom in about 25-35 feet seemed to work best. Rick landed one slot buster with a nice 3.5 pound cutthroat, but most our fish were in the slot with a few smaller rainbows. Ugly hat by the way!We worked the shallower water for a bit with some crank baits and swim baits, but that only produced 2 or 3 fish. By 1:00 the fishing had completely shut off and even though we continued fishing for 2 more hours we didn’t get any more bites and the fish finder went blank, so we called it a day.

The plowed part of the ramp was melted by the time we left which helped, but we did find out that one of the runner boards came loose on my trailer which added one more obstacle to the day. Oh, and I lost a hub cap off my boat trailer. -8 degrees mixed with boats just don’t seem to go together very well. Whoever was trying to keep us from fishing that day failed!

Hams Fork, Wyoming

2010-11-14T20:33:00.005-07:00

Fishing Time: 7:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
Weather: Very cold, windy, snow, 26 degrees
Moon Phase: 60% Moon
Location: Hams Fork River, Wyoming
Bait/Tackle: Fly Rods - streamers and nymphing
Who Went: Corey, Rick, Me My buddy Corey has been boasting about the Hams Fork River in Wyoming for a few years now, and has pictures to prove there are some big rainbows and cuttbows living there. We finally planned an outing and wouldn’t you know it I got sick two days before our trip. I invited Rick to go along with us, but he and Corey don't know each other and I felt like I was the glue holding the whole trip together, so I toughed it out and went anyway. The forecast for weather was ugly with a 40% chance of snow, a high of 31 degrees, and winds up to 30 mph. We were on the road by 5:00 a.m. and reached the Hams Fork by 7:00 a.m. The winds were already whipping and the temperature gauge on Ricks Jeep read 26 degrees. We rigged up our fly rods and by the time we were done we couldn’t feel our hands. We jumped back in the jeep to warm them for a minute and then made the hike down to the river. Once we made our way down to the river, Corey and Rick immediately started fishing and I sat on the river bank trying to catch my breath. I suddenly got very nauseated and felt like I was going to throw up. I dry heaved a few times, but to no avail and then sat on my knees as darkness started closing in around my vision. Right before I was about to pass out the darkness started to disappear and my vision went back to normal. Thoughts of why I even made the trip started crossing my mind and I knew I was going to have to take it really slow. Rick and I made our way down river looking for some deeper holes to fish. The river was very low and filled with moss. Corey went the opposite direction and headed upstream towards the dam of Lake Viva Naughton. We didn’t see Corey again until the end of the day. Rick caught one small rainbow just below some riffles on a somewhat deeper stretch, but besides his one fish we traveled a long distance downriver without seeing or catching anything. We finally came to a spot on a bend where the river looked fairly deep and Rick and I both felt there had to be fish there. We tied up some streamers and began casting towards the opposite river bank and within no time Rick had a hit, but missed. Finally after a few more missed hits, Rick landed a nice 18-inch rainbow and it gave us new confidence that there were fish in this river.As more time went by Rick continued to catch fish while I struggled with my casting and became very frustrated.I tried many different streamers trying to replicate exactly what Rick was doing, but it didn’t seem to matter.I finally had a few hits, but missed horribly and the frustration only got worse. Rick hooked up with a nice cuttbow (we think) that put up a good fight and took big fish honors for the day.We didn’t measure or weigh the fish, but my guess is 20+ inches and around 3-3.5 pounds.It was a gorgeous fish with dark red gill-plates and a body covered with dark black spots.The fishing in the deep hole finally began to slow down and I knew Rick had fished it out, so we headed downstream a little further, but never found anymore deep holes to fish. We headed back upstream hoping to find that Corey had found a few deep holes to fish, but when we finally met up with him he announced that he was fishless just like me. We knew the fish were holding in the deeper holes, but there just wasn't any around with the water being low, so we made our way back to the jeep and drove down river a bit to find some deeper water. We ended up stopping right below Kemmerer Reservoir to fish the deep pool that was right below the dam. Rick had one hit with no hook up and Corey and I were left with the ugly skunk smell on our hands! By the time we made it back to the jeep the snow began to fly and dropped a few inches in less than a half hour. It made for a slow drive home, with cars off the side of the road and snow packed roads. Welcome to Wyoming! Rick ended up catching about 8-9 fish and proved that his fly fishing skills trump my beginner skills tenfold! The weather and fishing were miserable and I probably never should have left the house feeling the way I did, but looking back on it, I’m glad I got up there!

Ricks Secret on the Bear

2010-10-10T09:45:00.002-06:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.
Weather: Sunny, no wind, 60’s
Moon Phase: 11% Moon
Location: Bear River
Water Temp: 52 degrees
Bait: Glow Bugs (egg pattern)
Who Went: Rick, Me

My fishing trip this weekend reminds me of the popular phrase, “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know.” I started fishing with Rick Everson about a year ago and we have shared ideas, fishing holes, and techniques that would take most fishermen a lifetime to learn. I have gained a lot of fishing knowledge from him including how to fly fish, and how to catch tiger musky through the ice, and I would like to think that he has learned a few things from me in return. Well today was my lucky day because Rick took me to his most sacred of all fishing holes up on the Bear River. I have waited almost a year for this trip because we wanted to make sure it was at the peak of the brown trout spawn, and we nailed it! At first sight the Bear River did not look capable of producing brown trout of any size, but boy was I wrong! We hiked down to the first good stretch of water and instantly saw fish on their spawning beds where they were tail slapping and rolling around in full spawning colors! I was in shock as we got closer and realized that there wasn’t a fish in the group less than 25 inches long!Rick let me work the first group and it wasn’t long before I worked out the rust on the old fly rod and landed my first fish of the day with this 25 inch, 5 ½ pound female with a belly full of eggs!I couldn’t believe it and I already thought my day couldn’t get any better, but once again, I was wrong! We worked a lot of good areas and missed a bunch of hook-sets and had fish spit our hooks consistently, but we also worked some more successful areas where we caught a few fish each and all were over the 24 inch mark and in the 5-7 pound range, with the biggest being this bruiser that Rick caught. We didn’t get a tape on him but he was a big hook jawed male that was probably around 27 inches long and around 7 pounds! I don’t know what my biggest fish of the day was, but it was probably another big male going around 26 inches and probably 6 pounds. The whole time I was fishing this river I felt like I was in heaven or living out a dream in my head. Fishing doesn’t get any better than what I experienced and I want to thank Rick for letting me in on an unbelievable untouched secret on the Bear River!

Antelope Hunt Turned Fishing Trip

2010-09-18T15:28:00.027-06:00

Fishing Time: Friday through Sunday
Weather: Perfect, clear and sunny
Moon Phase: 81% Moon
Location: Deep Creek, Fremont River, and Forsyth Reservoir
Bait: Jigs, Spinners, and Worms

Who Went: Mike, Kelly, Casey and Cy Hansen, My Dad, Me

Hunting season is here and my dad drew out for an antelope tag down on the Parker Mountain, near Loa, Utah. He invited me to go and I told him yes, but only because I knew the antelope hunt really meant a fishing trip on the Boulder Mountain. We got down to Torrey, Thursday night and after sitting around the fire talking about what great athletes we all were, we went to bed preparing to go fishing the next day. It was bright and early on Friday at about 1:00 p.m. when we finally left camp to go fish! My dad and his buddies are not the fastest moving bunch, and we debated on where to go forever, but with the recent struggles with my dad's health we knew we couldn’t go anywhere that involved hiking, and if you’ve ever fished on the Boulder Mountain you know that there are only a select few amount of lakes that you can drive to. The decision was finally made and we made the trek over to Deep Creek Lake on Thousand Lake Mountain. The fall colors were absolutely gorgeous and I snapped photos all the way up the mountain.Once we got to Deep Creek I loaded up my float tube with all my gear and made the short 100 yard walk to the lake. The lake is just as I remembered it and looked so cool with the quakies in full fall colors!I launched the tube and began casting and jigging an olive marabou jig working the shorelines and the middle of the lake. Soon after launching my tube, my dad made his way up the mountain and hiked to the far end of the lake where he slowly rigged up his famous worm and power nugget combo and casted only ten feet from the opposite shoreline. I continued to fish almost every inch of the lake without a bite and then looked over to see my dad reeling in a nice 15-16 inch Brook Trout with beautiful pre-spawn colors. We took a picture, sent him on his way, and went back to fishing. My old man still has the Brook Trout touch, but unfortunately it ended up being the only fish caught all day. Deep Creek holds some nice Brook Trout, but has never been known for giving away many fish. Saturday we woke up early and went looking for some antelope on the Parker Mountain. We were shocked and disappointed in how many hunters we saw and how few antelope were on the mountain. The DNR has removed a lot of antelope from the Parker to repopulate other areas of the state and it looks as if they may have taken a few too many. With a tough winter last year and the relocation program that’s taken place by the Division of Wildlife Resources, the antelope heards look like they have been obliterated. It didn’t help that they also combined what is usually an early hunt and a late hunt into one big hunt giving out over 300 tags, which made the mountain look like Disneyland with people everywhere! We were so discouraged that we didn’t even go back to hunt that evening, but went fishing instead. We ran over to the Fremont River to a spot where my dad loves to fish. I put my waders on and headed down river with thoughts of my last trip walking this same stretch of river and catching brown trout one after another. Unfortunately this trip was not a repeat and I only managed one bite and no fish! I couldn’t believe it, I've never been skunked on the Fremont River. The next day my dad and I stopped at Forsyth Reservoir for a quick cast or two before heading home. We both had bites and I had two tiger trout hooked that decided to spit my spinner back in my face. The fish were following my lure all the way to the shoreline, but I never could quite land one. Most people would think it’s a bummer of a fishing trip to not catch anything, and I would usually agree with them, but I don’t get out much with my old man anymore and especially to a place that is so beautiful it leaves you stunned at times. A good fishing trip that I won’t soon forget! Oh and Dad... I'm back as a Yankee fan!

Strawberry Hunt-n-Fish

2010-09-11T21:47:00.001-06:00

Fishing and Hunting Time: Friday through Sunday
Weather: Perfect, warm, no wind
Moon Phase: 15% Moon
Location: Soldier Creek Reservoir
Water Temp: 55 degrees
Bait: White tube jig tipped with worm
Who Went: Phil, Dax, Dick, Me

My cousin Phil drew out on the Wasatch Big Bull Elk Hunt this year and invited me to go with him to hunt the backside of Strawberry Reservoir over the weekend. My Uncle Dick went with us along with Phil’s son Dax who is 6 years old. I took the boat up there because my Uncle Dick knew of a hunting spot only accessible by boat or horse that he wanted us to try. I also had ulterior motives that we might be able to get in some fishing time! We drove up on Friday night but stopped short of Strawberry to Hunt a canyon near Daniels Summit. We spent all night in a blind listening to elk crash through the trees all around us, but never saw any come down to the watering hole we were watching. We hiked down in the dark and headed to my Uncle Dick’s buddies camp trailer where we spent the weekend. The next morning my cousin and I hiked down to a watering hole in the dark and then sat there until it was light enough to see. We waited there for about a half hour but didn’t hear or see anything so we wandered around the mountain into a large canyon. Just as we were about to lose hope my cousin spotted a four point elk wandering through the trees about 100 yards from us. We contemplated whether it was big enough to shoot, but decided it wasn’t. We hiked up and out of the canyon and met Dick and Dax by the road and headed back to the trailer. We asked Dax what he wanted to do for the afternoon and he adamantly said, “I want to go fishing!” He’s a kid after my own heart. We loaded up the fishing and hunting gear and headed down to the lake. We launched the boat and began fishing, but our spirits unfortunately weren’t as high about fishing as they normally are. Not only was it the worst time of day to fish, but we had been up at 5:00 a.m. hunting and hiking mountains, so we were wore out physically. Not Dax though, he was ready to fish and he was catching them all by himself with no help. I kept dozing off at the front of the boat and by 4:00 p.m. the hot sun had taken its toll and we decided to hit the mountain and find a shade tree to sit under while we waited for the elk to start to move. We pulled the boat up on shore and anchored it to a pine tree making sure it wouldn’t wander anywhere while we were gone, and then hiked up the mountain to our spot. We waited for three and a half hours watching this canyon without seeing or hearing a dang thing and decided to call it a night early so that we didn’t have to drive the boat back in the dark. Just as we were walking down the mountain to leave I took my binoculars and glassed a hill that was hidden from where I had just sat for hours. I saw two nice Bulls and a group of cows about a half mile up the canyon. We debated whether we would have enough time to get to them before dark, and decided to go for it. Phil and I ran up the mountain and got into a position where we felt we were pretty close to them. We got on the radio and called down to my Uncle Dick and asked him if the elk were still there. He told us they had wandered over the hill and no sooner after he said that we heard one of the bulls bugle and knew they were not close, so we called it a night. We went back to the trailer and ate more steak and potatoes than you should have in five sittings and then crashed! Next morning we all woke up early again, except Dax, he was not in the mood for another early wakeup call and Phil had to dress him in his sleep, but soon enough he was awake and ready to hunt again. I have to say that Dax is one of the coolest 6 year old kids I’ve been around. He’s not annoying like most kids his age who ask a million questions about nothing and never leave you alone. He kept up with us the whole trip and never complained while hiking or hunting, even when we sat there for four hours straight not making a sound and I felt like I was going to pull my own hair out. He just hung out like the big boys and even declined his coat when I thought I was going to freeze to death! What a little stud! I also learned quite a few baseball stats over the weekend because Dax’s favorite thing to do is look up baseball scores and stats via internet on his dad’s phone about his favorite team the Brave’s. I tried to recruit him over to the good side and route for the Yankees, but his dad’s pretty much got him brainwashed to be a lifelong Atlanta fan! This morning’s hunt started with Dick driving us around to all the spots where he has seen elk in the past. Dick rides horses up there religiously and knows every nook and cranny of those mountains, so he put us right where the elk were every morning and night. He pulled his truck off to the side of the road and parked it, and we hiked up and over a ridge to a lookout spot and instantly I spotted another bull sitting behind a bush. It was a good find and I felt pretty proud about it! We watched him for probably around a half hour debating whether he was a shooter or not, but came to the decision that it wasn’t quite big enough, and by then the sun was coming up and the day was getting hot, so we called the morning hunt complete and headed back to the trailer. I loaded my gear and got out of there. What a fun trip and good times hunting with the Bringhurst family. I love hiking and being in the mountains looking for big game. Fall is my favorite time of the year by far!

