Reports from my fishing trips with family and friends
Lees Ferry Report
March 1, 2009
I hit Lees Ferry for about 4 hours today. I took my 7 year old Lailah to fish with me and be my photographer. I started at 1:30 pm and fished just a few miles the boat launch sight for spawnning rainbows. These fish can be fussy if they have been fished over earlier the same day. Luckily, the fish were in a good mood and willing to take my egg immitations. I caught 8 fish at this first spot before leaving it to spin fish with my daughter from the drifting boat. Drifting was good too, yeilding many fish using a bottom bouncing technique with the spin rods. We were back on the dock at 5:30 with smiles on our faces.
Beautiful spawnning color
Lailah caught 'em drifting by Duck Island
Sight fishing procuded this 17" male
Lees Ferry Report
March 8,2009
I fly fished the river by myself today and had a great time seeking fish for upcoming guide days. I fished several spots looking for active fish. One riffle in particular, was quite good with 7 fish coming in about 20 minutes. The biggest was 17" and very scrappy. Egg imitations and midge patterns were successful for me. There aren't as many shallow spawning fish this year as compared to last March. I saw plenty of deeper fish on spawning beds however.
Beautiful rainbow from 8.5 Mile riffle on a plastic bead
Lake Powell Report
March 13 & 16 2009
Friends of my Dad, Butch, Steve and John fished Powell with me for 2 days. The 13th was tough on the lake. We targeted large and smallmouth bass because of good reports from friends. The 4 of us had a little action at our first spot with 3 fish on and one quality smallie landed. We moved up lake into Gunsight Canyon and saw many fish up shallow basking in the warmer water but we could not get them to bite. We had fun despite the slow bite.
The 16th was much better to us. We targeted stripers in the back of a long canyon with off-color and warmer water. We trolled crank baits and an umbrella rig and landed 7 stripers and had 2 more get off. The stripers are in very good shape with fat bellies. They ranged from 3 to 5 pounds. The water temp peaked at 60.5.
Lake Powell Report
April 18, 19
What a great couple of days. My buddy and fellow guide Mike Mcnabb, his son Paul and I hit Navajo Saturday and I went out solo Sunday to Last Chance Bay. The green fish are frisky. Many are shallow and tight to brush near deep water access. We fished Navajo initially for crappie with no success. Mike hit a fat striper on our one and only trolling pass near where we started crappie fishing on a deep diving crankbait. The largemouth however, were very cooperative. Hula grubs and weightless wacky rigged Senkos took these fish.
Sunday I went solo and eventually ended up in Last Chance. I talked to another solo angler in the back left fork who was trolling for stripers and doing quite well in the 20-30 foot range. I figured I'd leave the stripers for later and concentrated on crappie for quite a while without a fish. So it was back to the trusty weightless wacky Senko. That was the ticket. I fished it until I had one of many fish take the lure and when I set the hook the fish felt much smaller than the rest up to that point. It was a crappie. Where there's one, there's always more, especially in the spring. So for the next hour or more, I fished the area and brought 8 crappie to hand and had that many more short strike and shake off. Again I hit more Senko fish and a few pitching a 6" watermelon Texas rigged lizard to the edge of the brush lines and big boulders. I also used a 4" hollow belly Strike King swimbait to take 3 LM just before I went trolling for stripers. The green fish ranged from 2-3 lbs. I trolled only 20 minutes for stripers in the area where the other boat was having success and hit one fat fish on the umbrella rig with a 4" Swim Shad for the trailer.
2 quality largemouth taken on soft plastics
Typical Powell crappie
3 pounder on a Senko
Lees Ferry Report
July 3, 2009
It's time for the cicadas to hatch out at Lees Ferry again. The noisy bugs are clumsy flyers and end up in the water occasionally. The trout, especially along the tree-lined banks take notice immediately and will hit a large dry fly with gusto. I made my first cicada trip with my buddy Page native Kyran Keisling. We only fished from 10 to 2:30 but we had some great action drifting the banks throwing big bugs. Some of the strikes were explosive...great fun! The biggest fish of the day, a 18"+ beauty took a long run and into the backing on my fly reel. I'll be making more trips down to the Ferry while this awesome bite is on.
