Friday's Fishing report

I fished Henrys Lake on Friday and had fairly good luck.  The weather was calm and mostly clear in the early morning with elk dotting the meadows west of the lake.

I first fished the A-Frame Bay and only got one small cutthroat before I moved on the Duck Creek.  In seven feet of water I landed a 19 inch cutthroat and a 19 inch brook trout.  Both were taken on a Beadhead Electric Black.

 

I then decided to try the deep part of the lake as a slight breezy made drift-fishing about right.  In the Wild Rose Hybrid Hole in 20 feet of water, I started getting hits and a few fish.  I landed four cutts and another large brook trout.  Most of them were taken on a Canadian Red Leech with red tinsel in the black tail.

 

I heard reports of bait fishermen doing well along the Cliffs and also catching some large hybrids there.  I will have to try it in the next week to see what happens.  The lake is still too cold to cause the fish to school up much.

 

 

Henrys Lake opener

Yesterday (May 23) was the opening day for Henrys Lake.  The wind won most of the battles as very few fishermen fished past 9 a.m.  Before the wind came up hard, fishing was pretty good.  I had good luck in the A-Frame Bay in seven feet of water and at Timber Creek in 5 to 7 feet of water.  But after the wind came up, I had a tough time catching fish.

All my fish were taken on a Beadhead Electric Black leech.  I caught one nice brook trout and ten cutthroats between 13 to 19 inches. 

I will fish it again on Wednesday or Friday of next week and hopefully the weather will be better.  But the fishing is usually better in the early morning on most day.

Good luck.

Henrys Lake update

Spent two days at the Idaho Falls Fly Fishing Expo and had a lot of fun meeting old and new friends.  I was able to demonstrate my system of tying flies and also did a program on Henrys Lake and fishing there.

By the way, Mike from the Drift Lodge showed me a picture of the ice on Henrys and it is about gone.  I will be going up there in about 10 days to deliver flies and look at the conditions.  I had several businesses contact me about delivering flies to them for the summer.  That means I will be tying flies to catch up again.

For those of you who want to order flies or my book, contact me and I will get them to you before the opening day.

The spawning has ended on Henrys Lake and was one of the best run in recent years.

Henrys Lake map

As promised at the presentation tonight - Here it is.  Enjoy.

Ice fishing is over

I have made a promise to keep this blog up and running now that I am retired.

I believe that my ice fishing is done for this season.  It has been a weird year with very cold for a few days and then very warm for a week or 10 days.  The last two weeks have weakened the ice on most lakes and reservoirs.

I did not retire from teaching until December 1st, and was too busy to ice fish much before the new year.  I did make it up to Henrys to ice fish twice, but my first real trip was to Ririe reservoir on January 4.  I fished close to several people and we had a little success taking several trout and kokanee.  Perch fishing was the best I have every experienced on Ririe, but the kokanee fishing was the worst.  Last Friday was my last day there because of the rotting ice after fishing it 11 days.

 

About mid January, four of us made the long trip to Mackay Reservior where we caught 18 kokanee and two trout.  The fishing was also poor so the ice-house residents did more drinking than fishing.

Last Saturday four of us went to Chesterfield Reservoir near Soda Springs.  We had a good day catching planters but broke off the only two large fish we had on.

 

I may check out Island Park or Hebgen or Mud Lake, but with temps in the 50's, I really don't have much faith.

 

On Wednesday, Feb. 11th, I will be doing a presentation on Henrys Lake at the Shilo Inn and it will be free and the public is invited.