Just One of Those Trips

2010-08-07T16:38:00.002-06:00

Fishing Time: 7:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.
Weather: breezy, 90's
Moon Phase: 8% Moon
Location: Mantua, Newton
Bait: jig under bobber, swimbaits, plastic worms
Who Went: Bobber John, Me

Bobber John had an itch to go catch bluegills, and heard reports that Mantua Reservoir was producing them in large numbers. He pitched it to me with talk about good bass fishing as well, and as usual with talk of bass fishing and a new lake to explore, I bit on the sale. We got to the lake around 7:30 a.m. and were greeted with a windstorm and rain. The rain subsided, but the wind was off and on in all directions. It didn’t take long before Bobber John had a few bluegills in the boat, but I couldn’t find the bass. The fishing conditions were tough as the whole lake is full of moss reaching up to the surface, which makes it difficult to fish. After only one hour on the lake we began thinking of other places to fish near Mantua. After looking at the map, we decided to go somewhere a little off the beaten path and toward the Idaho border. Newton is a small reservoir that sits just north of Logan and it’s about 10 miles south of Idaho. It’s one of the only places that have Tiger Musky, and also offers a variety of other warm water species like bass and crappie. We got there around 11 and launched the boat at the only primitive launch ramp the lake has to offer. The skiers were out in full force and with the reservoir being approximately 150 yards wide, it made for an uncomfortable and rough afternoon. The sun also came up and it got very hot. We persevered through and continued casting the entire western shoreline hoping to land a bass or musky. I was throwing for musky and John was casting for bass. Halfway down the west shoreline John hooked into the only fish we landed at Newton with a small largemouth bass. The skiers and sun became too much and we made an executive decision to go home early and cut our losses. I got SKUNKED! It hasn’t happened a lot this year, but when it does it still stings! One cool thing that we did see at Newton though, was three different tiger musky surface and swim around with their head and part of their body completely out of the water. I have seen a northern pike do this as well at Yuba Reservoir, and it looks weird! Don’t know why they do it, but this was the closest we got to one all day. I also forgot my camera so no pictures, it just ended up being one of those kinds of trips!

Bobber John's Spotlight Moment

2010-07-24T11:38:00.013-06:00

Fishing Time: Sun-up to Sun-down

Weather: No wind, hot-90's

Moon Phase: 98% Moon

Location: Flaming Gorge - Linwood Bay

Water Temp: 66 degrees

Bait: 7-inch rainbow tube jig

Method: Inch-jig

Who Went: Bobber John, Rick, Me

After coming home from Flaming Gorge and flaunting the pictures of the lake trout we caught a couple weeks ago, my friends did everything they could to get me back up there and show them how it’s done. With limited time and conflicting schedules the only remedy was to do an extreme all day and one night trip. We left at 2:15 a.m. on Saturday morning and were on the lake by 6 a.m. With it being the 24th of July weekend I knew it was going to be busy, but I never expected the amount of fishing boats that were actually on the water. Luckily we got there early enough to get a head start on them. Just as it was starting to get busy, John landed the first lake trout he’s ever caught with a nice 24 pounder. He was ecstatic with the catch and is now addicted to lake trout fishing the same way I am. It took him 15-20 minutes to reel in and this is probably about 10 minutes longer than the normal fight for a 24 pound lake trout, so I thought it was going to be a 30+ pound fish, but it wasn’t to be. Either way it was a great fish and especially for your first lake trout ever! About an hour later John hooked up again and landed another lake trout, but this one was smaller at around 8 pounds! The presentation we used on this trip is what I call the inch-jig method and was taught to me by Captain Jim Williams. Jim is the best fishing guide Flaming Gorge has to offer and has taught me more about the big lake trout up there than I could have learned in a lifetime of fishing there. They are truly a difficult species to catch consistently, and I am not there yet, but I seem to get a little better each time I go. We finished the rest of the day without getting another hit and unfortunately Rick still hasn’t been lucky enough to enjoy the feeling of a big laker on the end of his line, but it will happen! The barrage of fishing boats on Flaming Gorge over the 24th is what I think killed the fishing, and I now realize why Captain Jim always tells me to run as far away from Flaming Gorge as you possibly can on a holiday weekend. Unfortunately for me, I have to go when I get the chance and can’t be picky choosy like he has the luxury of being! There was a considerable difference in the mood of the fish below us in the early morning hours on Saturday, compared to later in the day when there were 50 other boats dropping jigs on them. The fish showed no interest in our jigs once the clan of other fisherman showed up. Live and learn I suppose! We woke up early on Sunday and fished for 2 hours before we had to be home for other commitments, but the fish were still in a cranky mood and again I think it had to do with all the fishing pressure from the day before. We loaded up and were off the lake by 8 a.m. and home by 11:30. Now I’m being tortured everyday with the thought of when I will get back up there. I just hope it’s sooner rather than later!

Merry Christmas Flaming Gorge

2010-07-12T17:58:00.017-06:00

Fishing Time: Friday-Monday

Weather: Hot with thunderstorms

Moon Phase: New Moon

Location: Flaming Gorge

Water Temp: 65 degrees

Bait: 7-inch tube jigs

Who Went: JJ, Ed, Me

Flaming Gorge is probably one of my favorite lakes to fish, camp and boat. Lake Powell has always been number one in my heart, but Flaming Gorge is making a good push for the lead. One year ago in August my buddy JJ's dad Ed called me and asked if I knew any good guides for Lake Trout at Flaming Gorge. It was an easy question to answer as there is only one guide at Flamining Gorge I would recommend to anybody and that is Captain Jim Williams. No one knows lake trout at Flaming Gorge like he does. I asked Ed why he was inquiring of a guide service and he told me that he was going to book him as a Christmas present to surprise JJ with. I told him that was a great idea and left it at that. Christmas morning I woke up and went through the usual hoopla of gift exchanging and spending time with family when I got a phone call from JJ. I answered the phone and said "Merry Christmas, I bet it was a good one for you,"and he replied back and said, "it's about to be for you too!" I asked him what he meant and he told me that his dad paid for an extra spot on the boat with the guide so that JJ could invite a buddy to go with him. I was that buddy! It was a long wait but we finally made it to that magical date of Monday July 12, 2010. Of course we had to go up early and spend the weekend fishing before going out with the guide on Monday. We got there Friday night and within 5 minutes of being at camp we were already on the water. Friday was more of a find fish evening and no lake trout were landed, but we did get a good idea on where they were hanging out. Saturday was just one of those days that stick in your craw for awhile because we didn't get a hit all day long. We saw tons of fish and had them interested but they just wouldn't take the bait! By Saturday night I was pretty bummed out and I gave my dad a call to give him the report. He did his best to keep me in good spirits by telling me it was just one of those days and that tomorrow would be better. He helped my confidence by telling me he knew I could catch them because I have helped him and his buddy Mike catch them last year. It revived me a bit and I got a good nights rest and we were on the water again by 6:00 a.m. Sunday morning started just like Saturday with no bites and by 9:00 a.m. my hopes began to fade. Then I saw a racing mackinaw on my fish finder coming straight for my jig, I prepared for him to do as the rest of them had done and come up fast to take a look and then head on back down to the bottom, but this time he hammered my jig and I set the hook. JJ was taking a nap and I yelled fish on! It was a good but short fight until I landed this 9 pound mack. Soon after letting the 9 pounder go I got hit again and pulled in a small 3-4 pound lake trout. This was it for the day, but at least we didn't get lake trout skunked. We did get to spend some time bass fishing, but I mostly caught rainbows. I put on a small crankbait and couldn't keep the rainbows off. They were nice healthy 17 inchers and fought well. We caught a few bass as well, but with all the storms rolling in and out all day I think it effected the bass fishing drastically.JJ began to wonder if we would even catch lake trout with our guide and I laughed at him and said, "you haven't met Captain Jim Williams!" This guy has spent 30 years perfecting techniques that will catch big lake trout at Flaming Gorge. JJ was biteless for lake trout for the entire weekend and he was pretty discouraged about it. Monday morning came around and I promised him that this was his day to land a big laker! He said all he wanted was a bite! We got on the water with the guide and we instantly started seeing fish everywhere! This guide knows exactly where to go and where the fish are at all times of the year. Ed was the first to get hit, and in fact he got 3 hits in a row, but couldn't quite put anything in the boat. I was the next to get hit and landed this 18 pound lake trout.

Soon after letting this one go, JJ finally got his hit he desperately wanted and landed the biggest fish he's ever caught in his life with this 22 pound laker!It was 10:00 a.m. by this time and we had two nice fish in the boat. Captain Jim is unbelievable at how he has you sitting on top of fish all morning long. I think that is the biggest difference between him and myself. I can master the methods needed to land them, but he knows the lake so well and always has you sitting on top of fish, while I have to do a little more searching in order to find them. I guess thats the advantage he has being out there everyday, and doing this for 30 years! It was a good trip as usual at the gorge and all I can think about is when I get to go back. I will leave you with pictures of all the storms we endured over the weekend. We never did get to much rain or wind so the storms were nice as they kept it cool and bearable.

Chasing the State Record at Yuba

2010-06-26T16:13:00.003-06:00

Fishing Time: 6:30 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.

