Sand Hollow Bass Fishing 6-22-2017

Shifty needs to get his bass fix every once in a while, so we made a run to Sand Hollow in Southern Utah. The bass are plentiful in this body of water and they are Large Mouth Bass which is like Christmas to Shifty. We loaded up and hit the road at 4:00 am Wed. morning. We were on the water by 8:30. The day was HOT! 113 degrees by afternoon but we stuck it out in search of the bucket mouths.

We started out in the flats and reeds looking for topwater action. We got to our area only to find the trolling motor non-working again! I was not happy, I worked on it for a bit and found a trip switch that at least let the co-pilot work so we were partially functional. After that little dilemma, actually moved to a different area and I trolled a jerk bait to the new spot and hooked up a small one only to have it LDR, but it showed they were active. I threw a spook, to begin with, and a couple casts into the reeds and I hooked up my first Large Mouth Bass (LMB) of the trip. I landed it, took a couple pics and released it. We fished the area for another few minutes but got nothing else and Shifty wanted to move.

We moved to the pump house and Shifty started dragging a lizard and hooked up a couple nice LMB's with a Texas rig. We fished for most of the morning as it continued to produce fish for Shifty. It turned off in the early afternoon and we moved to the north dike where we threw crankbaits at the rocks. I landed one and had a couple more hookups. I let Shifty have the front seat and he caught fire and landed three largemouth bass in a matter of minutes running a bluegill pattern. We fished this area until 2:00 pm and moved around along the rocks on the northwest corner and made our way back to the dock. We loaded up and went to the hotel and dinner.

After dinner, we came back and fished the bank on the west dike. Shifty put on a number of different fire tiger lures and caught fire landing six largemouths in the short time we fished that evening. I put on what I had that looked like a fire tiger and caught 4 fish myself and then lost the lure to the rock garden. The sun had set and we couldn't see the line to put on a new lure so we called it a day. Back at the hotel, we longed at the hot tub for a while to loosen up our backs after being on the boat all day it felt great.

 

Day 2 we were on the water by 7:00 am and we went back to the flats. We scouted out areas yesterday before loading the boat and thought we could find some in the cooler morning air in the reeds. We fished for about an hour and got nothing. Shifty said to go where we caught fish last night at the dike, so motored over there. He put on a drop-shot ad started catching fish one after another, I don't fish bass that much and not familiar with the technique so I stayed with a texas rig and crankbaits. After he caught five in a row I decided to give the drop-shot technique a try. Like bait fishing with a plastic worm. I fished with it for a while and finally landed a bass. We trolled around and stayed on the dike the entire morning. Shifty caught a few more fish and I got one more as well. We fished until 1:00 pm and then had to load up for home.

We had a great time on Sand Hollow and Shifty got to use his new lure form Gull's Custom baits and caught a couple fish on it. The weather was nice but very hot 100 plus each day and that drove the fish deep. We will return later in the fall when it cools down a little.

This shot is a picture of the smoke plume from the Brianhead fire that was in full force while we were in Southern Utah. Amazing how much had burned in a short period of time.

Strawberry Kokanee Fishing

Tuesday morning met up with Danny and his friend Bruce and we headed to Strawberry Reservoir. We made it to lake around 9:30 and hit the water and went Danny's way points on is finder. His finder is loaded with catches in the area we started fishing. Danny's boat is set up to fish Kokanee Salmon with 4 down riggers he also has holder for long lining with lead lined poles. We placed all six poles and started fishing.

Fishing Starvation Res. with Jim and Parker 6/17/17

Saturday morning we met up at 8 am to go fish Starvation. Parker works swing shift so we let him get a few hours of sleep before we left. The day was supposed to be bluebird and hot turned into windy and whitecaps! We arrived at Starvation State park at 10 am and launched amid winds of 15 plus mph. We shot across the main channel to the north wall and started to troll. We went with light gear for the day, and Parker brought his downrigger to see how it would work, he bought it for his pontoon boat.

Rockport Trolling for Trout

Wednesday was a great day! I got to take out my cousins on the Fish Steeler and catch a lot of fish. We had a blast, many double-ups, and one triple up. We started off at 5 am Joe and I met Dennis and Eric at Chubby's and headed for the lake. We launched at 6:30 and could have launched a half-hour earlier, love long days!!

Fishing Deer Creek Catching Rainbows

Monday morning came early at 5:00 am and meeting up with Danny Adams for a morning fish. We headed up the canyon for what I thought we were going to Deer Creek Res. and then we drove right past the glass-smooth lake and went on to Strawberry. Danny is a kokanee salmon fisher, he loves the lake and the fish more than anything. We pulled off onto 131 and made our way to Strawberry Bay Marina. Along the way, we could see white caps in Strawberry Valley but we were hoping to see some protected water around the marina, Mud Creek looked better as we neared the marina exit. Coming around the corner to see Strawberry Bay white-capped didn't make us happy. We pulled down the ramp and could see the swells were 3 ft plus on most of the lake and some bigger, so we changed our direction to Deer Creek. 

When we arrived back at Deer Creek Island the water had a ripple on it, which makes for good fishing. We launched and made our way across to a lane that Danny likes to run and then the wind showed up and white caps were forming and coming at us. We started to deploy our gear and the boat was spinning and drifting fast due to the wind, so we went to the east side of the island where it was a little more protected. We got the downriggers set and Danny had the first Rainbow trout in the boat in 5 minutes. We trolled to the road and then up the bank. I reeled in and gave my flatfish a squirt of juice and back in the water. Less than 10 minutes I had a fish in the boat. We turned and headed back toward the island and into the wind and Danny put another rainbow trout in the boat, within about ten minutes. In less than a half-hour, we had three rainbow trout in the live well. We thought alright we will limit before it gets reals nasty.

The wind had different plans for the day, however. We made two more passes and got nothing and the water was getting nasty. The fish went deep and stopped hitting, so we decided to call it good. All in less than an hour and a half we launched and loaded the boat this morning, but we got out on the water and caught some decent rainbow trout.

Jordanelle Reservoir Browns and Smallies

Thursday with Shifty, we went to Jordanelle to catch some brown trout and fill our limit with smokers. We did that and then some with the late morning and afternoon fishing for smallmouth bass. We arrived at the ramp at 6:30 a little later than we wanted but we the only boat on the water when we launched. We headed to a new area of the lake looking for the brown trout. Seen a report by our state office with enough background that I knew where they were located.