I may have caught the last really warm days of the season when my daughter visited me last week. We enjoyed eighty degree weather, and she even took a dip in Lake Roosevelt. Things are changing fast though, and I may have missed some of my favorite fishing due to the cold weather.
My daughter Whitney and I made our trip to Banks Lake to do some smallmouth bass fishing. This is something she looks forward to every year, and although later than usual, we had surprisingly warm weather. Banks was flat calm when we put the Mark’s Marine Thunder Jet Luxor in the water at Northrup, and I drove down to a shoreline that had been very productive last year at this time. I deployed the Minn Kota and started down the shoreline. I was really hoping there would be a good top water bite, but I had no blow ups. Whitney was casting a Tiny Brush Hog and getting all kinds of bites and hooking some small bass. I put on a jerk bait and the fish liked it, and I was able to get some small ones, too. I had Whitney switch to a twin tail grub, and that worked even better. We had arrived at the fishing area at about three in the afternoon and stayed until dusk. It was one of those days when you really wanted to put someone on a bunch of fish, and they just didn’t cooperate. Oh well, there’s always next year.
Usually, we would go right back the next day, but she had never been to Lake Roosevelt. So, we went to Keller and launched the Mark’s Marine Thunder Jet Luxor. The target species was rainbow, and I have had good success below the boat ramp, both from the shore and trolling in the past. We hadn’t been trolling on the Minn Kota long with Kokabow blades and spinners and squids when I saw a change in the action on one rod. I popped it off the rigger and handed the rod to Whitney, We soon had a nice 13-inch rainbow in the net. Then things got weird. If a rod wasn’t acting right, we would bring it in to find a smallmouth bass on the line. This happened even when we were in very deep water below the cliffs. So, we ran back up towards the launch and began marking good numbers of fish on the Garmin. I saw Whitney run to the rigger rod, which was already off the clip and after quite a tussle she landed a 17-inch rainbow. She was very proud. This week’s photo is of my daughter with the nice rainbow she landed on Lake Roosevelt.
Although I didn’t have very good success bass fishing on Banks Lake when my daughter was visiting, I planned another day of fishing there. My fishing buddies Tom Verschuren and Rollie Schmitten were with me on this trip, and we launched at the Steamboat State Park boat ramp. This is a good alternative to Northrup, now that the fish cleaning station is functioning. Tom and I have had many good days of bass fishing on Banks, and Rollie and I had a blast last year at about this time. We caught lots of smallmouth on plastics and even on top water lures. I pulled the Mark’s Marine Thunder Jet into the boulder field above Rosebush and deployed the Minn Kota. I know smallmouth like to hide out among these boulders to ambush bait fish. We tried top water lures first. These won’t snag in the rocks, but the only bites we got were on plastics. We then ran pretty much straight across the lake to the far shore. This has always been productive —except last Thursday. We tried Tiny Brush Hogs, Lizards, jerk baits and top water lures and got small bass but nothing like what I am used to.
I threw a couple of line counter rods, side planers and crank baits in the boat. I was going to start the bass fishing adventure in the boulder field just above Rosebush, and the area below Rosebush is one of my favorite areas to pull crank baits. I have had good success over the years pulling cranks through here. As you can imagine, I have wide selection of Flickers Shads, Rapalas and other makers of crank baits, and I started out with a crawfish Flicker Shad, and a Fire Tiger. I put the plugs out the back at 80 feet and then attached the Side Winder planers and ran them out 30 feet. I kept my speed close to two mph and made my way down the shoreline, flirting with the weed beds that are usually at 12 to 15 feet. We trolled down past the Million Dollar Mile boat launch and we didn’t get any hits. I hadn’t heard of any good reports on the walleye fishing at Banks lately but thought I would give it a try.
You may recall my mentioning Calder Fiske. He’s the young man, 13 years old, that just held his second annual Kids Fishing Derby at the Blackbird Island Juvenile Pond in Leavenworth. Not only is Calder an avid angler, but he also wants other kids to experience the fun of fishing, too. Calder has caught all kinds of fish. His Dad, Dan, has taken him fishing in the Hawaiian Islands to the Snake River to Neah Bay. I have had him out sockeye fishing. Calder was all about catfish for a while, which he caught on the Snake River, and has now shifted his attention to bass. We have finally got a date to take his Dad and he out on the Mark’s Marine Thunder Jet Luxor on Banks Lake. We will try some areas of the lake that I haven’t fished lately and will hopefully find a bunch of smallmouth to smack our lures. Calder is no slouch when it comes to catching bass. He has shown me photos of some dandies he has caught. I am really glad we have finally got a date that we all can get out on the boat. It’s going to be fun!
