| September 26, 2007 By Wayne Gustaveson Lake Elevation: 3601 Water Temp: 71-74 F |
| Details of this report will include general concepts that will work through mid October. I will be on vacation for two weeks so there will be no new fish reports until I return. Water temperature continues to fall as nights are cool and days short. In springtime temperatures in the 60's and low 70's are the periods of greatest fish activity. That works just the same in Fall. Expect bass, stripers, walleye and sunfish to feed heavily before it cools enough to cause inactivity in forage fish and predators alike. Bass are feeding on shad, sunfish and crayfish in shallows. Lake level decline is stranding more aquatic weed beds each day. Forage fish hiding in weeds must relocate as the weeds dry up. Sunfish and shad are vulnerable to predation during the relocation process. Largemouth bass are very shallow as they live in the grass with sunfish. They can be caught next to shore or on very shallow flats that may not be deep enough for boat operation. Find weeds and largemouth are close. Use surface lures or weedless presentations to fish shallow weeds. Plunking a fluke or senko into an open pocket in a weed mat can be deadly. Smallmouth bass will be on rocks because that is their preferred habitat. That means crayfish are more important in their diet. If prey fish swim by they will attack, but their primary search image is bottom oriented. Fishing with bottom bouncing grubs/tubes in open water is more likely to be rewarded with smallmouth than any other species. Crayfish imitating lures fished slowly on the bottom around rocks is the best technique for catching smallmouth bass. As I write this, smallmouth bass are more often found on the "outside edges" meaning they are more likely to be on the main channel side of a rock, instead of the side nearest shore. That can change on a daily basis, but for starters look on the deep water side of a rock ridge and then adjust as needed. Classic feeding stripers pictured on graph. Striped bass are hungry and constantly looking for fish forage in open water. They are most talented at feeding and trapping prey in open water. They have little finesse while working a weedy bottom near shore. A good general strategy is to fish the outside reefs for bass while keeping an eye on the graph for fish in deep water. A spoon can be rigged and waiting. Employ the spoon at the first sign of multiple fish at 30 feet or deeper. These fish could be a school of larger bass or a striper school. Either one will be fun. Active stripers will respond immediately to a shad (spoon) dropped into a school. Stripers are so competitive that they rush to see which fish can get the shad first. The entire school responds to a single feeding opportunity. Draw the school off the bottom by hooking one fish, and keep them going with a shower of anchovy chum at 10 minute intervals. Striper schools will suspend under the boat, often following it, and actively feed, sometimes for hours, as long as bait is presented. Some striper starting spots include: Warm Creek near the floating restroom, Rock Creek in all three arms, Oak Canyon, Piute and Neskahi Canyon on the San Juan, main channel near mouth of Long Canyon, main channel at buoy 86A, dome rock in Bullfrog Bay, mouth of Knowles Canyon, and Striper City from the horn at Good Hope to White Canyon. Don't be surprised to catch a big catfish, walleye, sunfish or crappie. All fish are active at this temperature range. |
| September 19, 2007 By Wayne Gustaveson Lake Elevation: 3601 Water Temp: 75-78 F |
After months of water temperatures in the 80's significant cooing has dropped surface temperature to 75. That's a very active temperature for warm water sport fish. Larger fish that do not like the warm surface layers were forced to stay deep. They can now go anywhere they desire. That's timely because dropping lake levels are stranding weed beds which house the main food source. Sunfish hiding in the weeds are now forced into deeper water making them vulnerable to predation as they leave the drying weeds for the next deeper spot. Find a weedy cove for good fishing. That's not always easy with Powell's steep rocky shoreline. Weeds will be in flat-bottomed sandy coves. 5-Year-old Landon Springer with dad's 5 pound largemouth bass caught in Bullfrog bay. Largemouth bass are in the shallow weeds with the sunfish. A surface popper slowly retrieved with many pauses will draw strikes from bass up to 5 pounds. Smallmouth bass wait on the rocky edge of the cove for sunfish to venture beyond the safe limits of the weeds. Plastics baits that are rigged in a weedless fashion that can penetrate the weeds without hanging up are needed to fish the shallows, but grubs on jigheads can be worked at the edge and in open pockets with good success. Striped bass are aware of sunfish in the weeds but they are clumsy when chasing prey there. In weed beds stripers end up with salad as the main course. Look for stripers near weed beds but holding further out on the second terrace. The weedy cove will often have a flat that extends from shore to near 15 feet. Depth will drop quickly at the edge of the weeds to 20 or 25 feet. Stripers will be found at the next break where depth falls to 30 or 40 feet. Position the boat over the breaking edge and cast toward shore for bass and toward the channel for stripers. Spoons are the best choice for stripers since they fall quickly from surface to deep water. Active stripers can be found by reeling the spoon quickly off the bottom. Pause the spoon a time or two during the retrieve to entice following fish to bite. When stripers stop hitting spoons they can be reactivated by using anchovy chum and bait to catch more fish resting on the bottom. Trolling the 30-foot contour with deep diving plugs is another effective method of locating striper schools. Boils are still happening morning and evening but not every day. There is enough inconsistency that finding a boil is a very special event. Boils have been very good when located with numerous schools feeding on top from dawn to 8 AM. A return to the same spot the next day does not mean the stripers will repeat the event. Circumstances have to be just right for stripers to find a large shad school when the forage fish are scarce and hiding. |