If you'd like to join me for a full-day guided trip, give me a call. 928.640.2211
Lake Powell Report
June and July 2009
I've been out several times this summer chasing striper boils and fishing for large and smallmouth bass. The bass have been cooperative for the most part but on the small side. Stripers have been pretty boat shy and fairly tough to get close enough to get a proper cast to. While the young of the year shad are still in the larval stage and about an inch long, the stripers find them an easy meal since they cannot flee very fast. I've caught fish on each trip but only a few. As the newly hatched shad grow larger and gain speed, the stripers will loose their shyness about the boat and will be much easier to catch. The best days for boil chasing, which I've missed out on so far, are cloudy days. The stripers are much more catchable on cloudy days. With the Monsoon season started up, the cloudy days will come soon enough.
Lake Powell Report
Late August 2009
I've hit the lake a few times lately with a mixed bag of species to show for my efforts. Fishing the far western end of the lake in Wahweap Creek, I bagged quality largemouth up to 3.5 pounds on spinnerbaits in the evening of the 25th. The morning of the 29th yielded 4 walleyes on spinnerbaits in the exact same spot. Topwater poppers and spooks also took several small and largemouth bass on both trips. No striper boils were seen while in the back of Wahweap Creek.
Walleye on a spinnerbait
Largemouth on topwater
Lake Powell Report
September 19, 2009
I headed on a solo trip in search of either boiling stripers or bass this morning. I headed straight for the Haystack area of Warm Creek. After seeing many good reports about catching stripers on jigging spoons in 50 of water. I made my way back to the mouth of one of the fingers of Haystack and at 50 feet I started to see stripers on the fish finder. On the very first drop I caught a small one but he was just the first of many on the spoon. I soon was seeing huge schools on the fish finder and I was catching fish every time I dropped the spoon into the mass of shad and stripers. At 8 AM on the dot the stripers finally pushed the shad schools to the surface and began to boil on them. Some boils lasted several minutes, others lasted only 30 seconds. I caught several on topwater lures from the boils. What a great morning. Just before I called it day, I got a call for a afternoon guide trip so I hit the lake twice today.
A huge school of shad and stripers feeding on them
Quality striper on a Sebile Topwater
Lake Powell Report
November 1, 2009
I took my daughters Lailah and Lauren into Navajo Canyon out for about 4 hours. We fished the back ends of small pockets containing broken rock with jigs, dropshot and shaky heads with success. The smallies were happy to take every bait we dropped to them. Yamamoto Swim Senkos in baby bass and watermelon Hula Grubs were especially good. On the way out to Navajo and on the way back, we trolled through the Castle Rock Cut and over a nearby submerged island. The smallies and a couple of yearling stripers took crankbaits diving to about 10-15 feet.
Lailah fights a smallie
Lauren with a striper on
Hula Grub fish
Lees Ferry Report
December 20, 2009
I hit the water around 11 AM with my bud Kyran and we drifted with indicator rigs on the fly rods, spin fished with Glo Bugs, Panther Martin spinners, Kastmasters and marabou jigs . I also caught fish off the anchor with the center pin rig. Red and brown worms, yellow and pink Glo bugs and trusty Zebra midges all took fish on the fly rods and center pin. Ky used 1/16 oz jigs, Kastmasters and small spinners and caught fish out of the foam lines and eddys. All the fish Ky caught in the foam were in the 10-12 inch range. The deeper fish we caught drifting were 14-16 and FAT. I figure we caught at least 20 fish in 4.5 hours. The biggest fish went 18+ and took a jig for Ky from a 4 foot deep flat above 7.5 mile. A couple males were starting to show spawning colors. Great to be back on the river! I'll try to get back either on the 27th or New Year's Eve
Marabou jig fish
with nice colors
Kyran's 18 incher
Lees Ferry Report
January 31, 2010
My buddy Danny and his friend Gordon, both from Flagstaff, came up for a day on the river. My sources tell me that fishing has been good all winter and they were right. We drift-fished from 10:30 to about 5 PM and caught at least 20 fish. Gordon and I fly fished with deep nymphing rigs and caught fish on San Juan Worms and Zebra midges. The 3 of us also used spinning gear and large Glo Bugs ( egg flies ) and took many fish from water too deep for the fly rods. Many fish went over 15 inches with one beautiful 18" male in full spawnning colors.
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Lake Powell Report
March 7, 2010
I just couldn't stand watching the weather warm anymore. Even though the forecast called for rain about noon, I hit the water at 11AM and made my way into Warm Creek. Fishing was tough as I expected, but the fish I hooked were quality. The first fish I had was a largemouth in the 4 pound plus class. It took a Carolina rigged lizard in shallow water at the end of a brush pile where it intercepted a channel edge. This is the kind of spot you look at and just know there's gong to be a fish on it. Unfortunately, it came unbuttoned about 5 feet from the boat. The next fish took a weightless Yamamoto Senko from a isolated bush on the edge of the main channel. He came out and swirled on it as I lifted to place the lure in another spot in the bush - 2 pounder. I braved the drizzle for a couple hours without another bump. It was a great day despite the cold and rain.
