Available Fishing Guide:
Website: Fast Action Guide Service
OK, so we hit the water and were fishing by 6am. My friends Dan and Bill "Tiger Muskie" Green trolling our gear. Today the fishing was pretty slow. Morning bite was faint, saw maybe 6 fish caught, all trollers. We used everything in the tackle-box and scents, kwikfish, dodger/hooks, flasher/hooks - nothing. Around 11am as we were about to call it a (I think) guide boat started hitting fish. 4 in 30 minutes. OK, let's stick it out a bit longer. As best I could make out, this boat was trolling dodgers, 2-3oz? cannonball sinkers, hooks about 2 feet or so below the dodger, and a small strip (assuming herring strip?). So we duplicated our rigs as best I could, dropping down just ten feet or so since they were not putting out that much line and couldn't have been much deeper. We used sardine strips. Well, one hour later we called it a day, still no fish.
I'm not sure I will get out again this year as I have a trip next week. To sum up my 2008 Lake Samm chinook fishing: Good fishing IF you know what you're doing, otherwise it's hit or miss. I saw two guide boats that had the fishery nailed, but interestingly using very different techniques. Tuesday and Thursday the guide boat did it with riggers, green flashers, bare hooks and (something?, probably herring strips? or a scent roe sack?) and probably running the riggers in the 20-30 foot depth, as best I could see from how long the ball dropped. And today, a very different surface presentation that seemed to work quite well. Finally, the fishing tapered off day by day as near I could see. And, there is decent evening fishing.
So... next year I'll pull up these reports review and strategize for the 2009 season. At least I got one fish this year and learned a lot to be put to use for next year. Always the optimist, see you same time next year lake Samm!