After getting shot down by not one but two prospective fishing partners for the Lake Washington PSA Cutthroat Derby, I was very happy to get an 11th hour invite from Salmonbarry to join him aboard the newly outfitted Tin Cup for the derby. Apparently his prospective sidekick lost his wallet and was going to be busy replacing all of the licenses and credit cards on Saturday instead of fishing. As fate would have it, we proved to be a formidable duo again this week!

We met at the Gene Coulon launch at 0445 and I got my first look at the Tin Cup adorned with her new and improved canopy. Very impressive indeed and highly convenient as it turned out to be a warm sunny day.

We used a broad selection of lures and baits throughput the day switching-up with each lull in the action. Salmonbarry started out with his go-to slow death rig on the down rigger right out the gate and I chose to start with the beater chrome flatfish trolled long-line near the surface. While we marked a few clusters of fish in a current seam we did not find any biters before the sun crested the horizon trolling just south of Mercer Island.

Before long we found ourselves headed north along the west side of MI and into one of Salmonbarry's favored trolling patterns. The surface temp was nearly 70 degrees, too warm for trout to be comfortable, so I soon selected the American Lake Special to be my first rig on the down rigger.

Not far into this northbound troll we began to establish a steady pattern of fish in 117' of water suspended at about 35'-40'. We targeted this depth and Salmonbarry soon converted a take down into our first fish of the day and with that, the skunk was booted squarely into the drink! We picked-up another cutthroat a while later then I noticed a light bite and popped my line off the rigger and stuck the hooks into a fish. It fought slugglishly and turned out to be a northern pikeminnow. While some would have been disappointed with this outcome, I looked at it as a grand opportunity and our unexpected guest was summarily dispatched and cut into bait strips.

This proved to be the hot ticket inducing several strikes and accounting for our best fish of the day. The big fish hit on the American Lake Special tipped with a strip of pikeminnow and fished at the magic depth of 38'. It was one of only a couple of fish that actually had the horse power to pull the line free of the down rigger release clip unassisted. The take down happened on the northbound troll just south of Paul Allen's house and we landed the fish just offshore of his yacht.

We worked a pattern back and forth along west MI and picked-up fish consistently from about 6:30 to around 10:00 AM. The bite was best early when temps were coolest and there was a slight wind-chop on the water.

Altogether we landed 6 cutthroat ranging from just over a pound to the 3 pound 7 ounce MONSTA that proved good enough for 3rd place in the derby and $200. We also landed 2 kokanee one of which was released. I weighed-in 3 fish and Salmonbarry entered 2. We felt good about our effort and success given that these 5 fish represented about 1/8 of the 40 or so fish entered.

Northwest Fishing Reports was well represented with G-Man taking home the top derby prize and yours truly in third. We also enjoyed visiting with DJ Butler who entered a fish as well.

The event was well attended with about 90 registered anglers. Thanks to the Lake Washington Chapter of PSA for hosting another fun event and thanks to the sponsors for their generous support of the event and for supplying many raffle prizes.

A big shout out to G-Man as well for donating a couple of his fish to me after my prize winner and one of my other entries went missing when it was time to claim our fish. My in laws visited Sunday and this enabled me to send them home with fresh trout and still have some left to run through the smoker and share with my colleagues at the office.

Most of all, thanks to Salmonbarry for the invite and the ride on the Tin Cup. It was a privilege and a pleasure to fish with you and I look forward to our next adventure. Looks like it's my turn to host again!

I learn more and more about this fishery with each passing season and with new found success in each derby.

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