| September 13, 2007 By Wayne Gustaveson Lake Elevation: 3602 Water Temp: 79-82 F |
Bass fishing was excellent around weeds which are fairly shallow at this lake level. A good strategy was to use a topwater lure over the weed tops in low light periods or toss a shallow running lure that would move through the weeds without hanging up. Spinner baits and weedless plastics like texas-rigged worms, senkos and flukes were ideal. Fishing shallow water along shoreline rocks was good for little smallmouth but the bigger fish were on the cliff walls or near weeds. Live well overload Neskahi Bay on the San Juan was excellent fishing as always. I was disappointed with the large number of thin bass here, as competition for food in this bay must be intense. There are way too many bass in Neskahi Bay. If fishing there, please harvest a limit of 20 smallmouth bass to reduce total fish numbers and help balance predator and prey numbers. Surprisingly, striped bass at Neskahi were 18-22 inches long and in good health. My guess is that stripers are able to feed on slightly larger prey while 10-inch smallmouth bass do not have large enough mouths to eat what prey is available. Small fish are gone or hiding in tight cover. Largemouth bass feed well in these circumstances but smallmouth suffer. Further up the San Juan water clarity is murky beyond the Great Bend and into Zahn Bay. I did not find shad or game fish in the murky water. Alcove Canyon was good fishing for very healthy bass. It appears that poor bass condition is a localized event in Neskahi Bay. 
Good striper bait fishing spot near the mouth of Long Canyon - Opposite shoreline. Bait fishing and night fishing is great. This week some new hotspots have been detected at the mouth of Knowles canyon, near Long Canyon in the main channel and Rock Creek in the lower lake. While fishing for bass, a chance encounter with a striper school allows a quick catch by trolling or spooning. Return to that spot with bait, especially at night with a green light to maximize the catch. Hundred fish trips are still common. The difference between now and springtime is striper size is smaller but fish health is much improved. Smaller, healthier fish offer a greater fight, and dinner when that time comes. Fishing is slow when not tuned into the changes that have happened recently. Study this report and change your tendencies if necessary. Using last years techniques on the annual trip will not always bring success. |
| September 5, 2007 By Wayne Gustaveson Lake Elevation: 3603 Water Temp: 80-83 F |
The high profile action will be "on top" with bass and stripers feeding each morning and evening on shad schools. The extent of boiling action remains to be seen. Many shad were consumed in the late August blitz of surface feeding. Some shad escaped to swim another day but the predator pursuit is relentless. Look each morning and evening and investigate each double splash. Single splashes may be carp of gizzard shad. Double splashes mean stripers and bass chasing shad. Wayne with results of 10 minutes of boiling stripers Look for a resurgence of surface action near Trachyte and White Canyon. Striper abundance is greatest in this location. Lake level decline will displace shad and allow a new round of feeding. Striper abundance at most other locations is still strong with many yearling stripers actively feeding on top and deeper in the water column. The best strategy will be to use spoons as the weapon of choice for these conditions. Stripers want to feed but shad may not be numerous enough to allow a boil. Hungry stripers then sulk just at the cool water break (35 feet) of the shallower feeding area while scanning above for any trace of shad. Shad presence alerts the school into instant action. The slip-sliding action of a falling silver or blue spoon mimics the descent of an injured shad. One striper eating that spoon gets the rest of the school started just as if the shad school had been encountered. When graphing watch for a tight rectangular smudge of fish with an irregular shape at 30-50 feet. Often the resting striper school signature will appear as 2-3 smudges instead of individual fish arcs. The arcs appear as the school comes off the bottom to chase spoons back to the boat. Typical striper "smudges" on graph. Bottom most smudge is most typical striper signature display. Bass chase shad when available but they also root around the rocks looking for crayfish. The developing bass pattern is associated with rooted aquatic weeds that offer a safe haven to small sunfish. Sunfish are the 'go-to' target when shad are scarce. Find a tall grass bed and bass will be close by. All shades of green are found in the grass and sunfish. Try dark green or watermelon colors for quick bass action. Choose your fishing target. September is the time to satisfy all those fish cravings for all Lake Powell anglers. |