Weather: Windy, high 80's

Moon Phase: Full Moon

Location: Yuba Reservoir, Utah Lake

Water Temp: Yuba - 65 F, Utah Lake - 78 F

Bait: Yuba - Swimbaits and Tubes, Utah Lake - carp meat

Who Went: JJ, Rick, Me

It’s late June and I just barely made my first trip to Yuba Reservoir. A lot of it has been weather induced, but some of it has been the fact that I am just plain busy! Two kids is a life changer and I don’t mean that in a bad way! I have absolutely loved the new improved life with children, but it has put a slight damper on the amount of fishing trips this year. Well today we were finally on our way down there leaving my house at 4:30 a.m., and at the lake by 6:30 a.m. The weather looked perfect and we were very excited to get on the water. I put on my new found favorite lure for Yuba Pike that has now since made headlines in the daily herald, the mighty weedless swimbait. I rigged JJ with the same set up and Rick put one on as well all in different colors. We began the casting game for almost two straight hours with no bites. Just as our spirits were starting to head downhill I saw a large black object come out from the weedline and slam my swimbait. I yelled to Rick and JJ that I had fish on, but I assured them not to get too excited as it was just an average fish. This pike didn’t fight like most others that I’ve caught with the head shakes and aggressive jerks, he just began swimming to the side with constant pressure and I figured it was going to be an easy land and release. The pike slowly made his way to the surface and we all got to take a good look at him and this is where it all changed. It was a monster! At first sight I thought I was about to put myself in the state record books. I began to get very nervous about losing this big guy and Rick didn’t help calm my nerves as he told me it didn’t look like I had him hooked very well! Of course this is when the big fish went into fight mode realizing that he wanted nothing to do with entering my boat! It was a very good, nervous and fairly short fight until we finally got a net on him and even then only his head would fit, but at least he was secured. Rick helped me get the hook out then measure and weigh this beast and he came out at 42 inches long and 19 pounds! The state record is 43 inches long and 24 pounds. Either way it was a fish of a lifetime and I was very excited to say the least. We took a bunch of photos with me and the pike and then let him swim away for others to enjoy. Many people have asked me how I let a fish of that magnitude swim away and not bring it home, and the answer to that question is easy. A fish that old and big is not going to be worth eating because the meat is tough and it will taste very poor, but the number one reason I didn’t keep it is because even if I decided to get this fish mounted down the road, I already have everything I need. I have measurements along with the weight, and I have great pictures that show the detail and color of this fish. With the amazing detail that taxidermists can do with replica mounts compared to skin mounts, I prefer them anyway. Big fish do not have to be killed just so you can go home and show it to your neighbor and then throw it in the freezer for two years before it gets freezer burned and you end up throwing it away. Let the fish go and someone else might get to experience the same enjoyment you did reeling in a fish of that caliber. Not to mention the good fish karma it produces for the future:). Okay now that I’m off my soap box back to the fishing. I had another pike hit a couple hours later that instantly snapped my line. This is not uncommon when fishing for pike using monofilament line, but I was using 30 pound test, steel leader! My only thought is the fish must have swam head on to my bait and over shot it running right into my monofilament line above my steel leader. With big pike teeth it will snap monofilament line instantly. Frustrating but just part of the esox game. After getting that hit it went stagnant for another two hours and the concentration started to slip. Rick began fishing for walleye and I started rigging something for pike that I had always wanted to try, but never have. From my experience it seems that the pike like a slow retrieve, but with a swimbait you can only go so slowly before you begin to lose the action that the swimbait was designed for. So I started thinking about tube jigs. They work for every other fish and you can rig them weedless and fish them as slow as you want! The only difference is these are not your regular tube jigs I’m using, they are 7 inch long tora tubes that most fish wouldn’t dream about eating! After perfecting the rig we decided to try one more run down the shoreline for pike, and on my first cast with the tora tube jig I had a pike on! I couldn’t believe it and I began wondering if I had found the ultimate secret for pike at Yuba! This pike ended up getting off before being landed and it was a fairly nice pike. Rick and I laughed when JJ referred to this one as a little guy! I think I ruined JJ for life on pike fishing, because the first one he’s ever seen was not far off the state record! I continued casting that tube jig for about a half hour with no more bites, but by then the wind was really bad and our fishing was going downhill fast, so I still have faith that this method might work just yet! With the wind and boat traffic at Yuba we decided that we would call it a half day and hit Utah Lake for an evening run on channel catfish! We were on Utah Lake by 5:00 p.m., but the wind had only gotten worse and Utah Lake is not the most enjoyable lake to be on when the wind is blowing. We slowly made our way out to Bird Island through the 4 foot swells and surprisingly were able to anchor up with no problems. We landed quite a few channel catfish and Rick had the hot hand of the evening. He landed his largest catfish ever which was a very nice 10 lb female whose belly looked like it was going to explode! The waves got so bad that JJ started getting sea sick and I could tell he was looking forward to ending the night a little early. We ended up fighting the waves for another hour or so, but left short of night fall. The fishing was actually really good for channels and I bet if our boat wasn’t rocking like crazy we probably would have felt more bites and caught a lot more fish, but oh well! What a good day of fishing and I caught a fish that I will never forget!

"Everything is bigger in Texas"

2010-06-13T22:13:00.045-06:00

Fishing Time: Thursday through Tuesday
Weather: Windy, some rain and hot
Location: Lake Amistad and The Gulf in Texas
Who Went: Hunt and his family, Me

I can now attest that the title of this post is true. Everything from their southern accents and attitudes, to football and BBQ just seems larger than life. I must have passed a thousand different Barbecue joints as I traveled across Texas and not one of them shared the same name! I ate at three Texas BBQ Restaurants while being there and it was the best I’ve ever had! Hunt and his family picked me up from the San Antonio airport Thursday evening and we headed straight over to the famous riverwalk and dined on some good ole Texas BBQ. The riverwalk was alright, but I felt it was a little overrated. I pictured a large river like the Rio Grande running right through the city’s epicenter, but this is not the case. The river is manmade by concrete and fed by reclaimed water from the city’s sewer effluent. It does go right through downtown though, and the big trees that line the sidewalks did add some luster. The restaurant we ate at was called The County Line, and made up for my riverwalk disappointment. There is no shortage of meat in Texas and they aim to prove it to you! It was some good eats and a very enjoyable first night in Texas. This was my first time visiting the south and I must say I was shocked by a couple things. 1) I didn’t meet one person in Texas that didn’t bring up the name Barrack Obama on their own free will and then go on to tell me there discontent with him and the outlook of this country. 2) This was my first personal account that racism still lives. My vocabulary was educated with every slang word you could ever imagine to describe other races, and it was very sad! Once I got over the shock of these two things, I did notice there is such a thing as southern hospitality. Hunt’s dad Asa and his wife Donna treated me like I was there own. They offered their beautiful home, car, and they wouldn’t let me pay for a thing! Also staying with Hunt’s family was his Grandpa Ray who is 90 years old and has the health of a 70 year old. He came on our fishing trip and stayed step for step with us the whole time, it was amazing and he was an awesome guy with great stories. The Hunt family all made it a very enjoyable stay in San Antonio. The next morning Hunt’s Uncle John and Nephew Luke were at the house by 8:00 a.m. We ate a great breakfast made by Donna, while overlooking the lake (just flooded and thats why it's so brown) on the back of their house and then we took a drive up the road to check the other lakes around town to look at what the flooding had damaged. We also stopped at the bait shop to take a look at their live bait selection. Only in texas would you find this...

On the way to the other lake we noticed a sweet little Texas hunting vehicle that we couldn't resist getting a picture of. Imagine that there was empty Miller Lite cans all over in the back! The only damage we could find on any of the lakes was a few bent light poles and this dry docked pontoon boat. We all caravanned in Uncle John’s Chevy Suburban and I spent the whole 3 hour drive in the back seat with Luke who is 12 years old. I don’t think my ears ever got a rest as he talked to me about fishing the whole time. I’ve never met a 12 year old kid with so much enthusiasm about fishing and hunting, and I hope that my kids will share this same attitude towards the outdoors as Luke does. We arrived in the town of Del Rio three hours later and stayed in a rundown hotel right next to Lake Amistad. I took pictures of our room and the two dead scorpions that were on the bathroom floor. It made you think twice about using the restroom in the middle of the night. Before checking in to our room we went straight to the tackle shop that was next door to the hotel and I was amazed at the selection of bass fishing plastics they offer in Texas. Everything was 3 times the size of gear we use in Utah. This is when I realized there must be some big bass in this lake. I took a picture of a plastic worm that I use in Utah compared to the ones they use in Texas and it blew my mind! See for yourself…The next morning we were on the lake at sun up and met our guide for the day. Of course my bad weather luck followed me from Utah and the lake was socked in with rain clouds and wind. It’s a different kind of rain than what I’m used to in Utah, the rain was more of a mist and the temperature was still around 80 degrees, so it had no chance of keeping us from fishing. The guide was upfront and explained how this cold front would affect fishing, but we would just had to fight through it and find the fish! We started motoring out into the lake and the first thing that jumped out to me was how much cover was in this lake. There was grass everywhere and the whole lake was full of underwater bushes and trees. The only way to fish this lake is weedless and we started off fishing topwater poppers, but didn’t have any success. We then switched to a super fluke rigged weedless of course, but still could not put anything in the boat. We made our way back into a bay full of cover and tree lined shores where we rigged a monster senko worm like shown in the picture above and this is when Hunt showed that he was going to have the hot hand of the trip. He started putting small largemouth bass in the boat right away. I started my trip off by landing one of the smallest bass I have ever caught. Not exactly what I dreamed about fishing in Texas, but it was a start. We caught quite a few bass in this cove and we had a great time. Our guide had the strongest southern accent I have ever heard and loved to tell stories. When I could understand what he was saying the stories were pretty good, but I was mainly focusing on the fishing. Later in the day our guide took us to a place where our chances increased to land bigger bass and that’s exactly what happened. I had a hit that about pulled my pole into the water and I had thoughts of pulling an 8 pound largemouth to the boat. I was shocked when I pulled in the feistiest 2 pound bass I have ever caught. I will tell you that the bass in this lake fought with a vengeance and put Utah bass to shame. Then Hunt had a good hit and put a 5 pound largemouth right next to the boat before the bass graciously spit the hook back at him and went back down to the bottom of the lake. Our first day out was full of adventure and good times with quite a few bass caught, but no Texas monsters. At the end of the day we probed our guide for information about where to fish from shore later that evening and what to use. He gave us some good info and that night is what made our trip. We only landed one fish from his shoreline spot, but it was the biggest freshwater fish that Hunt has ever caught, excluding sturgeon. After a long drawn out fight and some close calls we were able to land Hunt’s 6 pound largemouth! Hunt was very excited and I was thinking to myself, this is what we came to Texas for! The next day on the water we had better weather and were in high spirits to catch something big. It didn’t end up happening, but we did put about 12 bass in the boat. We only fished for half a day and then we were off towards the coast in Galveston where Uncle John had a 26 foot waiting for us to fish the Gulf of Mexico. We dropped Hunt’s dad and Grandpa Ray off in San Antonio and rented a car to drive the rest of the 7 hour road trip to the coast. Hunt being single now, couldn’t resist spitting his charm with the girl at Enterprise so I took a picture of his game in action. He forgot to look at her left ring finger because it was decorated with a lovely diamond ring, so we left Christi at Enterprise and headed out on the open roads of the biggest state in the lower 48. The drive across Texas was very flat with bass ponds and BBQ joints every 100 yards. We drove through downtown Houston as I had never been there and then made our way on to Galveston and checked into our room. After checking in, Hunt drove me around the town of Galveston showing me all the torn up buildings that occurred from Hurricane Ike back in 2008. The town was not the quaint little coastal town that I had pictured in my mind. It had been hit hard by the hurricane and the buildings were in bad shape. It’s also a town known for oil and there were refineries everywhere which doesn’t do much for scenery, but the gulf was there and I was ready to fish. We met Uncle John and Luke down at the docks early the next morning with thoughts of running offshore up to 60 miles to get into some good ocean fishing, but my bad weather luck followed me as usual and the gulf had 5-8 foot swells making it impossible to go too far in a 26 foot boat. We did what we could, but only made it about 20 miles offshore to fish a few of the many oil rig platforms that sit off the coast of Galveston. This time it was my turn with the hot hand as I started landing 3 foot blacktip sharks on almost every cast. Hunt and Luke got in on the action with a couple sharks as well. Then I laid into what I could tell was a good fish. It took me about 15 minutes of fighting until we had a 5 foot shark next to the boat. Uncle John tried 5 times to get this thing in the boat, but the shark wasn’t having it. On the fifth try the shark bit right through my steel leader and swam off into the ocean. I didn’t get my picture with a 5 foot shark, but Luke did film me fighting it and Hunt snapped a few photos of the shark while it was on the side of the boat. We finally got bored catching shark and decided to go on a search for different species of fish, but it was a tough day on the water. It didn’t matter because I was happy as I landed the biggest fish I have ever caught! Once we got off the boat from ocean fishing I realized how hard on the body ocean fishing is. You’re constantly fighting to keep your balance in the rough seas, and the saltwater and hot sun takes it all out of you. We all took a quick shower back at our hotel and went to dinner at a nice seafood restaurant right on the beach, Uncle John’s treat! Hunt’s family was unbelievable and treated me to a trip that I will never forget. Hunt and I were so beat from the day that we didn’t even have the energy to go out on our last night of the trip and were in bed by 10:30. We woke up the next morning and made the 4 hour drive back to San Antonio Airport, but not before we stopped to eat barbecue one last time. It was one of the funnest trips I have ever been on and I can’t thank Hunt and his family enough. Hunt used his skymiles to get me there and his family took care of me every minute I was there. I spent 400 dollars on a trip that would have cost me a couple grand easy. I spent 4 days in Texas with two of those days being guided on one of the best bass fishing lakes Texas has to offer! Then I got to spend another day on the Gulf of Mexico fishing the ocean guided by Uncle John. It was a trip that can’t be beat, but hey, I will try! Hey Hunt where we going next year ha ha!

Bobber John Finally Gets to Pelican

2010-05-28T15:46:00.011-06:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m.

