This is an interesting place to fish where you can fish for several days without a bite then wham, get into some beautiful fish. The Potholes Canal starts at Banks Lake with miles of river to lake type fishing. There are several breaks in the canal that form small lakes and the fish gorge till they are very fat. There's a sportsman group pen raising and releasing a large number of trout each year in Banks Lake, so quite a few are getting flushed over the dam. I don't believe the F&W have stocked the canals.

I fished the canal several times in October and caught and released a number of fat 12-20inch rainbows. Evenings are the best time when the trout start to feed. My best fish was a hog of about 10 lbs. My largest rainbow to date. Put up a very tough fight on 6 lb test line in the river like current. It took about 20 mins to land. All the fish I caught were very good fighters from battling the current. The canal water is shut down in late Oct. and dries up, so the fish somehow manage to migrate to the side lakes and ponds and winter over.

This is a very dangerous area to fish if you have kids or a dog, so be careful. Many sections of the canal are concrete bank, so if you fall in it's difficult to get out.

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