Lake Powell Report
March 28, 2010
I hit
Pretty wood duck hanging out with the Mallards
Lake Powell Report
March 11, 2010
Went out solo again partly to look at a couple areas I was told about on the 10th and to check if the crappie were active on a particular spot. First I ran into Padre Bay and found some eager fish around big boulders with lots of brush around it. I took a few 1 pound largemouth here on watermelon candy Yamamoto Hula Grubs. Later, I followed the brush line into the back of the finger and found wolf packs of 1-2 pound large and smallmouth willing to take Yammato Senkos, Roadrunner crappie jigs and best of all, small Zara Puppy topwaters. About :30, I ran back into Last Chance to one of my crappie spots to see if they were catchable yet. Try as I might, I couldn't get any crappie action in that cove. Instead, I concentrated on flipping shallow isolated trees on the edge of the main channel in the muddiest water and caught several fish in the same 1-2 pound range on pumpkin jigs with a plastic chunk trailer.
Lake Powell Report
March 28, 2010
I hit the lake solo to seek out largemouth and crappie way up in Last Chance Bay. Last April, I found a great crappie spot in LCB, but I didn't find then on this trip. The water temp is just a little cool at 53 degrees. I did find some willing large and smallmouth however. I took several small largemouth on crappie jigs and had a 3#+ fish chase a spinnerbait right to the edge of the boat. I caught 2 quality 2# smallies today. One I flipped on a jig and plastic trailer and the other I took on a Rapala DT6 crankbait casting to the drop-off in the Castle Rock Cut as I was making my way back to the dock. Great to be on the water with almost no traffic.
Lake Powell Report
May 5-8, 2010
After a 3 year wait, my best fishing buddy Rich Stanton, from my home town of Tucson, joined me again for a May 5-8 trip to the San Juan Arm. Looking at the weather forecast earlier in the week, we thought we had it made in the shade; sunny skies, moderate wind speeds and highs in the 80's. Oh, if we just had it so easy. The run up the lake was smooth as silk with nearly glassy water the entire 63 miles to the Neskahi area to set up our tent camp. Shortly after we arrived, the wind started. It continued all that night, Thursday and finally eased about lunch on Friday. Sustained wind of about 15 and gusts in the 25+ range made fishing unprotected areas very tough without anchoring.
So enough complaining, despite the wind we did have a great trip. The water temps ranged from 59 in the mornings in the main bay to 71 in very shallow heavily stained water. We ran into friends Rhonda and Striper Steve and they told us of good crappie fishing in "Crappie Cove". Rich and I planned to rely only on fish for dinners. The plan was to catch enough crappie for at least 2 dinners on the first day, so info on a crappie hot spot was great to hear. We quickly had enough to make dinner for 2 nights. Anchoring with the bow into the wind, we positioned the boat just a few yards off narrow cuts with shallow brush and lanes in between to retrieve jigs. The action was fast and we landed many slabs and ended up with 3 over 1.5 pounds that evening along with lots of small bass as well.
Day 2 Rich and I braved the windy conditions and fished some of the main lake points, reefs and cuts in the Piute and Neskahi area. We caught some fish on jigs, dropshot and weightless Senkos on a couple spots but the sheltered areas treated us better for sure. We tried many times to get fish on reaction baits like spinnerbaits, topwaters, crankbaits and swimbaits. Only a few fish came on spinnerbaits and crankbaits. Our best pattern which held up every where we tried it was fishing jigs, Yamamoto Hula Grubs, Senkos and such in the brushy flats shallower than 8 feet or narrow cuts with rock slides and brush mixed in. After a quick lunch back at camp, we ran up the Great Bend about half way. We found shelter in a couple little canyons but only a few fish in the back of each one. A little farther up we found a shallow little cove with a couple boulders, sparse trees and sandy bottom. This a crappie spot. Almost every time we find a spot like this, there are crappie. We anchored up wind again and boated many crappie, mostly black males guarding the spawning area. We also happened onto a striper school nearby and managed to catch a nice 3 pounder to have with our crappie dinner that night.