Weather: WINDY, 80's

Moon Phase: 99% Moon

Location: Pelican Lake

Water Temp: 60 degrees

Bait: Jig tipped with worm under a bobber, drop-shot with roboworm

Who Went: Bobber John, Me

My buddy who was formally nicknamed "Johnny Leach" but is now being referred to as "Bobber John", is always boasting about the monster bluegill that he catches back east in Ohio where he’s from. He always asks me, “Where can we go to catch Bluegills that big in Utah?” Well today was the day I proved to him that there is at least one place to catch them like that! Only problem is it’s a 31/2 hour drive away towards Vernal, Utah and you have to have a boat to fish it! If you were to Google Pelican Lake it would tell you that it’s one of the premiere Bluegill fisheries in the country, producing Utah’s state record for catch and release at 2 lbs 7 oz. It also holds the state catch and release record for Green Sunfish which is a close relative to the Bluegill. I took Bobber John to Pelican last year, but due to very cold and rainy weather and not having a boat, we were unsuccessful. Today was the day I was going to show him what Pelican Lake is really like. We were on the road at 3:30 a.m. and the 31/2 hour trip seemed to fly by like most our trips, we talked fishing and “Arizona Politics” the whole way there. We arrived to the lake with blue skies and only a slight breeze. John picked the first location that he thought might hold some Bluegill, and he picked right! He instantly started catching them one after another. At one point he turned and looked at me and said “dude this is as good as or better than Michigan!” He told me later that it wasn’t quite as good as Michigan, but it was a close second. Must have been the excitement in the moment?! We continued to catch Bluegill until it finally started to cool off a bit with us now only landing one about every 5-10 minutes. This is when I talked Bobber John into fishing for Largemouth Bass instead of Bluegill, which is what I really went to Pelican Lake to fish for. I was about 20 minutes into bass fishing and landed four small bass when the weather went from perfect to crazy. The wind blanket hit and we were getting gusts up to 40 mph. It put a quick stop to the bass fishing because I couldn’t hold the boat steady forcing us to anchor and bobber fish for Bluegill again. This didn’t really hurt Bobber Johns feelings and we put about 5 or 6 more in the boat, but the wind became too much to handle! We reluctantly loaded the boat on the trailer and decided to drive towards home and see if the wind would die down as we approached Starvation Reservoir. As we approached Starvation the wind was still whipping, and the lake was the windiest I have ever seen it!

No one was out there on a boat and I wasn’t going to be the idiot to try it. The benefit about Starvation is it has a fish cleaning station which we utilized to clean the Largemouth Bass and Bluegill we kept from Pelican.

It took us at least an hour to fillet the fish and the wind made it difficult the whole time. When we got done we hit the road again towards home with the thoughts of fishing Soldier Creek Reservoir, but when we reached the lake we were told by two fishermen they had been out all day and only caught one fish between them. It was also beginning to rain and the air began to get cold so we called it a trip and headed for home. I did drive Bobber John down to the dam to show him the Strawberry River that comes out and how beautiful it is. It seemed disappointing to drive all the way to Pelican Lake only to get a couple hours of good fishing in, but in Bobber John’s mind it was one of the most successful trips he felt he had been on since being in Utah. Either way it was a fun trip and the drive is usually half the fun. I love seeing new scenery and talking about the struggles and triumphs that life brings us!

Are You Really Gonna Launch That Boat Here?

2010-05-08T10:03:00.000-06:00

Fishing Time: 3:00 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.
Weather: cloudy, 60's
Moon Phase: 26% Moon
Location: Utah Lake
Water Temp: 63 degrees
Bait: Curly tailed grubs, drop-shot, worm under bobber
Who Went: Hunt, Robbie, Dave (Robbies Uncle), Me

My buddy Hunt was in town from Portland this weekend and my other buddy Robbie Collins that I haven't seen in years wanted to hit Utah Lake this weekend, and they didn't have to twist my arm to much to get me out. Robbie has a favorite spot on Utah lake that I have fished many times in the past from shore or float tube, but never from a boat. His honey hole is in Springville where the river runs underneath the freeway and out through a huge marshland full of reeds and into Utah Lake. I questioned Robbie many times before we actually headed down there, because I've never seen a boat like mine launched from this spot. There is a small primitive boat ramp entering the marsh where many small aluminum boats launch with no problems and this is where Robbie and his uncle were going to launch there 14 footer.

He assured me that he has seen many boats launch there that are bigger than mine. Funny thing is he's never seen my boat, so already I was a little nervous. I pulled my boat down a long bumpy dirt road to the boat ramp to find about 10 boats all trying to launch at this small primitive boat ramp at the same time. Every boat that I saw was a small 14 foot aluminum worth no more than 500 dollars (as seen in the picture above)! As Hunt was backing me into the water to launch the whole parking lot stopped and turned to watch me. One guy yelled to me, "are you really gonna launch that boat here? why don't you take that thing to a real boat ramp?" Another guy ran over and started telling me that what I was doing was not the best idea and that there are a lot of underwater objects that my motor would surely hit! I don't think any of them noticed that I have a trolling motor on the front of the boat and I didn't even need to use my big motor so I wasn't as worried as they were, but they were starting to get me a little nervous. Once in the water and on my way down the small river I got even more weary because it was very narrow and you have other boats trying to pass by with shallow water as low as 1.5 feet.

We just took it slow and finally made it to the mouth of Utah lake where it was a whopping 5 feet deep. We anchored up next to Robbie and his uncle and the fishing began! During a normal year the white bass should be in total spawn mode right now and the fishing would be stellar. Like most my trips this year so far, this one wasn't to be. We threw for about an hour and neither boat landed a fish. We then got lazy and started to catfish and talk about the old days when we all used to go to college and live together. We didn't catch one catfish and the final tally for the day was Robbie's boat with one white bass and my boat with one white bass for a total of two fish! The continuing cold weather this year has put a huge damper on whats supposed to be the hottest fishing of the year! This weather is killing me! That will be the last time I launch my boat there, I marked a waypoint on my gps of where the entrance of the river is and can now reach it from the main lake. You gotta love gps!

It's Been a Long Time

2010-05-01T14:04:00.002-06:00

Fishing Time: 1:00 p.m. to 2:30 p.m.
Weather: Rain, clouds, 50's
Moon Phase: 88% Moon
Location: Goshen Warm Springs
Bait: Double tailed grub, drop shot with roboworm
Who Went: John, Me
The month of May is starting off as cold as April was, with storms throughout the week bringing snow and rain often. The warm water fishing has been affected tremendously as the water temperatures have stayed low and the weather patterns have been very unsettled. This is usually the time of year when most waters in Utah begin to warm up and the fishing is off the charts, but not this year. The weather has backed up the schedule and who can tell when the weather will finally give us a breath of fresh air and sunshine! With most the waters I love to fish this time of year being slow and unproductive, I decided to make a visit to a small pond that I haven’t seen in 6 years. The Goshen Warm Springs is a group of three natural geothermal warm spring ponds where temperatures stay a mild 60 degrees year round! With rain in the forecast today I figured this might be a spot that won’t be affected by lowering water temperatures and barometric pressure. The last time I fished here I landed 8 nice largemouths in the third and last pond going in sequential order from the parking area, and with my polarized sunglasses I could see bass swimming all over this shallow yet crystal clear pond, including some very nice sized ones. The only issue that’s kept me from fishing this area the last few years is the fact that is was closed to the public approximately 6 or 7 years ago. The reason for its closure is adjacent to these warm spring ponds is an old ore mine with tailings that have leached heavy metals into the water of these ponds. It was once a very popular swimming hole for the locals of this area and in order to keep people from swimming in the metal infested waters they had to shut it down completely to the public. This being the case, its closure has only spiked my interest in fishing there even more, because I know that no one has been fishing it, and the potential for some very large bass has my head spinning!!! I invited my buddy Johnny Leach to go check it out with me and we were fully prepared to take our trespassing tickets like a man if we were to be caught, but with six years of dreaming and thinking about the size of fish that might be growing in this pond without the predation of man, I couldn’t overturn my curiosity now, even if there was a cop sitting at the front gates when we arrived! We reached the entrance into the wildlife area midday and were greeted by a big no trespassing sign and an old Warm Springs sign that had been spray painted CLOSED! The signs made us a little weary, but we were there now with nobody in sight. We quickly rigged our poles and made our way down the overgrown trail to the first pond. I told John about how there used to be bluegill in this pond and that the kids who swam here in the past would spend hours fishing for them in the crystal clear water only to be disappointed by the intelligent bluegill that knew better than to take their offerings. We didn’t see any bluegill today and the only fish we saw were four large carp swimming in a marching line from one brush pile to another. We swiftly made our way past the second pond as I don’t ever remember seeing fish in this pond and today seemed to be no different. Once we arrived to the third and final pond I put on my polarized glasses and began to scan my eyes across the areas where the bass seemed to live 6 years ago.
John kept waiting for me to say okay found them, but it never came. I began wondering where all the fish have went. I walked around a marshy area to another spot where I use to find bass and this time I saw one fish that began to swim away upon seeing me approaching. I told John to cast right out in front of where the fish seemed to be heading and as soon as his double tail jig hit the water he hooked up with this bass. It was a small but healthy looking fish and we took a quick picture and let him go. Upon release the bass swam slowly toward a shallow area and sat there appearing to rest after the big ordeal. For fun, John and I decided to cast to him again and see if he would bite, but the small bass would only turn and stare at our bait as it fluttered by. I finally made the perfect cast and put my bait one inch from the fish’s mouth and let it sit there for several seconds. I soon saw him suck my plastic in like a vacuum. I prematurely set the hook like I have so many times in the past while sight fishing, making the mistake of going off a visual instead of feel. I had him on for a split second until the hook popped free from his mouth. The fish did not startle at all and went right back to the same shallow area he was before. We casted at him for another 10 minutes before realizing he had enough and wasn’t going to make a mistake for a third time. We continued our way around the small pond making a few casts, but never again seeing another bass. I have no explanation of how or why that many bass have disappeared from this pond. Maybe the metals got to be too highly concentrated for even the fish to live, or maybe the locals disregarded the closed signs like we did and have finally fished out the small pond. I don’t know the reason, but it makes me sad to see another small bass fishery bite the dust! We took the Lincoln Beach road around West Mountain on the way home and stopped at a few spots only to get rained out or bored from the slow fishing. It looks as if we will have to wait out this bizarre weather for the fishing to pick up. I sure hope it’s soon!

Funny Story About Yuba

2010-04-13T22:13:00.001-06:00

I had to share this funny story with my readers. If you read my last post, I talk about the volunteering I did with the DNR, gill netting down at Yuba Reservoir. I also talk about how well I got along with the warm water fisheries coordinator Drew Cushing, and how he really liked some of my ideas about how to fish Yuba Reservoir. I didn't think much about the conversations I had with Drew that day or with any of the other biologists, but I do remember thinking to myself that I felt like I knew more about the pike fishing at Yuba then they did as the managing biologists of the reservoir! With this said, you have to read this article from The Daily Herald that was sent to me from the Rocky Mountain Anglers Group that I'm a member of. Based off my last post you should get a kick out of it. It is almost word for word what I told Drew in our conversations during that day. So when you think your getting great fishing advice from our very "knowledgeable," state fisheries biologists, you now know that most of their information is nothing but word of mouth from local fisherman like me!

/ Utah News, Sports, Events - Daily Herald Newspaper / Utah Valley Sports News Daily Herald / Recreation / Water-activities / Fishing
ALLPHIN: The new Yuba offers great fishing
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Don Allphin - Herald Correspondent Posted: Tuesday, April 13, 2010 9:45 am No Comments Posted
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Yuba Reservoir, a popular impoundment located between Nephi and Scipio just off I-15, has been a hit-and-miss fishery for many years.
"It's just a big bathtub," said Drew Cushing of the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources. "The lack of structure has always been Yuba's problem. But now, we are developing healthy populations of three top-of-the-food-chain predator species that are doing very well."
Northern pike, walleye and yellow perch are all doing very well in Yuba, as a recent gill-netting survey is thought to prove.
"We're still analyzing the data," continued Cushing, "but early indications are that all the species in the reservoir are fat and very healthy. The northern pike are getting ready to spawn soon and the females are full of eggs and males are ripe as well. We are still not seeing quite as many walleyes as we hoped to see, but those we are catching are very healthy fish."
Although the recent gill netting survey didn't specifically target yellow perch, Cushing believes that the perch population is improving too.
"The perch spawn last year was great," he said. "In fact, all three species are prolific breeders and produce a lot of offspring. For that reason, we're taking a different approach to managing this fishery. In years past we've tried to protect the larger fish, thinking that was the best thing to do. But at this point, we're going to target the 'top end' (larger) fish which should provide for better survival rates for all three species."
Cushing is referring to the new regulations in place on Yuba that allow limits as follows: Walleyes - 10 fish with one over 24 inches; Northern pike - 10 fish of any size, and Perch - 50 fish.
It is hoped that anglers will remove some of the larger fish so that significant numbers of smaller fish will live long enough to grow up.
With water temperatures still in the low-to-mid 40s, anglers who target northern pike should slow down and fish swimbaits on or near the bottom.
"There is no question that the big northern are eating carp and so anything in a gold color will work," said Cushing. "Rattle traps, and swimbaits are my personal lures of choice."
Walleyes will take jigs, smaller swimbaits, lipped and lipless crankbaits and are right now beginning to spawn. Once again the key to catching walleyes is to slow down, watch your fish finder and put your presentation right in front of their mouths.
Perch are suckers for small tubes and small jigs. Many anglers opt to use a drop shot rig or a small jig tipped with a night crawler.
"Starting in the third week of April, fishing on Yuba should be super and will only get better and better," Cushing concluded. "The reservoir should fill up this year and that will translate into some great fishing opportunities as the flooded salt cedars will provide some much needed structure for all three sport fish species."
Take advantage of this unique opportunity to catch fish up to 40 inches in length just an hour south of Provo. Good luck, and please send me photos of your fishing success.

