The Fishing Magician: February 12, 2026

Just a week ago I was reporting on the results of ice fishing derbies and talking about the ice fishing at Fish Lake, near Lake Wenatchee. Well, things are different now. The warm winter we are having has kept anglers looking for places to fish as conditions change.

I wanted to see what the warmer weather had done to the ice on Fish Lake, and I am glad I did. When I arrived, I could see several anglers fishing from the dock. When I walked out to visit with them, I saw that they had broken up the ice at the edge of the dock to get their lines through to get at the trout. One angler told me that the day before there was a serious incident. A group of anglers had come up to the lake and most of them were fishing from one of the docks. One of their group decided to go out on the ice and had fallen through. As luck would have it, the sheriff’s department was at Fish Lake running training drills on cold water rescues. As a result, the unlucky angler that went through the ice was only in the water for about ten minutes and got warmed up before hypothermia became an issue. This was an important reminder to always check the conditions of the ice before even thinking about going out on it. You want four inches of good clear ice to even consider it.

When I was in Grand Coulee Dam recently, I checked the boat launch at Spring Canyon and visited with an angler on the beach there with a nice bunch of fish. I wanted to see if anything was going on at Crescent Bay. To reach Crescent Bay you take the first right after passing a small “informational” park just down the hill from the town. The gravel road will lead you to a parking area. Crescent Lake is on the right bank of the dike and Crescent Bay is on the left. There weren’t any anglers on the beach, which is much larger now that the level on Lake Roosevelt is dropping. I did see a truck pull in just as I was leaving. I haven’t had a good report on the trout fishing from this beach for a while, but things change when the water drops. I then checked the boat launch that is at the mouth of Crescent Bay. Because the water is still up this is a great place to launch if you want to troll near the top of the dam and even into Crescent Bay. There were several trucks and trailers here.
One of my favorite places to fish in the winter is at Keller, near the ferry landing. I go down the lake a ways from here, into the Federal Park that borders the shoreline. There are several accesses to the water and some of them have picnic tables and garbage cans, and there are vault toilets nearby. The sandy beach stretches quite a distance down this shore. I think a long cast will put you in maybe 10 or 12 feet of water. I found a number of anglers doing just that the other day. Most of them were scattered at the furthest down lake area of the park. Fishing had been slow they told me. One angler had three on his stringer and I saw a fish caught the short time I was there. Most anglers were fishing a variety of colors of Power Bait on a sliding sinker rig. You know how fishing goes. Sometimes they are biting and some days not so much. I have had some great days fishing from the shore here, though. Well worth the trip. The Lake Roosevelt triploid rainbow are terrific eating and great from the smoker, too.

The water level on Lake Roosevelt is much higher than usual for this time of year, and I wondered how it was affecting the fishing. When I fish from the shore at Spring Canyon it can be a long walk to where I like to fish down along the beach. First I pulled into the boat launch to see how far the lake was down and the docks are still up pretty high and launching is easy. There were a bunch of trucks and trailers parked here, and I could see boats trolling above the dam and right off the launch bay. Then I drove over to where it’s an easy walk down to the beach and found several groups of people fishing. As I made my way down, I saw a fish jump off the shore and an angler run for his rod. David Cruz landed the fish, his fifth and final fish for the day. He showed me his stringer, and the trout ranged in size from about 14 to 18 inches. He was using a marshmallow and a piece of worm on a sliding sinker rig. He and his friend had traveled here from Hauser and Coeur ‘d Alene, Idaho. This week’s photo is of the limit of rainbow that David Cruz caught at Spring Canyon.

Everyone agrees that this has been a very strange winter. We have hardly any snow on the ground here in Leavenworth, and many of the lakes that people like to ice fish aren’t frozen yet, and there is more warm weather on the way. I stopped by Billy Clapp Lake the other day. Last year at this time it was frozen, but right now it is wide open. I can see where anglers have made rod holders from the rocks and are fishing from the shore near the boat launch access site. I can even see where people have launched small boats from the beach to troll for the rainbow. Billy Clapp has produced great catches of impressive rainbow some winters. With the warm weather forecast this would be a place to try. I also went by the Coulee City Marina to see if it was frozen. I have fond memories of ice fishing for perch here over the years. I found a good layer of ice on the surface, but not thick enough to walk on. This may clear off soon with the warm weather. I still might try it for perch when the ice opens up.