Fishing Forum

Before reading further, I want to point out that we are not nearly the fishermen some of the others here are, but we are learning. We had a good trip--for us--with more limited success than many have reported from Powell recently. I also want to point out that the few fish that we took pictures of, we did a "hold the fish close to you" version followed by a "hold the fish away from you" version to make sure that everyone who saw the pics would be happy and to avoid any ugly exchanges or locked threads.
My dad and I made the trip from Orem to Wahweap last Thursday and fished Friday and Saturday.
Friday: We started out heading straight to Gunsight Canyon. We found lots of stickups and submerged brush. We concentrated on one little inlet near the mouth of the canyon. We caught several small small mouths. We had several hits on spinnerbaits when we fished them right through or around the brush. We were having a hard time hooking them up. Finally I got a big hit from a large mouth that then immediately wrapped me around a stick. After a little maneuvering, I was able to get around him and got him in the boat—my first large mouth bass at Lake Powell. I caught him on a 3/8 oz Strike King Premier Plus Spinnerbait in Sexy Shad color.
We then headed around the bend to Padre Canyon and fished rocky shoreline. We had a hard time figuring out what they wanted, but finally I threw out a 5 inch Gulp Shaky Worm in green on a ¼ oz Spot Remover shaky head jig. After that I would get a bite, or a nibble, or a hook up on nearly every cast. I fished it almost vertically just a few yards out from the boat in 8-15 feet of water. I also had some success on a 3.5 inch yamamoto tube in smoke on a 1/16 oz weighted 3/0 Owner twistlock hook, and a 4 inch Senko on a 3/0 wide gap worm hook fished weightless.
Later we headed up lake near Grotto canyon and I fished a spot that two years ago (the last time we visited) was an exposed island but is now about 10 feet underwater. The fish were still there and it is here we probably had the most success in the shortest time. Shaky worms were the ticket, although I also caught fish on a ¼ Booyah jig with a Yum Craw Papi trailer.

Saturday: We had heard that fishermen were having some limited success fishing for stripers by the dam. We tied up to the buoy line, threw out chunks of anchovies and dropped our line. We stayed for probably 2 hours without a single bite. Another group was right next to us and had stayed even longer, they also had no success. We then tried trolling up the canyon walls on deep diving plugs—again, no luck. We then headed up Antelope Canyon to a big crack in the wall where we had had success in years past. No luck at all for stripers, but I did catch some very small small mouth on a slow sinking tube.
At that point we gave up on striper fishing. Too bad, I think my dad would have had more fun bait fishing for stripers, but it just didn’t seem to be happening. So, we headed up Warm Canyon, found some shallow reefs and had similar success on shaky worms, smaller spinnerbaits and weightless Senkos. We caught pretty small small mouths. After several hours in Warm Canyon with pretty spotty success, we made one more run up the lake. The main channel was pretty rough due to increase boat traffic so we stopped halfway to Gunsight and fished a shallow area off the main channel where we saw some exposed brush. Tried several different lures, but didn’t catch a think until I moved to the shaky worms, then I caught a few more smallies. As we fished a familiar looking aluminum john boat with a hand rail across the front came motoring by. We waved. I think it was Wayne, but couldn’t be sure.
We then made our way back up to Gunsight and tried fishing across from the area we fished the day before where there was a more rocky shoreline and less brush. We caught several small smallies and one pretty small largemouth. Then we headed back across and fished the brushy inlet we fished the day before. After a couple of small mouth I realized I was fresh out of the 5 inch Gulp Shaky worms so I tried a similar size and colored Roboworm. No sooner had I rigged it up did I start seeing greenish shapes slowly cruising the brush beneath us. I dropped it down, gave it a few shakes and WHAM! Got my best Largemouth of the trip (certainly not a trophy, but for me it was pretty good). Dropped the roboworm down again and BOOM another similar sized bass that took the bait, jumped, and threw the hook. After that, we got a couple of more bites, but no hookups. Had followers on a spinnerbait and on an X-Rap, but no takers.

I don’t know how many fish we caught—not as many as a lot of people have reported and certainly no big ones to speak of, but I had a great time. It was a little hot for my dad’s taste and he got a little tired and cranky, but hopefully he had a good time too. I had a blast and can’t wait to come down again—hopefully when we can get some stripers.
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Thanks for the report.

Half the fun of Powell is the scenery and trying to figure out the ever changing spring fishing.

Many of the reports come after the spectacular trips, but even the average at LP can beat the good elsewhere.

Those are nice bass you caught and not many folks have found the stripers this year.
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Hey Troll boy 8 I was also down theren friday sat and sunday. I must have passed by ya a time or two it sounds like. L too like to fish in Padre on the rock slides we were there. I was knocking them dead on maniacs 6 inch minnows and two and three inch cutter bugs. In brown and green and white on the 6 inch. When I talk about knocking them dead I mean knocking them dead . I had to fillet them cause the jig head was so far in their gut. Now this is just a secret between me and you LOL Maniacs are the real McCoy. By the way I got a watch just like you have. But mine has the rabbit button and the auto pilot. Aren't they handy. I like it better than the foot petal. Maybe one of these days we can meet up. Pikeman GOFISH
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The autopilot on our Minnkota stopped working within about 3 months of when my dad got the trolling motor. He brought it in to get it fixed, it worked once, then it broke again and he gave up. It is an awesome feature, when it works, I think we probably just have bad luck as I don't know of anyone else who has had som many problems with it as us. What kind of boat where you in? We were in a 17' Tracker in a bunch of rods sticking up from the console.
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Trollboy !
The Scout and I and our wives were down there the same time frame as you. We had similar success. I guess we didn't hold our mouth right or something but we didn't do that hot on smallies or largemouth. We picked some up but not in any numbers. We did get into stripers for a short while and got about 15 or so, very healthy fish. Any where else but Powell that would be great fishing, but I guess there its considered slow. It still was a great trip!--Gary
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I know what you mean. Typically I would consider catching a fish--any fish--a good day out on the water. Then you read some of the reports of people catching 200-300 fishing in a 48 hour period and you feel like a failure if you can't match that. I thought we had a pretty successful trip and I got to fish the way I like to fish and even sight fish a little bit. Really would have liked to get into the stripers for my dad's sake, but, what do you do? I read some reports on Wayne's Words. Looks like some people were having success trolling in 18-30 ft of water. We were probably just too deep where we trolled and didn't fish deep enough when we were bait fishing as it looks like some were catching stripers on anchovies in 80 ft of water. I think we had it all wrong. I did also just read that there are striper boils happening in the back of Last Chance. Maybe I'll have to squeeze out another trip. Maybe have to pawn some stuff to get the money to go, we'll just have to see.
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its funny how the fish look pretty much exactly the same no matter how far or close they are haha oh well but great report lake powell never dissapoints
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Fished out of Bullfrog during the same time frame and had about the same success. Nothing at all happening in Moki, one nice LMB along with a few smallies and some smaller blue gill in Forgotten. Success was a little better in Lake Canyon where we had one great afternoon along a rock pile and toward the back of the canyon in the brush catching crappie, smallies, kitties and fat blue gill along with the biggest LMB of the trip (not huge but made a fat yummy fillet). Spent the entire next day in Lake Canyon and didn't have as much luck as the day before but still was better than Moki, Crystal or Forgotten. Only hooked one Striper the whole four day trip and that was night fishing the wall across from the house boats in Bullfrog. Tried our luck night fishing every night but couldn't even attract the kitties much less the stripers. Still an amazing trip and will hope for more success in Sept.
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With the striper boils already starting up, it will be interesting how it will be in the fall. Can't wait.
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