Volunteering at Yuba

2010-04-07T20:17:00.003-06:00

Three months ago I was approached by a fishing buddy who wanted me to join the Rocky Mountain Anglers Group (RMA). The RMA started about 30 years ago when a bunch of guys that didn't know how to catch walleye, got together and formed a group to help each other learn how to fish for this elusive species. Well, it worked! The RMA is known to have some of the most knowledgeable walleye fisherman in the Western United States. This being said, the fish that I have always had a very tough time consistently catching is walleye, and after only attending four meetings now, I already feel that I may be able to go out and target and catch this difficult yet rewarding species. Another great thing about the RMA is that they are very closely involved with most fishing events in the state of Utah, and also work together with the Division of Natural Resources (DNR) to help keep our fisheries as some of the best in the nation. All this being said, I had an unbelievable opportunity to volunteer and help the DNR do their annual gill netting and creel surveys on the walleye down at Yuba Reservoir. All I can say is, I missed my calling in life! Forget Geology, I should have studied Biology! I couldn't believe that these biologists could even consider this work. Seriously, I wish my boss would say to me one day, hey Chris what I want you to do is take these nets and hook the truck up to that boat and run down to Yuba Reservoir and catch as many walleye as you can in one day! Are you kidding me? Can you say dream job?!

I met the DNR at the docks at 9:00 a.m. and the weather was absolutely gorgeous! The lake was glass and the sun was shining. I met a great group of biologists that were all good guys, and I really lucked out to have Drew Cushing show up to gill net with us for the day. Drew is the Program Coordinator for all of the warmwater fish in Utah. Basically he is one of the head biologists in the state . I ended up shooting the breeze all day with Drew about my swimbait tactics and techniques I use to fish for pike at Yuba, and by the time we got to our vehicles to head for home, Drew and I stayed and talked fishing for another half hour. What a cool guy and a rarity as a biologist to be such an avid fisherman. Believe it or not, most fish biologists do not fish! Sounds crazy I know, but they truly are only biologists for the most part, and not fisherman. Anyway, after talking fishing all day and getting to know Drew, he asked me if he could go fishing with me in the near future. I was in awe that one of the top fish biologists in the state wants to ride on my boat and fish with me, so of course I told him I would love to. He gave me his contact info and said to call him in May and that we could head up to Willard Bay and fish, which is one of the reservoirs that he manages. How cool is this? Man am I excited.

As far as the netting at Yuba goes, it was a blast, but about all I learned is that I would never go to Yuba to target walleye. We caught fifteen walleye while dunking six nets and checking them each five times with an hour and a half inbetween sets. We also caught four pike, but no state record monsters like I was hoping. I took the picture above to prove there are actually walleye in Yuba, and the ones below are of the pike just because they are awesome!

On the way home from Yuba, I couldn't resist the nice weather and the fact that I already had my waders and fishing pole in the truck. I stopped by Lincoln Beach down by the "L", to see if I could land me a walleye on rod and reel instead of a 50 foot gill net. When I got there the lake was glass and I texted my buddy to tell him how nice the conditions were. Needless to say he did not believe me, so John this picture is for you. Told you, pure glass! I ended up combat fishing with all the walleye diehards, but it only took an hour of no bites and not seeing one boat or person land a fish, before my worn out body from a long day decided enough was enough. I hit the road for home dreaming about my next life as a fisheries biologist.

Coldwater Bassin at Lake Powell

2010-04-02T22:05:00.000-06:00

Fishing Time: Thursday evening through Saturday afternoon
Weather: cool, breezy, mostly 50's with cloud cover
Moon Phase: 85% Moon
Water Temp: 49-54 degrees
Location: Lake Powell
Bait: Everything, but best was christmas colored grub with 1/8 ounce jighead
Who Went: Bobber John, Rick Everson, Me

After missing my annual Lake Powell trip in 2009, I was really excited to get down there this year. I watched the weather hourly the whole week before our trip and of course the forecast looked great all through the week until Thursday when we planned to leave. These pictures show the summit in Spanish Fork Canyon on our drive down.

Multiple cars were going off the road and here we are trudging through the snow dragging my boat behind. I’m sure people thought we were nuts! Once we got out of the canyon the snow subsided, but the wind didn't. When we reached Hanksville, the wind was whipping from the North at about 30 mph! We started making backup plans just in case the water was too rough to travel in my boat packed with all our gear. As we made our way closer to the Hite Marina, where we launched my boat, the clouds split and the lights from heaven shined down upon us. The wind was gone and we anxiously pulled down to the primitive boat ramp of the old Hite Marina that is now long been dead due to low water years.

Our hearts began to beat fast in excitement to begin the trip we had waited through a long cold month of March to go on. Launching wasn’t easy as the boat was heavy with gear, and the launch ramp was very shallow. The boat didn’t want to release from the trailer, but with some effort and determination it finally gave, and we were on our way to find a camp spot. It didn’t take long to find a great camp spot with a nice natural boat slip, and we hurried to unpack our things and get camp set so that we could hit the water for some evening fishing.

Just as I was about to lay my tent down to set it up, I noticed there was a scorpion right next to my foot. Needless to say I found a new area to put my tent.

Once camp was set we headed out onto water that looked like glass, we were so excited because this was nothing like what we were expecting from the weather reports we had read the night before.

As I turned on the fish finder the water temp read 49 degrees and I was not too thrilled. That is very cold water for bass as they prefer 55-60 degrees at the very least! We didn’t put much thought into it and were just excited to be on Lake Powell on a beautiful evening with no wind or rain. We first headed into the back of White Canyon where we were camped. The water in White canyon was stained and muddy which helped warm the water a degree or two, but didn’t do much for the fishing. We soon figured that muddy water might not be the ticket on this trip and we were right. We headed down to two mile canyon and out of the muddy water. Here is where I landed the first bass of the trip with a decent little smallmouth. Soon after, I caught another bass but this time is was a largemouth. Rick and John were excited about me catching fish but were ready to get in on the action themselves, especially after my next cast. I casted right up against a rock island and instantly an explosion occurred. This bass came out of the water and began the tail dancing they are famous for. I didn’t realize her size until she became visible at the boat side. That’s when I started yelling, “get the net”! She was a beast, and had a big round belly on her, probably ready to spawn! She weighed in at just less than 5 pounds and made my trip the first night there!

Unfortunately for Rick and John my fishing bonanza didn’t stop there. I continued to put bass after bass into the boat and even one lone crappie. Rick did end up catching a couple that night, including this nice largemouth, but man did I have the hot hand of the evening.

We decided to invite the crappie, one largemouth and 4 smallmouth over for dinner that night and they were delicious! Of course I let big mama go to finish her spawn and keep the reservoir stocked with more of these awesome fish!

The next morning we woke up bright and early and headed south to Good Hope Bay in search of some walleye. We didn’t find the walleye, but we did find the stripers. Funny thing was, they were jumping all around us but we couldn’t find anything that they wanted. Rick finally landed the only striper of the trip while trolling with a large white curly tailed grub.

The stripers continued to frustrate us so we moved on to bass fishing and found that they were just as willing to bite as the night before! John got on the board first with a nice largemouth and continued to catch smallmouth on his favorite rig all throughout the day. John’s favorite rig was a jig tipped with worm underneath a slip-bobber, and although Rick and I gave him a little grief for using a method that we referred to as the five year old method, we all knew that its a very effective method for catching fish, but it was to much fun giving him crap about it! His nickname for the trip became Bobber John!

We fished long and hard all day Friday landing quite a few good sized smallmouth, with a good mix of largemouth as well.

The evening proved to be good for me again as I landed another nice largemouth in the 3 pound range and capped off the night with the only walleye of the trip, caught right before sundown!

It was a nice walleye and we had big plans for night fishing for some more walleye and catfish after dinner, but the wind came up and put a damper on that idea. Instead we took all the meat and vegetables we had on the trip and threw them in a big pot and boiled it all up and had some awesome stew around the campfire.

The last and final day we were there was our worst. The fishing was still decent, but the wind made for tough conditions controlling the boat. John caught a very nice largemouth that got off right at the boat, and has now grown from around 3 pounds to about 5 or 6. You know how it goes; the ones you lose are always the biggest! Rick landed a nice 3 pound bass right at the end of the trip putting him on the lunker board, and I landed a few more smallmouth.

Soon the wind just became to much and hesitantly we called the trip to an end. After we loaded our gear and got back to the Hite boat ramp, a guy informed Rick that the stripers were in the bay right across from the ramp. We toyed with the thought of unloading all our gear and going over there for a couple hours, but with the wind still blowing and all our gear already loaded, we decided against it.

What an unbelievable trip! We were some “fishin fools” down there, and well surpassed our expectations in the cold April waters of Lake Powell.

It was awesome fishing with two guys that are as crazy about the hobby as I am, and I can’t wait to do it again next year!

Heading South

2010-03-20T15:27:00.000-06:00

Fishing Time: 8:30 a.m. to 7:00 p.m.
Weather: warm, calm, high 60's
Moon Phase: 23% Moon
Water temp: 49-52.3 degrees
Location: Sand Hollow Reservoir
Bait: Everything, but drop shot with roboworm is what all fish were caught on
Who Went: Hunt, Me My buddy Hunt was in town this week from Portland and wanted to get away for the weekend and go fishing somewhere. We talked about places to go, but with most the lakes in the ice to no ice transition mode, we decided that we might as well head south to warmer weather. Sand Hollow, near St. George is the lake we decided on, and it holds nothing but largemouth bass and bluegill. I have heard a lot of good reports about some big bass down there and also about how beautiful the lake is resembling Lake Powell, on a much smaller scale of course. Well I can tell you that one of those reports is not true and that is that Sand Hollow resembles Lake Powell. As we pulled up to the reservoir we were very disappointed to find a catch basin in the middle of the sand dunes! It has one outcrop of red rock sandstone that is pretty cool, but besides that it was storage water held behind a big rock dike in the middle of some sand dunes! It also bordered the town of Hurricane and gave no feeling like you were getting away from the hustle and bustle of life. We were not allowed to camp on the lake and were forced to stay in a designated campground overlooking an empty subdivision that has obviously been humbled by the recent economy! We joked about the name of our camp spot and called it, the Sand Hollow Retreat overlooking the beautiful Sand Hollow Bluffs Subdivision. What a selling point that would be in their brochure! As far as the fishing, it ended up being about as productive as us finding a good camp spot! We found out from the camp host that the wind had been blowing for the last two days with gusts up to 85 mph and when we got there the good old american flag told us that the wind wasn't over yet. It was so bad we didn't even fish on Friday.This left the water temperature of the reservoir at a chilly 49 degrees on Saturday morning. There was also a bass tournament going on Saturday and the small reservoir was littered with boats. I only saw two bass caught by other boats all day long, and I only managed to catch a total of four. This was the first and smallest of the four I caught, but none were really picture worthy, all were under 2 pounds. Hunt had a rough day and didn't land any bass. I’ve heard that in mid April to May you can have 100 fish days on this reservoir so I would maybe return during that time frame, but it definitely wouldn’t be for the great camping or scenery that was rumored to be at this lake. We hit it wrong once again and I’m getting very tired of the weather not cooperating with the weekends that I go fishing. We did get gorgeous weather on Saturday and it made for a very peaceful day and evening on the lake, but the wind the previous three days in a row just killed the water temps and fishing. I’m headed to Lake Powell in two weeks and I’ve already started praying to the weather gods to let it shine, please let it shine!

My Little Fisher"wo"man is Here

2010-02-24T16:26:00.000-07:00

Fishing Time (birth): 8:26 p.m.
Weather: Snow, abnormally warm
Moon: Full Moon
Location: St. Marks Hospital
Bait(doctor): Dr. Carrie Sloan
Who Was There: Mom, Dad, Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles, and cousin Dakota
My best fishing day following my son’s birth happened today and arrived in an even smaller package than he did. My daughter and newest fishing partner, Addison Lynn Duncan, was born today at 8:26 p.m. She weighed 2 lb 14 oz and was 16 ½ inches long. She had a little more of a difficult start than my other little fisherman Devin did. She needed the ventilator to help her breath, and they also added surfactant to her lungs because she didn’t quite stay in moms belly long enough to naturally create it on her own, but beyond that, she has done great! I now have two little fishing buddies to share the water with and I couldn’t be more excited about it! Now I just have to start brain washing them at an early age of how important fishing and the outdoors are, and to enjoy and cherish every outing they go on with their old man!

