Northwest Fishing Reports

Anyone know of any good cat rivers or lakes on the west side of the state besides the Columbia?

In Vancouver Klinline Ponds I have seen some very large Catfish caught from the ponds.

Kress Lake in Cowlitz County and Swofford Pond in Lewis county are both managed for multiple species that include catfish... (e.g. WDFW actually plants channel cats in these lakes for your sport fishing pleasure)

There are supposedly some really big ones in Swofford.

how bout in north central washington.

i mean rivers to catfish in

I don't fish for catfish anymore trout, but used to and it was a lot of fun...


great eating fish when you know how to cook them....


via conversations with WDFW biologists about 7 or 8 years ago I found out that they
have a "warm water" species hatchery in the moses lake area and one of the species they
"hatched" and "nutured" then was catfish for to plant them in various waters around the state.....

that was where I found out that catfish were planted in Kress Lake and Swofford Pond....

haven't kept current on the topic though.............

and they may not even be doing this anymore.......



I think WDFW still has a "Warmwater species" department and if I were you I would try to make contact
with someone there and get the latest scoop on what's going on with that particular species....

most WA sporties are after trout, salmon, and bass..... I think WDFW is very forward looking in the way it's dealing with the warmwater species, but there really aren't that many folks fishing for catfish so the information about how they manage this form of opportunity isn't quite as easily available as the information for salmon and trout.............

but if you can get to the right person at WDFW I can guarantee that you will find out everything you want to know and more... Every WDFW person I've ever talked to about this kind of thing was more than happy to pass on everything they knew... in fact I've usually had more problem getting them to stop than to get them started talking.....

caught pretty big ones in green lake

Might not be where you want.but have you heard of Lacamas Lake in Clark County.....................I have caught 5-10 pound hogs out of there using hotdogs or chicken liver...........That just what i know

I havnt really fished for catfish but this summer I would really like to get in to it. Last year I tried on one of the last trips of the year and had a huge cat on thats all it took to get me thinkin about cats. Im not sure but from what I undestand most of the better catfishing is done east of the mountains. But like I said i am not to big on fishing for whiskers.