Tuesday, September 15, 2015

Fishing Jordanelle with Joe and LeeAnn

Saturday morning I took Joe and LeeAnn out on the Fish Steeler on Jordanelle Reservoir. We got to the lake and on the water by 7 am and had our first fish on board by 7:15. Running the small boat ramp pattern we fished there all morning until we limited out. LeeAnn had never been trolling before so it was fun to see her get a few fish in the live well.
Joe, LeeAnn's husband, is seasoned at fishing with a fly pole in his hand, actually one of the best nymph fishers I know. He can find fish when no one else is catching anything. He has a little experience trolling, so it was fun having both on board the Fish Steeler. Rainbow trout were the target today and they were plentiful and decent sized. The hit was hot in the morning until about 9 am and then it slowed down. We tried several different patterns in the area and found fish in each of them.
The morning was spectacular, no wind and just a little brisk. The sunrise was great. We fished until 11:00 am and gave up fighting the recreation boats and wakes, but did limit out and the final fish of the day was a nice 16 inch Brown trout with wonderful colors. It was put in the hole so quickly we didn't realize we had caught a Brown trout until we were loading up the stringer for a picture. The morning was kept lively by few mishaps here and there and we had a few laughs at each other. The best was when Joe was being guide and holding LeeAnn's fish for a photo and it jumped out of his hands and tail slapped her.
We were rolling, even LeeAnn got a chuckle out of it. The fall colors are coming in strong right now with the oaks turning fire engine red and oranges. Hope you get out this weekend and enjoy this fall weather. Tight Lines and keep smilin'.

 

Saturday, September 5, 2015

Small Mouth Bass at Jordanelle

Went fishing with my brother Kelly on Jordanelle Reservoir. We started off at 5 am on Thursday morning, drove up to Heber stopped for supplies and back on the road. Next stop Jordanelle, we pulled in at 5:45 and the sun was nowhere to be seen so we readied the boat and waited for enough light to see the lines on the ramp without lights. Launched to the boat and noticed the wind had picked up significantly. We planned on fishing for Rainbow trout in the morning and then going after some Small Mouth Bass after we limited out on trout.

With the wind blowing as bad as it was we decided to stay in the marina bay that was protected for the most part. We fished down the south bank into the bays and caught the first fish within a few minutes. The lake is loaded with small mouth bass and has large ones over 4 pounds. They have opened the lake to spearfishing and some fishers think they have devastated the large fish, but each year the UDWR find big small mouth bass in their survey. We fished for about an hour in the bay moving all the way around it and thought the wind had laid enough to go trolling in the small boat bay so we left the protection of the marina bay and found out quickly that the wind was still howling. Three to four foot swells were still rolling with whitecaps, so we went across the main body into another bay that we thought would be protected from the wind, but we were wrong. The wind was blowing directly into the bay we entered.
We still tried our luck at catching some bass but quickly tired of fighting the wind and waves and moved to the dam and into the Rock Cliff leg of the reservoir. Along the dam we got into the fish again catching a number of small mouth bass within a very short period of time. We fished along that stretch for a couple hours and continued to catch fish by the bucket full. Kelly did hook up a nice Rainbow trout and got it to the boat but it quick released as I was putting the net in to land it. Kelly started fishing a big purple worm on a drop shot and started catching fish buy the dozens most of them were small and he could not keep them off the line. We fished until noon and the wind continued to blow and started to come from all directions and down the draws we were fishing and grew tired of fighting the boat to stay in a position to catch fish. Plus we were thinking of getting a nice big garlic burger in Heber, but they were not open so we ended up at the Heber City Cafe at the Heber Creeper station. A great choice for lunch, I had a Cajun Cheeseburger special order and it was great! The day ended with the ride home and telling stories. Until next time tight lines and keep smilin'.