Fremont Lake "part deux"

2010-01-30T17:11:00.000-07:00

Fishing Time: 7:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Weather: Perfect, clear, no wind, high 40's
Moon Phase: Full Moon
Location: Fremont Lake, Wyoming
Bait: Tube jigs tipped with chub meat
Who Went: Hunt, Dave, Newton, Scotty, Me
My annual Ice fishing trip with my buddies almost became a no show for me this year as Cari and I are both in a waiting game with her pregnancy. We have been told by the doctor that the baby should already be here, but every day at our ultrasound over at St. Marks Hospital, they tell us the baby is still hanging in there. This was the story again on Friday when they told us we were going to make it through another weekend. I took that as a doctor’s consent, and got the green light for fishing (I have an awesome wife). Just like that I was back in the game and we hit the road only to arrive at the lovely town of Pinedale, Wyoming on Friday night to pleasant cold temperatures in the low 20’s. For having a sign as you enter town that says, “Welcome to the Ice Box of the Nation,” low 20’s didn't seem too bad! The Lakeside Lodge where we stayed last year looked the same this year with a nice back porch right on the lake and two nice queen beds. Of course there were five of us, so naturally the little guy (me) got the floor. However, I came prepared this year and brought a nice big pad and sleeping bag. Fremont Lake welcomed us with this gorgeous sunset, and soon after with the biggest moon I have ever seen. Now on to the fishing… We woke up early and were walking on the ice before sunrise. I took this picture of our group with the same big moon behind them that was so beautiful the night before. We drilled our holes and got set up to fish as the sun began to make its way over the mountains. The weather was brisk, but the skies were clear with no wind, and we knew if we could hold on until the sun climbed over the hillside, it was going to be a beautiful day. Very few fish were seen on the electronics, which is the same story as last year, but we were hoping that if one did happen to show up, it would be a good sized one! I was the first one to have my rod bend, but it ended up being a small lake trout in the 18-20 inch range. The color on the lake trout at Fremont Lake are so much more dark and pronounced than the ones I’m used to catching at Flaming Gorge, so even though it was a small trout, it was still a victory in my book. After spending the rest of the morning without a bite, we decided to walk over to some locals that were ice fishing near us, to get the scoop on what this lake really has to offer. He was an elderly gentleman and was very cordial. He helped us out tremendously by giving up one of his favorite spots on the lake. Unfortunately, it was on the other side of the lake and we had to pack up everything and make a long move. When we got to our new spot we were excited we moved even before dropping a line in the water. This end of the lake was back in the deep pines and had a breath taking backdrop to enjoy while wetting a line. Soon after we started fishing, I got a hit and set the hook into what I thought was a very nice fish. Everyone gathered around and watched as the fish tore off line from my baitcaster reel and made some good runs. We were all very excited until the fish came to the surface and surprised us with its size. It was not the big fish we were expecting. On our drive over to our new spot my fishing pole must have gotten bumped and my drag became loose. I had it set very tight the night before so I thought for sure I had a really good fish on! Then to make matters worse the fish came off as I tried to pull it through my ice hole! We did get a good look at him though, and I would put him in the 5 or 6 pound class, then just as my fish came off, Dave hooked into one of his own. He was able to land his fish, and it was about the same size as the one I lost, but this one was generous enough to come out of the hole for a few mug shots. After the excitement was over, the fishing went back to being very poor and Hunt ended the night by landing one of the smallest lake trout I have ever seen, but at least he got on the board! Scotty and Newton were skunked for the second year in a row, and looked forward to getting off the ice! As the sun went down, Hunt and I sat on the tailgate of my truck and enjoyed the unbelievably gorgeous scenery the Wind River Mountain Range has to offer. We talked about how good life is when you’re in the mountains fishing, and you can forget about all the stresses of life by leaving them at home for a couple of days. If it wasn’t for these outdoor trips I think a man would go insane, but like all good things they must come to an end, and now I’m back home and dealing with the daily grind of wondering when our baby girl will enter this world! Uggh! When is the next trip?

Flaming Gorge Bust

2010-01-23T08:53:00.000-07:00

Fishing Time: 7:30 a.m. to 9:00 p.m.
Weather: WINDY! partly cloudy, warm high 40's
Moon Phase: 43% Moon
Location: Flaming Gorge Reservoir
Bait: Tube jigs tipped with minnow
Who Went: Rick, MeI was very excited to head up to the gorge this weekend and fish for trophy lake trout. Rick Everson and I got to the hotel in Green River, Wyoming on Friday night, and stayed up late rigging poles and arranging gear, so we could be ready bright and early in the morning. We only had two hours to dream about monster macks coming through our ice holes before the alarm clock went off, and the journey became reality. I wanted to fish Linwood Bay, but the reports said there was no ice that far south on the lake, so we settled on fishing a good looking hump near Buckboard Marina. We walked out onto the ice in the dark following the light of the gps. We carefully chose a spot on a topography map the night before and entered the gps coordinates in order to put ourselves in the exact area we wanted to fish. After a little over a mile walk we arrived, and started drilling holes and gearing up when a four wheeler came and stopped to talk. He asked how we found this spot and why we were there. I couldn't believe the arrogance in his voice and my blood started boiling. Long story short he ended up fishing right next to us. He was a local from Green River and actually ended up being a pretty nice guy, but I still wish he wouldn't have imposed on us. His fish finder started causing interference with Rick's fish finder and he kept trying to talk to me during the earliest part of the morning when fishing for big fish is the best! All I wanted to do was concentrate on fishing! You drive 3 hours to spend the night in a crappy hotel that costs you 60 bucks a night, and pay a lot of gas money for about 4 hours of prime time fishing! You have to take advantage of every minute of those 4 hours, so when someone drives their four wheeler over a mile out onto the ice just to shoot the breeze, it's hard not to be rude, but this seemed to be the omen for the trip. at 11:00 a.m. the wind came up and hit 20-30 mph and didn't stop the rest of the trip. Rick and I were stuck sitting in his ice shack all day long. Any time we tried to get out, the wind would start to blow the whole shack away! When evening hit, the wind died down to a nice breezy 20 mph and my patience was starting to run thin. It also just happened to be the weekend that the burbot bash was going on. The burbot bash is an event sponsored by BigFishTackle.com and they all came up to catch some burbot, barbecue and have a good time. There was close to 300 people and they were all probably as disappointed as we were with the weather. Rick and I wanted to fish for burbot, so we toughed it out and joined the burbot bashers. We caught a bunch of small lake trout, and only one small burbot! The trip was so miserable that the picture of the burbot is the only picture we took all trip! I don't call many trips to Flaming Gorge miserable, even when the weather is bad, but this trip took the cake. If you have ever been in true 30 mph winds then you know how miserable we were! Can't wait for a nice summer day up there with no wind at all!

Skunky Day on the Ice

2010-01-09T20:41:00.000-07:00

Fishing Time: 8:30 a.m to 1:30 p.m.
Weather: Warm, high 40's
Moon Phase: 26% Moon
Location/Bait: Willard Bay: small ice flies tipped with meal worm. I-80 Pond: "frozen minnows"
Who Went : John, JJ, Me
JJ called and asked if we could go fishing this Saturday, but he wanted to go somewhere new that we have never been before. He also didn't want to travel very far, so after some deep thought we decided on Willard Bay. Not many people ice fish Willard Bay and you don't hear many good reports from there, but we decided to try it anyway. To bad hind sight is 20/20, cause I wish we would have chose a different lake! We saw very few fish on our electronics, and didn't get any bites. By 10:00 a.m. we had about enough and started brainstorming on where we could fish on the way home if we ended the trip short at Willard. We finally came up with a crazy idea about ice fishing the I-80 ponds for largemouth bass. Of course I was down with the idea because these are the kind of wild trips that I live for. We all thought about it and finally agreed to pack up and make the trip. We picked up some special bait at the pet store on our way there, and I kept wondering whether it was going to be frozen enough to walk on, but we were pleasantly surprised to find the ice was a solid 4 inches and completely safe! The I-80 Pond is only about 5-6 feet deep and you could look down your ice hole and see the fish swimming around. We only saw a couple swim by, but it was pretty cool when we did. Needless to say our special bait didn't work and we ended the day with a big fat skunk. It was a fun day though, and its already got my mind daydreaming about how I can get the largemouth to bite through the ice! I guess I've got all summer to think about it. That's the great thing about fishing... there's always tomorrow!

Night Fishing Pineview

2010-01-07T16:34:00.000-07:00

Fishing Time: 6:00 p.m. to 1:00 a.m.

Weather: very cold and clear

Moon Phase: 46% Moon

Location: Pineview Reservoir

Ice Thickness: 8 inches

Bait: small minnow on a trebble hook below a split shot sinker

Who Went: Rick, Me

Rick and I fished Pineview Thursday after work for some late night Crappie fishing, and late is exactly what it ended up being. I knew I had to work the next day, but we still didn't get home til 3:00 a.m. Needless to say it was a rough day at work on Friday. We hiked out to a spot off Browning point near the island where we found 30 feet of water, it looked like a decent spot, so we started fishing. Our fish finders didn't show any fish for about an hour and we were not getting any bites, so we toughed the cold weather and made a move. We went out to deeper water in about 46 feet and found suspended Crappie showing up all over the fish finder. This got us pretty excited and we hurried to get the tent up and the heater going so we could start fishing. This is the first time since I have started ice fishing that I can honestly say I continuosly saw fish showing up on the fish finder for 4 hours straight and the fishing still wasn't good! We caught a few fish here and there, but for as many as we were seeing I thought it would be a lot better. Rick got us started with this nice Crappie that finally got us off the skunk list!It seemed like as the night went on the fish started giving in and biting more often, and I finally landed my first Crappie of the night.The fishing stayed somewhat consistent from the hours of 8 p.m. to midnight with us both landing around a couple an hour, but as soon as the clock hit 12:00 p.m. the fishing completely shut down. I would say we probably caught around a dozen total for the night. Rick took a few home for dinner. Biggest Crappie of the night was 13 inches. It was fun fishing at night, but I think next time I will do it when I don't have to wake up at 7:00 a.m. and work all day!

What's happening at the Berry

2009-12-26T22:25:00.000-07:00

Fishing Time: 7:30 a.m. to 4.00 p.m.

Weather: Cold, no wind, single digits

Moon Phase: 71% Moon

Location: Strawberry Reservoir

Ice Thickness: 12 inches

Bait: White tube jig tipped with minnow

Who Went: Hunt, JJ and his friend Dave, Newt and his friend Chris, Rick and his friend Chad, Me

Every year when I put up my new calendar I mark the 26th of December as "the best fishing day of the year". Strawberry Reservoir usually freezes right around Christmas day, and if you can time it right, which is usually around the 26th, the fishing can be rediculously good! I recorded my personal best at the berry on this day two years ago when I landed 51 cutthroat trout, including a nice 24 inch, 5 pound cutt. That being said, this morning started with great anxiety and anticipation to duplicate the years past. This year was a little different though, as temperatures have been very cold and Strawberry has been frozen for almost two weeks now, the ice has already felt the footprints of many fisherman hoping for the same success we have experienced. We got to Chicken Creek East early in the morning and walked out onto the ice in -11 temps before the sun started creeping over the mountains. We set up shop at an extending point where I have had a lot of success in the past. Once the fishing began I instantly hooked into my first trout of the day. Once released, I dropped my jig down again, and before it even got to the bottom I was already reeling in another one. This one was nice and probably hit the 4 pound mark. Thoughts of a great day started to enter my mind! I dropped my jig down again, but this time I sat there for an hour with no bites. To make matters worse, none of the other 7 guys I was fishing with had any bites either! We decided to go on a fish hunt and hiked close to another half mile out to the island to see if the unchartered territory might bring more success. I managed to catch two more fish out of the area but that was it! We moved again with the same result, only this time I landed one fish. The rest of the group was still skunked! Two guys I was with decided to give Strawberry the birdie finger and left early, while the rest of us made the trek of a lifetime across the entire bay over to a little cove we felt might hold fish. When we got there I quickly hooked up with a fish and the others started to get angry with my success. Soon after though,

they all got into the mix each catching a few of there own.

JJ landed this cutthroat that had no color at all! I think it could have been an albino. I took a close up picture to show how the fish literally had no color pigment at all!The somewhat faster fishing didn't last very long and soon enough the boredom got to us. We decided to have an Ice Auger Championship, "man vs. machine". Hunt is probably the fastest I have ever seen at drilling a hole through the ice with a hand auger, so we put him to the test. This is the results of round one...

Since JJ encountered some starting malfunctions we decided to give him another chance in round 2...

It was a tight race, but it looks like if the machine starts quickly it will make it through 12 inches of ice faster than man. After that excitement was over we decided to call it a day. As we crossed over the entire bay to get to our cars we ran into some interesting moments. The crystals on the ice made for some cool pics.

We also ran into some sketchy areas in the middle of the bay that looked to be open water and some very thin ice. It was like a mine field and we had to be very careful all the way back to our vehicles.

Solitude on Ice at Utah Lake

2009-12-18T23:20:00.000-07:00

Fishing Time: 4:30 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.

