Previous Next

Bumped into AMX at the ramp. He had a really late start, lol.

Anyways, I planned on starting off with trolling then switching over to bass and then see how it went. But as I pull up to my trolling path, I see some surface activity near the bank in a fishy looking spot.

So out came the bass rods. I started with a spinnerbait and then with a swimbait. Fished along the bank for about 45mins total before I gave up. All I caught were a couple of perch. I was marking some large sonar fish in about 33' of water hugging near the bottom. I tried dropshot but couldnt even get a nibble.


Out came the trolling rod. A minute or 2 later, I get a solid bite with FISH ON!!! Didn't even get a chance to get comfortable in my seat. It's pulling a little bit of drag. I get it close and see it's a really nice trout. Into the net it goes. A 17" cutt-throat.

I continue along and get a couple small strikes. I'm thinking they are possibly perch. I'm marking balls of fish and soon afterwards, I'll see my rod tip bounce. A couple of times, I believe the fish hit the line or my dodger because they didn't have that "boing" action. More like a bump I guess.

After about 1.5 hours and no more fish, I decided to cross the lake to the other side. I fired up my main motor and just idled across with the trolling rod still in the water. Personally, I think the 2.8-3 MPH GPS is too fast for trolling, but I was proven wrong again. Got a strike and fish on. Looked and felt big due to drag from the increase in speed, but when it got closer, I could definately tell it was small. But a nice size perch ~10".

Anyways, I see LOTS of fish around me jumping. It's like Rufus Woods several years ago. Splash here, splash there. Splash everywhere. Most looked like trout. They were catching some major air. Not very big from what I could tell though. Guessing in the 12-14" range. I did see a couple that looked to be about 16"+ range.

I swap out my wedding ring and decided to try out my new needlefish. Less than 5 mins later, FISH ON!!!!
14" cutt-throat.

Keep going and I get a MONSTER strike. I grab the rod and feel the headshakes. I see drag is getting pulled. Then I see a large fish jump way out there and dead goes my line. Looked to be something in the 20" range. Couldnt tell if it was a trout or squawfish though. Put pole back down and a few mins later, I get another strike. 15" rainbow I believe. The only way I can tell the cutt-throats and rainbows apart is by the red slash under the jaw. If I see that, cutt-throat. If I dont, rainbow. I assume that's how it goes?

Anyways, I get another trout at boat side, maybe 16". Tried to net it a few times, but it kept bulldogging downwards. After the 3rd or 4th time, it pops off. Got a few more strikes, but they didn't stick.

I eventually lost my rig on something. It wasn't hitting bottom, but it was dragging on something. I saw the weird movement on my pole, but couldn't tell what it was. Then all of a sudden, my pole just drops and I knew I got caught on something. I go towards the snag and reel in what I could. I'm directly over it and it's about 40' of water. I can see a line with a bouy about 10' below the surface. I believe that's what I got caught on. I was making a slight turn and it must have rubbed up along side it. Nothing I could do, so I tried to snap my line. It broke on the uni-unit knot between my lead core and fluorocarbon. Broke on the fluorocarbon side. Lost my only dodger and new on fire needlefish.


I tried out one of my flatfish afterwards for a bit, but didnt get a single strike on it. But by now, the sun was out and it was high noon, so maybe that has something to do with it.

My hookup ratio wasn't that bad today. Definately between, but I still lost quite a bit of fish. If I caught them all, this would have easily been a 4 rating.

Also, it was pretty cold out this morning. Low clouds, I think high 50s to low 60s for most of the morning. Then by about 11AM, the clouds finally started to burn off.

The Quadfather

9/19/2012 8:45:00 PM

FF,, you just might turn away from those bass before you know it. Cutthroat fishing can be a blast, and in my opinion you did pretty good for lake Samammish. It is a fine lake for cutts, but over the last year the Kokanee have gotten crazy outta control. Sometimes you can't pull a cutt for anything. You just come up with Kokes.
You mentioned your sole way of telling apart the cutts. from rainbows was your seeing the red slash on the underjaw....
Important to realize that not all cutts. will have an obvious red slash, sometimes it's barely visible. Maybe G-man will chime is with the reasons why.
I was just going to mention the other identifier is that the jaw on the cutts. continues back past the eye of the fish, farther than with a rainbow.
The most obvious thing for me is the particular black spotting. Look closely at the area just before the tail fin on your pic. That's classic lake WA. Lake SAm. cutthroat spotting. Nice report!

FishingFool

9/20/2012 11:13:00 AM

Thanks QuadF. I've noticed a few that I've caught did have a barely visible red/orange slash. As long as it's not 100% white there, I've been calling them cutts. I haven't noticed the jaw line yet. The jaw line difference is not extreme as SMB and LMB is it? I've been looking at my past images to see if I can see the difference, but can't tell.

I have noticed the spots though. I see that they are more prominent on the cutts than the rainbows.

I also notice I snack more when trolling. This could be a bad thing, LOL.

Amx

9/21/2012 7:09:00 AM

Ya keep snacking while fishing you'll get fat like me. lol.

Nice day fishing.

I didn't get anything worth reporting about. Lots of perch tho.

The trout I have caught over the years have been Rainbow or Kokes. Rainbow - obvious. Kokes silver with black back. Anything else is just a 'trout'. haha They all go back in the water anyway. :-). I did catch 4 or 5 BIG trout this past spring, up to maybe 24" 5 lbs or whatever, some day I'll weight and measure one. They were the biggest trout I've ever caught. My previous biggest was a 16" measured rainbow. All while bass fishing, all with a crankbait, or Senko next to and under a couple docks.

Leave a Comment:

Login

Flag

×

Why is this comment inappropriate?

Close Submit

Delete this comment? Provide reason.

No Yes

Edit

×

Cancel Save