SJ Trip May 2026 - Part 1

PowellBride

PowellBride

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We arrived on the SJ late Saturday afternoon; just in time for happy hour and dinner. Fishing would commence in earnest tomorrow morning.

Some of our observations so far:IMG_0385.jpegIMG_0373.jpegIMG_0377.jpeg

  • It’s definitely a new lake, we are having to relearn our way around the SJ. Where the prop eaters are hiding below the surface, good spots to anchor and where to find the big LMB
  • It’s pretty quiet down here, if you break down you’re on your own. It’s unlikely anyone will boat past. We’ve on;y seen 2 boats in the past 2 days.
  • The past 4-5 years we have seen little of the quagga mussels on the SJ. Different story this year. They are EVERYWHERE! The walls from waterline to 20 feet up are just coated with them.
  • Crappie have also surprised the 3 of us. In the past 20 trips we’ve made over the last 5 years, I bet we haven’t caught 1/2 dozen between us. We are catching 1/2 dozen or more daily, and they are BIG! 12+”
  • Paiute canyon has silted in to the mouth of the bay. Water is green with zero visibility in the bay. We boated about 1/2 way between Paiute and Neshki, but water was turning toward brown and with no visibility we so no reason to risk an encounter with a “prop eater”
  • The is a big “prop eater”across from Peek-A-Boo arch about 50 yards from shore, go wide if you’re headed to Piute
  • Shoot-the-Chute (or Syncline) is basically silted in, you can go about 1/4 mile before the canyon ends
  • Trail canyon is one big sandy beach at the end of a shallow cove
  • Overall fishing is decent. Not the fish every cast we experienced a few years ago, but consistent with lots of crappie, sun fish, blue gills, decent size SMB and a handful of really nice LMB. That LMB is almost a big as my stomach 🙃
 
PowellBride said:
We arrived on the SJ late Saturday afternoon; just in time for happy hour and dinner. Fishing would commence in earnest tomorrow morning.

Some of our observations so far:View attachment 35764View attachment 35765View attachment 35766

  • It’s definitely a new lake, we are having to relearn our way around the SJ. Where the prop eaters are hiding below the surface, good spots to anchor and where to find the big LMB
  • It’s pretty quiet down here, if you break down you’re on your own. It’s unlikely anyone will boat past. We’ve on;y seen 2 boats in the past 2 days.
  • The past 4-5 years we have seen little of the quagga mussels on the SJ. Different story this year. They are EVERYWHERE! The walls from waterline to 20 feet up are just coated with them.
  • Crappie have also surprised the 3 of us. In the past 20 trips we’ve made over the last 5 years, I bet we haven’t caught 1/2 dozen between us. We are catching 1/2 dozen or more daily, and they are BIG! 12+”
  • Paiute canyon has silted in to the mouth of the bay. Water is green with zero visibility in the bay. We boated about 1/2 way between Paiute and Neshki, but water was turning toward brown and with no visibility we so no reason to risk an encounter with a “prop eater”
  • The is a big “prop eater”across from Peek-A-Boo arch about 50 yards from shore, go wide if you’re headed to Piute
  • Shoot-the-Chute (or Syncline) is basically silted in, you can go about 1/4 mile before the canyon ends
  • Trail canyon is one big sandy beach at the end of a shallow cove
  • Overall fishing is decent. Not the fish every cast we experienced a few years ago, but consistent with lots of crappie, sun fish, blue gills, decent size SMB and a handful of really nice LMB. That LMB is almost a big as my stomach 🙃
Click to expand...
Powell bride thanks for the report!
It sounds like water clarity degrades significantly the further up stream you go in the SJ to the point you are nervous about seeing “whales” just below the surface. I assume that between the main channel and Cha you can still see stuff ok if you are vigilant?

This is kind of a random question about sunfish. We haven’t seen/caught many in the past years. We find a lot of bluegill but not sunfish. Were you just finding them in brushy areas mixed in w the bluegill? I thought I’d heard it theorized that they were more susceptible to striper predation and that’s why we don’t see them like they we did 20 years ago.
 
We were seeing a rare bluegill with some sun fish and a lot of Crappie…. All in the spots where we normally fish for LMB and SMB. In about 20” of water where we can see rocky structure. We’ve been following aging the bay and the walls along the main channel, have not really spent any time in the canyons where we might see some brush at the end of a canyon
 
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