Weather: clear, calm, 30's

Moon Phase: 5% Moon

Location: Utah Lake

Ice: 4 inches

Bait: Glow Tube tipped with minnow or worm

Who Went: Me
One of my ice fishing goals this year is to land a walleye through the ice. I made my first attempt tonight at Utah Lake. I arrived to the warm springs near the "L" at Lincoln Beach around 4:30 p.m. There was absolutely no one around and it felt like I had the whole lake to myself. First thing I did was walk onto the ice and drilled a hole to check for strength. Ice was a solid 4 inches so I was good to go! Gathered my gear and walked out to an area that looked walleyeish. I drilled about 12 holes in all different depths and locations. Next thing I did was go back to the shore and sit there for 45 minutes. Sounds crazy I know, but I have heard that this is the secret to walleye fishing at Utah Lake. The lake is very shallow and walleye are so timid that you have to be very quiet, so you don't spook them off. You can't be trudging all over the ice drilling holes in 5 feet of water right above their heads! Once my 45 minutes was up I tippy toed as quiet as I could out onto the ice and began fishing each and every hole. I saw a fair amount of fish on my fish finder that came up to my offering, only to move on without a bite. I stuck it out well into dark but it wasn't to be, so the walleye go up 1-0 in the series this year.

Early Ice Fishing in 2009

2009-12-05T09:01:00.000-07:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.

Weather: Windy, partly cloudy, 20's

Moon Phase: 84% Moon

Location: Scofield Reservoir

Ice: 6-7 inches

Bait: Ice Flies tipped with meal worm or worm

Who Went: Dave, JJ, Me

I know it's a little early for ice fishing, but the itch started early this year, and I heard that Scofield was already frozen with the recent cold snap we've had. With that said, we made the trip to one of the coldest places on earth! When we got there I was shocked that my truck said it was a cozy 9 degrees. I was expecting temps in the negatives. I stepped out of the truck and soon realized that with the wind, my expectations were met. It couldn't have been over -10 with the windchill factor! Half the lake was still open water so we were careful as we walked out onto the ice and checked it for strength. It was solid as a rock so we made our way out to a spot that looked good. We set up shop and we were all glad that JJ brought his new ice fishing shack that is about the size of a house. It fits three guys very comfortably and I am amazed how far the ice shack engineers have come in building these things. It went up in under 5 minutes. As soon as we started fishing we began getting hits and seeing fish all over the fish finder. We had a hard time hooking anything for the first half hour until Dave hooked up and we found out why. We were sitting right in the middle of Chub City! We started landing little chubs left and right! We started getting some trout in the mix as well, so we just stayed put since the weather didn't really give us the urge to move. The trout were all small and we caught cutthroats, rainbows and Dave landed one Tiger Trout. Once the weather calmed down a bit we decided to venture to some new holes. I think we should have done this a few hours earlier but oh well. We didn't catch as many fish, but the ones we did catch were trout. JJ was having a tough day so he decided he was gonna start fishing out of Daves hole .We ended the day with a total of approximately 40 chubs and 36 trout. Trout totals were me at 18, Dave at 14, and JJ with 4. The ice fishing has officially started and with the cold weather sticking around the other lakes are probably close already! As we walked off the ice I took some photos of the open water out in the distance. If you look close in these last two pictures you can see it just past the guy in the orange pumpkin suit.

Last Boating Trip of 2009 at the Berry

2009-11-27T18:21:00.000-07:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Weather: Foggy morning then clear and calm

Moon Phase: 77% Moon

Location: Strawberry Reservoir

Water Temp: 39 degrees

Bait: White tube jig tipped with minnow or worm

Who Went: Phil, Troy, Me

The picture above is what it looked like at Strawberry Reservoir when we showed up on Friday. It was about 20 feet of visibility at the most. Lucky for us I have a gps and we were able to navigate the lake just fine by following the gps maps on my lowrance fish finder. This picture shows how important the gps was for going through tight terrain with no visibility. The red lines indicate our traveling path. We had nothing to go off other than electronics! Crazy!

Phil and I heard some good reports about the Renegade area so that's where we started fishing. Phil's cousin Troy started out with the hot hand and started landing fish immediately, and soon after Phil and I started getting into the mix. The fish Phil is holding was around 4 pounds.

This fish I caught had some plastic surgery gone bad...

We caught fish all morning in complete fog and calm water. It was cold, but with no wind the conditions were bearable. The fog didn't start burning off until around 10:00 and once it did we realized that we were not the only boat in the area. There was a boat next to us that was reeling in what looked to be a very nice fish. We motored a little closer and watched as they landed a very nice cutthroat. They yelled over to us and asked if we had a scale they could weigh the trout with, so I brought mine over to them in hopes of getting a better look at their nice fish. I took a picture of it, but it was from a distance and doesn't do the fish justice. It weighed just under 7 pounds. After Renegade we went on a journey fishing every corner of the lake. We never found anywhere that was extremely fast fishing, but we seemed to catch a few at every stop. We went a little ways into the narrows and in one spot had to trudge through some thin ice. I was a little nervous about scratching my boat, but it ended up being fine. The narrows were gorgeous as usual, but the fishing was slow. I have never seen the lake this calm and it lasted all day long! In one little bay near the marina I landed this nice fish that went just under 5 pounds.We ended the evening fishing the last hour of daylight in the back of East Portal Bay near the marina. The fishing picked up and made for an exciting finish with me and Phil fighting for the crown of most fish caught in a day. Phil went on a three fish run and tied it up making it very interesting, but then I caught two insurance fish right before dark to seal the deal. I ended up with 18 fish on the day and Phil at 16. Troy didn't keep track but he was probably close to both Phil and I. It was a great way to put the boat into hibernation for the winter with one last successful trip. Now it's on to ice fishing...

Walking Thistle Creek

2009-11-20T13:48:00.000-07:00

Fishing Time: 1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m.
Weather: Sunny, clear, 50's
Moon Phase: 15% Moon
Locations: Thistle Creek, Spanish Fork River, Hobble Creek
Bait: #1 Gold Mepps Spinner
Who Went: Phil, Me

The weekend forecast called for snow, snow, and more snow so I got my hours in for the week and took a half day off on Friday to go fishing. I talked to my cousin Phil and he wanted to go, so we decided with the limited time we had we would run up to thistle and walk the river for a couple hours. When we got there we saw an SUV parked in our fishing territory and soon realized that they were working the same stretch of river that we planned on fishing. It was frustrating but we headed down to the river anyway. In the first decent fishing hole we found I had a fish on with my second cast. It was a about as good a fish as your going to get on Thistle Creek so I had Phil take my picture with him before letting him go. As I was letting him go, Phil had a fish follow his spinner down the river and then the fish just stopped and stared at it when Phil couldn't reel in anymore. So Phil dragged the spinner up stream for about a foot and the fish took it. We thought it must be the dumbest fish in the river and we got a pretty good laugh over it.
I casted one more time into this hole before moving on and caught another small brown. I told Phil after taking some pictures, we won't have to worry about pulling out the camera anymore in between fish since it's kind of a pain while walking the river. Little did I know those would be the only 3 fish caught all day! We continued upstream and started to notice a lot of footsteps in the mud and realized there was a reason we didn't catch anymore fish. Those two guys had obviously beat us to the punch and fished that stretch of the river just before us. We decided to leave and head down the canyon and try a stretch of the Spanish Fork River where a guy that Phil knows claims to catch 5-6 lb Browns on a regular basis. When we got there the river looked good but the water was flowing extremely fast. We could barely wade through it without losing our footing and falling in the river. It might still be a good spot, but not when its flowing like that. Then we went back to Phil's house and grabbed his two boys and took them up to Hobble Creek. I had to move some tables at our family cabin for thanksgiving so Phil helped me out real quick and then we ran down to the river so Dax and Stratton could catch a fish. It was tough fishing such a small stream with a spinner. If we would have had a worm I am sure we could have caught fish, but the only thing we came prepared with was a Mepp's Spinner. We had fun walking the stream anyway with Dax and Stratty. They found sticks and ran around having a good time. I can't wait until Devin is in the mix running along with them!

Returning the Favor

2009-11-08T13:31:00.000-07:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
Weather: Sunny, clear, 50's
Moon Phase: 65% Moon
Location: Price River
Bait: Orange glow bugs
Who Went: Rick, Kobe, Sheldon, Me

Back in the middle of September I took Rick Everson on a trip to Flaming Gorge to show him my technique on how to land big Lake Trout. Due to bad weather and inactive fish, we didn't land the big one we were looking for, but Rick was nice enough that even though we didn't get what we were looking for, he followed up on his end of the deal and took me on the river to see if we could find any big ole Brown Trout that might want to play. Rick brought an extra fly rod for me to use. Yes I said fly rod! I decided it would be fun to give it a try. I know I bag on it quite a bit and usually call them lint throwers, but I actually had a lot of fun doing it and might be purchasing a fly rod of my own very soon. We fished on the Price River right below the Dam at Scofield Reservoir. We hiked in about a mile and a half and then worked our way back to the dam hitting every promising looking hole on the way upstream. It was a fun way to fish as we all had polarized glasses and we were basically sight fishing. See a fish and cast to it trying to entice a bite. We were using glow bugs, which look like a big orange fish egg, as we were expecting the browns to be spawning. We seemed to have just missed the spawn, but the glow bugs were still working well. The first fish I tried to cast to made for quite the experience. I snagged about twelve bushes, tangled my line about ten times, and couldn't get the fly anywhere near the fish. After this first blunder of trying to get the fly fishing down, I felt I picked it up fairly quickly and didn't have many other problems, but that first attempt took a lot of patience from Rick and I think he thought he was in for a long day! Two other guys came with us and they were both fly fisherman as well. Kobe works with Rick and then Kobe's cousin Sheldon tagged along as well. Rick is a really good fly fisherman and landed the first fish we saw on the river. We soon found a hole that was stacked with fish and had some nice ones in the mix. We all started landing fish from this hole and this is where I caught my biggest of the day. Rick also caught fish out of this hole, including a new addition to the Price River, the Tiger Trout.

Sheldon got in the mix with a nice cutthroat...Then Kobe landed this nice brown... I continued to catch fish all the way up to the dam and had a great time. I made Rick take some actions shots of me fly fishing cause I told him my other fishing buddies would never believe I actually went lint throwing!

Rick took big fish honor for the day with this fat brown... I almost hit for the cycle on the river as I caught browns, cutthroats and a tiger trout. All I needed was a rainbow, but it wasn't to be. I had a lot of fun fly fishing and I could see me doing it once in awhile just to get out and walk the rivers. I don't spend enough time on the rivers now that I have my boat.

Fall at the Berry

2009-11-06T14:17:00.000-07:00

Fishing Time: 12:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.
Weather: Windy, Windy, Windy, sunny, clear, 50's
Moon Phase: 80% Moon
Location: Strawberry Reservoir
Bait: White tube jigs tipped with minnows or worm
Who Went: Phil, Mike Zenger, Me

I only had to work a few hours on Friday so I called my cousin Phil to see if he wanted to make a late morning run up to the berry. I think he was pretty excited about the phone call and so the plan was made. Phil's buddy Mike Zenger also wanted to go and the smack talk of who would catch the most fish began before we even got on the road! We got up there around 12:30 and were welcomed with gale force winds! We headed through the white caps past Mud Creek Bay and back into Strawberry Bay where we started our day. On the first drop of the day I missed two good hits and I had no idea that I was about to put on a clinic on how "not to" set a hook all day long! Zenger caught the first fish to start us off and the smack talk started to get good. Phil also started catching fish as well, but I was still fishless! We also ended up fishing at Chicken Creek East, and the back of East Portal Bay without much success. The weird thing was we actually got a decent amount of hits throughout the day but just didn't land many. I was the worst missing hit after hit, but Phil also missed quite a few and Zenger some as well! With about an hour left of daylight, Phil had a slight lead on the fish count and Zenger was right behind him. I was in last place with 1 fish and about 30 missed hook sets! It was frustrating to say the least! The wind was still whipping so we decided to hide behind the mountain over at Haws Point and try our luck there until dark. It ended up being a good choice. The wind finally died down and we started catching some fish. Unfortunately we only had about half an hour to do it until dark. Phil and Zenger continued to battle for supremacy while I stayed at the bottom. The final tally was 9 fish for the winner Phil, 8 fish for Zenger and 4 for me. The weirdest part of the trip was that we never found any areas where we continually saw fish on the finder. Even when we started catching them at the end, they were not showing up on the finder. We just couldn't find any good concentrations of fish! We had a blast though and want to get back up there before winter sets in, so I'm sure we will!

Check Off Another Species

2009-10-18T12:00:00.000-06:00

Fishing Time: 2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Weather: Windy, warm, sunny, clear, 50's

Moon Phase: New Moon

Location: Round Lake- Uinta's

Bait: Renegade and Mosquito flies behind a bubble

Who Went: Justin Hunt, Josh Newton, Dustin Pelligrino, Me For a long time now I've read reports about fisherman making these long hikes deep into the Uinta's to find a species known as the Arctic Grayling. I was always intrigued by this small fish that looked so different in pictures than anything else I have ever caught. Well I got my chance to go after them this weekend when my deer hunting group decided to hunt in the Uinta's. I did my research on where the best place would be to catch grayling and found that there is a reason people hike so far to catch this species. The only lakes that hold Arctic Grayling are the highest lakes in the Uinta's and all require long rugged hikes. After studying maps and talking to everyone I thought would have helpful input, I decided on three lakes that all held grayling and each sat about a half mile away from each other, Round Lake, Sand Lake and Fish Lake. All three lakes sit at 10,000 feet in elevation and require a rigorous 4 mile hike in, and that's just to the first lake which is Round Lake. Its another mile to make into the last lake which is Fish Lake. It looked tough and steep on the map, but the fishing sounded promising! We of course got a late start on the hike, getting to the trail head around 11:00 a.m. Grino had his rifle just in case a monster buck showed its face, and Newton and I were both armed with pistols on our sides for deer purposes, but more importantly, in case we ran into a hungry black bear.

