Made it out to Chelan May 9 - 12 with family. Haven’t been out there in a while. Fishing was amazing. Get out there if you can. It is a big lake with many potential areas to hold fish. Viewing past posts on northwest fishing reports here got me started in the right direction and I hope this post helps future anglers.

Fish are down in the lower basin near town. I’ll post a few spots where we caught fish. The most productive being a spot between lake side lodge and “the red roofs”. There are a lot of boats out as well so if there fish aren’t there, follow the crowd. I also had success in front of “the blue roofs” and “the red roofs” in about 70ft water. Trolling with downriggers at 25 - 30 ft worked well too. Later in the day or if it got bright I’d go 30 - 40 feet. Early early morning there were a few picked up with flat lining. Keep an eye on your fish finder for the schools and adjust accordingly. Another technique which produced a lot of with was a dropper rig with 4oz of lead. It looks a little odd since the line doesn’t appear to get far away from the boat but it was our top producer. It worked from around 50 - 35ft deep of water when the fish are hugging the bottom. The trend here is get your gear where the fish are. This is probably the most important piece being in such a huge and deep lake. Need to have the right spot and water column depth.

Once you’ve found fish, I’d start with whatever your go-to set up may be. First day the fish seemed to favor 50/50 brass and nickle God’s tooth spoon rigged Kokanee style. The next was a spin-n-glow or a pink micro hoochie. The last day was a glow micro wedding ring or pink micro hoochie. Dodgers were either arrow flash or Paulina peak tear drop shaped digger. Gold with moon jelly, wonder bread, or orange/chrome worked. I matched the lure with corn with either natural color or pink corn. If the lure color was pink or close, it got pink corn. Corn was prepared with pro cure and canned tuna. I’ve read about people only using the juice, but throw some of the meat in there too for added scent/potency. You don’t need a lot and should have plenty left for a sandwich. If your marking fish and not getting bites after 10 - 15 minutes, swap out gear. The dropper rig was a lot of fun if we passed over fish. I’d let out line till it hit bottom, one crank on the reel to get it off the bottom and did a slow jigging motion. The down riggers were nice to get suspended fish. Set backs were about 75ft or a little less. Fish don’t seem to be too boat shy. With such huge variation in gear from day to day, don’t be afraid to experiment.

Fish are running a bit bigger this year from what I hear. Definitely bigger than 2 years ago when I was last there. Heard of reports of 15” fish. Wasn’t that luck but did get into a few 13”+. Most are about 11” fat and healthy. Vacuumed packed some and the others are brining as I type to be smoked. Tight lines everyone. Get a chest or bag full of silver!

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