Day 4 Rich and I awoke to a flat calm morning...about time.It was bitter sweet however; we had to break camp and head back to Page. It's common to at least hear wild burrows while in the Neskahi area and we had one close by every day. This morning, he decided to stop by and have a goodbye walk just past camp. So after a quick breakfast, we loaded the boat and headed out to fish our way back. We fished beautiful Reflection Canyon with much success on largemouth and smallies on dropshot, jigs and Senkos. Dangling Rope marina was our lunch and ice cream stop for a while before stopping nearby to fish a good sized sunken island. We took several smallies off the top of the island but the highlight was seeing an enormous striper cruising by. I quickly tied a large minnow lure on and cast for several minutes in the direction it was last seen. We estimated it at about 40 pounds. The girth of the fish was astounding. Dungeon Canyon was our next stop and the fish treated us well. Again, we spotted another huge striper in the narrow back of the canyon. This one was a bit smaller, but still over 25 pounds.
What a trip, it's always great fun fishing with Rich. Despite the wind, we had a great time and stuck some quality fish. I can't wait to get back... perhaps soon
Day 3 dawned nearly calm and we were excited to make the 12 mile run up the river to Zahn Bay. As we ran up past the Great Bend, the water progressively got greener and finally a creamy tan as we entered a smaller bay just a couple of miles below Zahn. Rich and I stopped and fished in this bay and we caught some very nice largemouth. The first one of the day turned out to be the biggest of the trip and in fact, the 6 pound 4 ounce beauty is my personal best largemouth on Powell. Again, the pattern was shallow brushy flats .
Day 4 Rich and I awoke to a flat calm morning...about time.It was bitter sweet however; we had to break camp and head back to Page. It's common to at least hear wild burrows while in the Neskahi area and we had one close by every day. This morning, he decided to stop by and have a goodbye walk just past camp. So after a quick breakfast, we loaded the boat and headed out to fish our way back. We fished beautiful Reflection Canyon with much success on largemouth and smallies on dropshot, jigs and Senkos. Dangling Rope marina was our lunch and ice cream stop for a while before stopping nearby to fish a good sized sunken island. We took several smallies off the top of the island but the highlight was seeing an enormous striper cruising by. I quickly tied a large minnow lure on and cast for several minutes in the direction it was last seen. We estimated it at about 40 pounds. The girth of the fish was astounding. Dungeon Canyon was our next stop and the fish treated us well. Again, we spotted another huge striper in the narrow back of the canyon. This one was a bit smaller, but still over 25 pounds.
What a trip, it's always great fun fishing with Rich. Despite the wind, we had a great time and stuck some quality fish. I can't wait to get back... perhaps soon
Lake Powell Report
November 10, 2010
I’ve been out a few times in the past 2 weeks. Overall, the fishing has been ok here in the southern lake. The spots where I was getting 3-4 pound stripers in now dominated by yearling size fish of about 12" inches. On a guide trip on 10/28, I had a very nice family from The Netherlands and we whooped up on the little guys on topwater poppers. Their 9 year old son had a blast on light gear; we couldn’t keep the fish off the lures. Another trip on the 11/1 found the Greenes from New York City and me looking for those fish again but they were only taking anchovies and not topwater. We caught a bunch and moved on to see some more of our beautiful lake and did some smallmouth fishing.
Lake Powell Report
December 5, 2010
Fall has been much milder than usual. The water temps are still in the 50's and reports about great striper and largemouth fishing close to Page have been frequent. I hooked up the boat and headed out for a afternoon trip. My buddies Kip and Jarret had been on a good jerkbait ( hard minnow plug ) bite the day before and I planned to try to duplicate their success. Well, it was one of those "you should have ben here yesterday" deals. I couldn't get a largemouth to take a jerkbait or any other reaction bait to save my life that day. However, all was not lost to say the least. On my way out to Warm Creek where Kip and Jarret had their good action, I stopped, as I almost always do, in the Castle Rock Cut to fish the steep edge of the channel. I had a Smithwick Rattlin' Rouge jerkbait tied on and soon had a couple of little smallmouth bending by rod. Not only did the smallies like it, but 3 stripers and 2 small walleye thought it was tasty as well.
After I was done with that piece of water, I made my way into Warm creek to fish main points with the Rouge and other reaction lures. After fishing many points I didn't even have a fish follow any bait I threw. While watching my fish finder between spots, I saw an obvious school of stripers on the screen. I reached for the jigging spoon and sent it down to the bottom. A couple hops later I was fighting a 3 pound striper. Drop after drop, I had striper eat the spoon. At one point, I had 10 drops in a row with a hooked fish coming over the side of the boat.