The hike was absolutely gorgeous, but very difficult and when we started seeing these tracks all the way up the trail, we were glad we brought protection. We hiked through many different types of terrain on the way up and took pictures all the way. We started out in the quakies and then hit a small meadow with the Weber River running through it. The lakes we hiked into are the headwaters of the Weber River. After the meadow it was straight pines so we knew we were starting to gain in elevation.

Not to long after hiking into the deep pines we hit some steep rocky conditions along with some snow. It was like this for about 2 miles!

After trudging through the snow with wet feet, we finally made it to the first of the three lakes. We only rested for a minute before we tied on a fly and a bubble and started casting. I had two hits on my first cast but had nothing to show for it. It has been a few years since I last fished using a fly and a bubble and it is a difficult thing to master especially for a bass fisherman like myself. I have a tendency to rip lures through a fishes mouth with my hard hook sets, and fishing with a fly and a bubble requires very finesse hook sets, and even more so when your catching grayling which are a small fish to begin with and have very small mouths.Finally after about ten missed hits, I hooked and landed my first ever Arctic Grayling! It wasn't a state record by any means, but it was a beautiful fish.

After that it was Hunt's turn, but he started out with the hot hand for cutthroat. He must have landed a half dozen of these guys before finally landing his first grayling.

Then it was Newtons turn... And Grino's turn... And then there was a grayling double up by Newton and Hunt... After about two hours of fishing we all landed quite a few fish and had a lot of fun, except for when I slipped and fell shin deep into the lake! We didn't make it to the next two lakes cause we just didn't need to. We caught plenty of fish in Round Lake. We also wanted to hit the trail going down in the light and do a little evening hunting. We still ended up hiking the last mile in the dark. We hunted pretty hard on the hike down and even took a side trail for probably another half mile round trip, but didn't find anything living. We got to the truck in pitch black conditions with no moon and we were all beat! It was a full day and felt like a great accomplishment. We must have hiked close to 9 miles total. That only leaves one fish on the list of gamefish in Utah that I haven't caught, and I have a feeling there might be a story of that one being caught very soon!!!

My New Found Love "Willard Bay"

2009-10-03T23:21:00.001-06:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.
Weather: Cloudy, cold, calm, 50's
Moon Phase: 98% Moon
Location: Willard Bay
Bait: White Curly Tail Grub, 1/4 oz jighead
Who Went: John, Me

Since Wipers are one of the last game fish I have yet to catch in Utah, John and I decided it was time to change that. We headed to Willard Bay under rain threatening clouds and cool temps. When we got there the lake was calm and cool. We launched on the north end and started fishing the north east corner along the dike. Nothing was showing on the fish finder nor were we getting any bites. We must have moved 10 times trying to locate fish. We fished freeway bay, the island, all over the northeast corner and around the north marina, without seeing more than an occassional single fish go across the fish finder screen. Just as we were starting to get down on ourselves, I noticed what looked to be a small boil to the north of us! I fired up the big motor and cruised over as fast as I could. I saw one jump and casted right to him. Within seconds it was on. I could not believe it, this was the hardest fighting fish I have ever caught. In my mind I was thinking wow my first wiper is going to be the state record! It took drag numerous times and when it would see the boat it was off to the races again! Once I finally got it in John was already hooked up with one of his own. I waited with the net to land his fish and I just happened to glance at the fish finder only to see it was a black out with fish everywhere! We landed Johns fish and just tossed it in the boat so we could continue to fish. I missed three more bites and then the fish were gone! We continued to cast for another hour and I ended up picking up one more straggler before I had to leave due to other commitments. I wanted to stay all night after feeling the battle they put on! It's safe to say I might be seeing a little more of Willard in the future! Good times!

Swirling Pike at Yuba

2009-09-26T15:20:00.000-06:00

Fishing Time: 7:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.
Weather: Sunny, calm, 60's

Moon Phase: 56% Moon

Location: Yuba

Bait: Swimbaits, Crankbaits, Spinnerbaits, Rapalas

Who Went: Johnny Leach, Me

Got to Yuba and it was still dark, perfect! Launched the boat into glass and felt like it was going to be a great day. We buzzed over to the first rocky point we could see. There is no stick ups this time of year as Yuba is about 20 to 30 feet lower than summer conditions. We started casting swimbaits along the rocky shoreline when I saw a big ole pike come out of the water and say hello. Little did I know this would set the tone for the rest of the morning. We started seeing pike everywhere. Swirling around, jumping, and nosing out of the water, yet we couldn't buy a bite! A boat behind us working the shoreline we just got done casting to, caught a medium sized pike and thats when I really started to get frustrated. We cruised over to another rocky point and just as we are setting up to fish a boat comes flying in and starts casting right in front of us. First cast and he had on what looked to be a nice one. He ended up losing it (karma) but now I was getting very frustrated and mad at the jack ass swooping in front of us! After casting for 3 straight hours we decided to try our luck trolling. Just as we were about to quit trolling, John had a fish on. It was a dink but at least we were on the board!

We went back to casting for about another hour and still couldn't put anything in the boat, so we decided to go home and watch college football. On the way in there were some deer down by the water taking a drink. I love seeing wildlife while out fishing.

Last Trip of the Year to the Gorge

2009-09-19T15:01:00.000-06:00

Fishing Time: Friday through Sunday

Weather: Friday: Perfect. Saturday: good morning, rain and wind in afternoon. Sunday: Rain

Moon Phase: New Moon

Location: Flaming Gorge

Bait: Tube Jigs

Who Went: Rick Everson, Dustin Sisam, Me

I promised Rick a trip to the Gorge to show him how to catch a big lake trout, and in return he is going to show me how to catch big browns off the river. We got to the Gorge Friday evening and when we showed up the lake was glass! We hurried to set up Sisam's tent trailer and got on the water with about an hour to fish. There were lake trout all over in Linwood Bay, but none wanted what we had to offer. Once I said ok last drop of the night Rick pulled in what would be the only lake trout of the trip!

Saturday morning we woke up to a slight breeze, but nothing we couldn't deal with. We saw fish everywhere, sometimes stacked up 10 at a time. They wanted nothing to do with us. They would follow our jigs for about 10 feet and then head straight back down to the bottom. We did this for 4 straight hours until the wind came up and pushed us off the water. We hid in a cove where the wind couldn't find us and caught smallmouth after smallmouth and a couple rainbows, but nothing big. Then the storms came in! We got off the water and headed to camp. We tried waiting out the storm, but it never died down so we did what any die hard fisherman would do, we went out anyway. We might as well have just stayed in the trailer and played poker all night cause the wind was so brutal that we couldn't fish effectively. We got up Sunday morning to a monsoon, so we packed up and got out of there! The weather ruined another trip to the Gorge and thats getting old. We had fun though and I got to fish with some new faces. I hope Rick understands that some trips it just doesn't happen, and will still take me to his secret brown trout hole!

Why do you hate me Deer Creek?

2009-08-22T11:17:00.000-06:00

Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. to 12:00 a.m.

Weather: Sunny, hot, high 90's

Moon Phase: 7% moon

Location: Deer Creek (east of island along rocky shoreline)

Bait: Everything!

Who Went: Me

I had a hard time deciding on a place to fish this weekend. I had it pre-planned to take my float tube and leave the boat at home to save money, and I wanted to try somewhere that I don't fish often. The spot I narrowed it down to was Deer Creek Reservoir. Its close to home, and probably the one reservoir within close proximity to my house that I don't know much about. I wish I could say I increased my knowledge while fishing there, but unfortunately I didn't have much success. I was mainly fishing for trout and walleye, and I used an assortment of different tactics to try and entice them with. I tried jigging with a tube jig tipped with worm. I tossed curly tailed grubs. I threw rapalas and spinners. I tried dragging the bottom with tube jigs and curly tailed grubs trying to find the walleye. I also drop-shotted a gulp minnow thinking that might peak their interest. I fished depths from 1 foot all the way out to about 40 feet of water, and after 3 hours of no bites, I decided to fish for the only species I have caught consistently up there, Smallmouth Bass. I rigged up a drop-shot with a roboworm and started casting towards the rocky shoreline, and within a few casts I had a hit but did not hook up. Shortly after getting hit, I landed the first fish of the day with this 10-12 incher.I Had a couple more bass that wanted to play, along with one small bluegill, but that was it for the trip. Once again I left Deer Creek Reservoir with a dissapointed feeling and wished I had went somewhere else! I did stop by the Provo River right below the Jordanelle Reservoir Dam to see what it was all about. I have heard stories of some big Brown Trout coming from this area, but have steered clear of this stretch of river due to the fact that its a fly fishing hot zone. Unless you pull up to the parking lot in a suburu, and get out of the Suby decked out in your columbia fly fishing gear and russle around the river banks turning over rocks to find the hatch, then you can feel a little out of place. You also have to go back to the car and sit on your bumper and tie your own fly matching that newly found hatch, and then go out and be "one with the river," as you fling your pocket lint around. This is the life of a true purist fisherman! Whatever, I went anyway, and just as I described I pulled up to a parking lot full of Suburu's and a bunch of hippie lookin dudes hanging out together tying flies and drinking pale ale. I hopped out of the truck, grabbed my spinning rod, tied on a rapala right in front of them matching my hatch, and headed down to the river. Unfortunately the river is still running very fast and it made it impossible to fish a rapala effectively and I didn't end up catching anything, but I explored the area and I think it could be a great place to fish in the fall when the river settles down. All in all it was an average trip, but it beats sitting on the couch.

The Gorge

2009-08-07T08:21:00.000-06:00

Fishing Time: Mornings and evenings for 3 days
Weather: Windy, windy, windy, stormy, and cool temps for 3 days
Moon Phase: 98% Moon
Location: Flaming Gorge
Water Temp: 60 degrees in morning to 65-68 in afternoon
Bait: 7 inch Tora Tube Jigs
Who Went: Dad, Mike Hansen, Me
Its that time of the year again and its becoming an annual trip for me and my old man. Chasing monster Lake Trout at Flaming Gorge Reservoir. This time my dads best friend Mike Hansen wanted to tag along and take his chances on catching a fish of a lifetime. He's glad he did! We got up there on Thursday night and had plans of fishing Friday through Sunday. With the sun going down on Thursday night the first storm of the trip started rolling in. We went to bed and hoped for the best for Friday morning. It ended up being beautiful and the best morning of the trip. Surprisingly my old man was waking us up before the alarms even went off (this never happens)! We were on the water early and started fishing Linwood bay. The breeze was still lingering from last nights storm so we decided to move to a spot we felt would be sheltered by the wind. This area is called Swim Beach and it ended up being a very good move. We were seeing fish all over on the fish finder and were getting some real active chasers when Mike screamed "Fish On". I grabbed the camera and started filming and my dad took net duties.
We do not have an official weight on this fish cause I only have a 20 lb scale, but my guess is somewhere between 20-25 pounds. It was a beautiful fish and we got her back in the water for others to catch and enjoy. It was a great start to the trip and Mike was excited. Then about 20 minutes later Mike was yelling again, and pulled in this nice 8 pound mack. After that it was my dads turn and he landed this nice 7 pound mack! I ended Friday mornings fishing by making the final drop of the day and landing the smallest fish of the trip at 5 pounds. The wind started blowing pretty good by 11:00 a.m. so we headed back to camp with plans to hit the evening hard when the winds died down. The only problem was that the winds didn't die down THE REST OF THE TRIP!!! We lost our tent the second day. We were all sitting in camp chairs next to the tent when a wind gust came up and we heard a big snap and then rip. The tent poles snapped in the wind and the sharp edge where the pole broke ripped a long hole right through the tent. My old man ran to town and bought a couple two man tents which worked well for me and him, but Mike being 6' 5" had to leave the door open and hang his feet out to sleep which was a funny sight. We still went out and fished every morning and evening, but the weather just didn't want to cooperate. You can tell in this picture that even right before dusk the wind was still blowing us around. We did have a few good hits and I had one that was on for about two seconds that felt like a good one. Mike had the hot hand on this trip and was able to land the only fish caught after Friday morning with another 8 pound mack. I felt it was still a successful trip for the most part, but my main goal was to get my old man into a monster fish which didn't happen. He did catch a nice 7 pound fish and I think he had a good time, so the big one for him will have to wait til next year!