Northwest Fishing Reports

Good question. I've always used salmon for dogfish crabs and craws. I use dark humpy meat for sturgeon in the fall. I hope I'm not breaking any rules...

There are no regs for crawfish bait, use whatever you want.

Mordalphus wrote:There are no regs for crawfish bait, use whatever you want.

Cool, I have shad. :-)

I've never used it, but if it's oily and smelly they should love it! I usually use injured fish I catch out of lake washington, since I don't feel safe eating them. Trout works great, perch too. I tried sculpin but it didn't work as well.

Mordalphus wrote:I've never used it, but if it's oily and smelly they should love it! I usually use injured fish I catch out of lake washington, since I don't feel safe eating them. Trout works great, perch too. I tried sculpin but it didn't work as well.

I'm soaking it in herring scent for a couple days as well. It should have the aroma of ten shad.

Haha, well there ya go. I have used herring before and it works great too, but they eat it really quickly since they're so small. I can only eat crayfish about once every few months, they're good, but they've gotta be bad for you haha. But if you've never eaten the signal crays here in Washington, you're in for a treat, they're so much tastier than rusty crayfish.

If the water is cold or the Craws are deep, I trap with a fresh trout . If it's a little chilly like the Coweeman Or Kalama river (cowlitz) I free dive for them. Goggles and snorkel and a mess bag. One you are in the water swimming, two, you work for your food and gives them a chance to get away. In a 3 hour span of time, my cousin and I can pick 2-4lbs. I have found that on a small stream where it bends, there is usually twiggy sedement on the inside deeps of the bend. Dive down 8-15ft and start pickin!

Also a few lake that should be on there:

Mount Adams area of Gifford Pinchot.

Takhlakh lake (skamania) pretty busy In the late summer
Walupt lake (skamania)
Blue lake (skamania)

I just wanted to add a lake for the list. I hauled a good four pounds from two traps and they were extremely tasty!!

Beaver Lake, Okanogan county

I have limited experience but I cut my bait so the meat and guts are exposed for the scent to go farther and quicker. I plan to start searching kitsap county this summer.

Cascade Lake, San Juan County

We use cat food or canned dog food. Works great.

You can add Mineral Lake in Pierce County. I was fishing there with my boy recently, and saw three of them (one of them about 6 inches long from tail to tip of the claws) in the shallows by the boat launch in the two hours we were there. Someone had cleaned their catch on the bank and they were coming up to feed on the scraps. Caught two of them with my bare hands without getting wet.

Im in pierce county im close to chambers creek and lookin for some tasty dads for dinner with my trout can anyone help me with lake s and streams in my area

lake sutherland in clallam county has them.

16reddevil20 wrote:Im in pierce county im close to chambers creek and lookin for some tasty dads for dinner with my trout can anyone help me with lake s and streams in my area

i keep meaning to drop a pot in crescent over by purdy but can't find my pot. guess i'll have to get another.

here's another for the peirce county list, carney lake. caught them as a kid under boards along the shore while swimming around the lake on an air mattress.

Thanks you ill try that lake I live tacoma area if anyone know where a guy get some dad I want to try chambers creek if anyone knows a good spot let me know

I just bought 3 traps and put some cut up hotdogs into them and put them over the dock at Beaver Lake in King County just 1 day ago. If I pull something up in 4 days when I come back, I'll say that Beaver lake has crayfish.

Like i said last time, I only got started doing crayfishing just 2 weeks ago when I bought the traps. I put 3 traps in Beaver lake on a stump. Came back 2 days ago and found nothing on it. I thought that maybe these western washington lakes have nothing. I was using these cut up polish hotdogs I got from the local Costco store.

Today however I took my gf to Pine Lake and saw 2 traps laid out on the docks at Pine Lake. Pulled them up just to see if anything was inside and saw that using raw chicken parts (with no bait box or jar) there was 1 little crayfish in each one. That sort of gave me some hope.

So my plan is to go tomorrow to either Lake Sammamish or Sammamish River (the creek in the north side) and throw them in different places and try it out. Read a few old posts where people said that they had luck in Sammamish River or any of the creeks further up north.

*UPDATED*

It has been awhile since I have updated this thread. I have gone back through and updated the list in the very first post.
Keep it coming guys. This thread has been very helpful and there is a ton of information contained in it for all those crawdad hunters out there.



fishnislife

Anyone know of any pierce county lake or streams close to Lakewood

I live in Lakewood close to stielacom lake fish it often it does have two feeder stream and a outlet stream where should I start looking for crawdad at their is a lot of milfoil I know it is rocky bottom just need help on where to start looking for them