Lake Powell Report
April 22, 2011
Finally got out to go fishing for fun! I hit my crappie spot in Last Chance Bay. After a disappointing 2010 on this spot, I'm happy to report that the fish are back. I caught many crappie 9-12 ounces on a variety of jigs presented on the swim. Several largemouth were in the area as well and fell victim to the jigs. I also caught a few largemouth and smallies on Yamamoto Hula grubs in the area. The day was mostly overcast and just a little cool. the water temp in the stained water was 60 degrees.
Lees Ferry Report
August 20, 2011
I went down at 11AM by myself wanting to concentrate on looking mainly for bigger fish. I spent a lot of time fishing streamers on the drift with the Teeny 250. First fish of the day came on a cone head black bunny leach from a rocky shelf about 10 miles up. Beautiful 17 inch female. For the next 3 hours, I fished the area below the dam looking for Mr. Big. I tried several different streamers finally finding a yellow bunny to be successful. I hit a several fish on that fly but nothing over 15 inches. I switched to nymphing and caught several more with 2 going 17. I made my way down a few miles and fished a productive stretch in the shade. The fish in this spot were very aggressive. I had put a unique big bugger called a Playboy Bunny that I fished with at the Green many years ago. The wanted that one big time. The first fish there was a fat 17 inch football. The other 4 were 15ish. After that I went wading to cool off. I hit a few in good current on a dry between trees on a bar that doesn't get much pressure, Little Catchings. Duck Island was next. The outside has been fishing well with dry/ dropper. I hit a few more there both on dry and Zeebs before the weather started looking ominous. Another great day. Practially in my back yard. No pics, I left the camera at home.
Lees Ferry Report
September 3 & 5, 2011
Labor Day Weekend
9/3 Whack 'em & smack 'em. Holy cow! So, what do like to fish? Dries, dry/ dropper, shallow nymphing, swinging buggers. It's all good, no great! Every riffle has scads of willing fish to take your dries sometimes and all you want on droppers of many types. Zeebs naturally. I fished size 20, 18 and 16 and they all worked in every color I tried. BH scuds in ginger, pink and squirrel belly colors. Shallow nymphing with regular scuds and a tung head pheasant tail on the bottom (no split shot) was good too. But the best action I had was swinging buggers over flats. Standing crotch deep using a 5' sink tip and 4 feet of 10# flouro with a black or brown sz 8 or 10. They couldn't leave it alone. I'm sure longer sink tips would be good also. I tried the Playboy Bunny bugger that worked so well for me a couple weeks ago but this time, nada. All 5 spots I waded were awesome. I even caught several on cicadas along a 300 yard bank I drifted.
9/5 I took out my buddy Joe Florko who is a NPS Ranger on Lake Powell. Joe had fished the river several times but only in the walk in. We fished 4 mile, 7.5 mile and 9 mile bars from 11:30am to 5pm. All fished well with dry/ dropper. Size 18 and 16 black and rust Zeebs took the majority for Joe. After taking several fish on each bar with Zeebs or BH scuds, I switched to swinging buggers on a 15 foot sink tip. Seeing lots of fry and 3" fingerling trout, I tied some gray crystal buggers after Saturdays trip. They work just as well or better as black, brown or olive. My average fish on the buggers was bigger than on Zeebs and dries, no surprise there. Size 4 caught the bigger fish and SZ 10 caught numbers, lots of numbers. I stuck with the sz 4 after a while.
Very quiet upriver, 3 guides, 2 private boats and us
2 quality fish on the Bugger
PERSONAL TRIPS 2011-2009
Lees Ferry Report
November 5, 2011
MONSTER BROWN
Caught on a gold 1/4 oz Z-Ray
26.5 inches, 6 lbs. 1 oz
Kyle Walker, the son of Jim Walker our Superintendent of Page Schools caught it around 10 this morning. Jim and Kyle fish with me a few times each year on the Ferry. The fish tried to jump 3 times and shook it's head violently many times before I was able to slide the too small net (shallow rubber bag on a 20" hoop) under it and scoop it into the boat in one motion. When it jumped the first time, we thought it was a carp or big sucker. When we got it into the boat, we all looked at each other in amazement. Other than that fish, the rest of the day went great as well. Many fish took spinners, and bottom bouncing with egg flies. Good average size of 14-15 inches with at least 6 in the 16-18 inch range. No, browns are not very common at Lees Ferry
Jim Walker with a nice 18 incher up by Glen Canyon Dam