Sea Breeze Charters - Sea Breeze Charters is a full-service charter company out of Ilwaco Washington that specializes in salmon, sturgeon, tuna, and bottom fishing. We have a fleet of seven boats and have been in business since 1964.
Arrived at Fish about 8:30 and started out by row-trolling with a little spinner fly, ( Black woolly bugger, with a little 'helicopter' spinner in the nose. ) A few small tigers, all released.
I next tried anchoring near the upper end of the lake and floating worms off the bottom. No takers, but I had several hits while reeling in. Switched to a wedding ring / worm combo. Several more smaller fish, all let go.
That's pretty much how it went all day. I would troll for a while, still fish for a while, troll for a bit, still fish for a bit. Try as I might, though, I couldn't hook any of the nicer tiger trout. Nothing that I brought in was over 10" The most effective method seemed to be to cast out an inflated worm, let it settle, then reel in and see if anything would grab it on the retrieve.
But then...
I had gotten several hits on this one worm and when I brought it in, I saw that it was fairly chewed up...so I took it off the hook and tossed it over the side.
About ten feet down, I watched a nice fish swim up and grab it. That gave me an idea: a fishing method I haven't used in a long time. I reeled in, tied a 2.5 # leader to my main line and put on a size 16 caddis hook. Then I hooked up a crawler, and tossed t out, no weight, just let it sink naturally.
That did it! I nailed a 12 incher on my next cast. When I moved over to the gap between the lily pad Islands, I did even better, finishing up the day with a 17 inch tiger. ( Got him on the very last cast of the day. )
And a few other observations:
This is one DEEP lake. Even at the edge of the lily pads, it has to be a good 30' down. It's also loaded with tiny Pumpkinseed sunfish. Little snots that would steal my bait about every fourth cast. Not complaining though. When the Tigers start getting large enough to forage on these little spinys, I predict there's going to be some real monsters coming out of Fish Lake.
The really interesting thing was this: I've caught tiger trout before, but these fish were almost of a different strain. The others I caught put up a decent fight, but the Tigers out of Fish Lake were real scrappers, every one of them made several jumps, trying to shake the hook. Except for that large boy, he dived deep when I hooked him, much more the way a Brown or Brook will fight you. I also noted that they had a much more serious mouthful of teeth than the other tigers I caught, almost like a walleye.
Last but not least...yeeshk, it was HOT out on that lake. I drank up every pop in my cooler.
All in all, a three-and-a-half-star day. And I will be back next season.
I hooked somthing odd there near the gap pretty deep. I was on my float tube using 30# test spider wire. I always use spider wire in heavy test. I just like that if I have to I can haul in the titanic if needed. Whatever I hooked on the bottom had a little give to it like a chain or wire robe off a dock but was straight down from me. I ended up breaking off my line trying to haul in by hand whatever it was. This is around augest I think, didnt catch any fish except bluegills.
Maybe there is another record tiger trout in there. Someone caught a 13+ pounder this year and doubled the weight record. Fish On!
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Sea Breeze Charters - Sea Breeze Charters is a full-service charter company out of Ilwaco Washington that specializes in salmon, sturgeon, tuna, and bottom fishing. We have a fleet of seven boats and have been in business since 1964.
