[cool][#0000ff]I figgered with the forecast for sloppy weather from Wednesday on I better jump on Deer Creek today...if I was gonna jump. Shoulda stood in bed.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Beautiful, clear and calm...after the cold morning breeze about froze me into my tube. Air temp 22 (same as Willard two days ago) and water temp double that at 44...same as the air temp when I hit the ramp about 11:30. Lotsa samesies.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Headed for my "perch condo" off the end of the island...dragging a spinner on one rod and a jig and fly on the other. Got my first two bitty bows on the way. Shook 'em both off at tubeside without asking them to pose for pics. Ditto for the other slimerettes I hooked later. Waste of pixels. Sorry to the picture deprived. Only Timp shots today.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]I really searched the area that I almost always find perch...year round. Saw only a few single blips on sonar...and maybe a couple of married ones. Only saw one or two small groups of fish and they were suspended a few feet off the bottom...unperchlike. Probably all finless freddies. At least that is all I found attached to my jigs when I set the hook on whatever hits I got down there.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]After an hour or so of perchless searching I turned on the electric motor and cruised over many acres of lake bottom...watching the sonar and dragging the jig and fly combo behind me. Had a few interruptions from feisty freddies but never did find any promising perch habitat. [/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]I scoped out water from less than 20 feet deep to over 60 feet deep. Almost all the fish that swam through the sonar screen...with middle fins extended...were well above the bottom. Unless they were very sneaky perch I suspect most of them were trout. But I did see a couple of small schools that could have been crappies...or white bass? Stopped and worked them vertically but couldn't get no love.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Quite a few dinker boats full of trout trollers out this morning. Chuckled to myself as the old song "Rub a Dub Dub" went through my mind. Seemed like every small boat had 3 old fudds huddled in it trying to catch trout while avoiding the chill. Almost LOL when they got all excited while skipping a poor little slimer across the top of the water. Hey...that's the way I roll.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]The breeze finally died down about 10 and the water got flat enough that I could employ all of my vast skills at finesse fishing. Well, maybe half vast. I sent down some small ice fishing size jigs whenever I saw anything suspicious below me. Nary a tick or a tickle. So much for finesse. Should brung the Dupont spinners.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Looked around and didn't even see the trollers getting any more love so I figured I had all the fun I could stand. Hit the ramp about 11:30 and headed for home.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Oh yeah, a State Parks truck was checking all the vehicles for appropriate passes and mussel certificates while I was packing up to leave . I woulda got a ticket if I didn't have my pass. BUT my pass did not allow me access to the locked restrooms. Glad I had it just the same. I predict that it is gonna get unsanitary out there before they reopen the restrooms next year. Some folks gotta go and can't wait to drive back down the road to an open facility.[/#0000ff]
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Now those are some beautiful pics.
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[quote lavaman]Now those are some beautiful pics.[/quote]
[cool][#0000ff]Thanks. We both like Lady Timp...from all angles.[/#0000ff]
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Too bad you didn't find what you were looking for. At least a few rainbows gave you something to do while you waited though.
Nice shots of Timp. Majestic mountain.
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Wow, I didn't realize they even locked up the vaulted one's. I figured they would the other ones cause they will freeze. Guess you'll have to leave the perch searchin to me as soon as it is safe ice LOL.
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Sorry you didnt get into the perch. Beautiful pics, wish I could have seen it for myself but alas, work keeps getting in the way [mad].
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[cool][#0000ff]Thanks.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Also appreciated the Google map and suggestions you PMed to me. But, as I replied there...and might be of interest to fellow perchaholics who are not that familiar with Deer Creek...the perch have an annual migration pattern during the seasons and are not likely to be found in shallower water anywhere around the lake right now.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]I have fished Deer Creek going back to the sixties, when perch was "trash fish". Not to me. I loved 'em then and love 'em now. In fact I take some credit for helping popularize them...especially after some angler lobbies got Deer Creek opened to winter ice fishing. In those days you could keep perch only...no trout. There was a season for those. Anybody remember the "openers".[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Once folks had a chance to load up on perch, and were introduced to how good they were on the table, a lot more anglers added perch to their list of target species. And there have been a lot of out of state anglers move to Utah who have been happy to find their former faves in our state too.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]In interacting with other Deer Creek perch jerkers, and through my own fishing activities, I have found that perch begin migrating into deeper water once the fall water temps drop below the sixty degree mark. In late September and into October they move from shallower shoreline structure into about 15 to 20 feet of water...usually in the same areas. As the temps drop further they follow underwater points or contours into 25 then 30 feet and then about 40 to 45 feet. I have hit them several times in close succession and watched those movements almost on a daily basis.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Then, one day they are simply GONE...like my trip yesterday. But they gotta go somewhere. Right? With a more mobile craft (boat) and good sonar you can start moving out into deeper water and looking for humps and bumps in about 65 feet of water...or even deeper. They stack up in big schools. And they can be caught easily if you find them and make vertical presentations. They don't stop eating like the walleyes do when they go deeper.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Deer Creek does not freeze solid enough for ice fishing every year. But when it does the perch often move back into their previous final staging areas...at about 40 -45 feet. And sometimes they move even shallower toward the end of the ice season...especially if the water chemistry in the lower levels is degrading.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]A big part of the perch picture every year is the water level situation. If the fish are orienting to a specific depth their location might be greatly different from year to year with different water levels. But if they show up each year around a mud bottom with winter worm chow then they might go there anyway...even if it is significantly shallower or deeper than "normal"...whatever normal is on a lake that fluctuates wildly from year to year.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Sorry about the long dissertation. Just wanted to make the point that while I was disappointed not to find the perch...I was not surprised. [/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]And yes, I actually did enjoy playing with the hatchery pets...even though I diss them a lot. For recent escapees of the runways they got a lot of spunk. Hit hard and battle all the way in...most of them taking some air. Perch don't do that. But perch sure do eat better.[/#0000ff]
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[cool][#0000ff]They may leave one or two open at the main park at Walsburg but the restrooms both at Rainbow Bay and The Island have been locked up the last two years. By the end of ice season last winter the area around the restrooms at the island was "festooned" with the leavings from dis-gruntled anglers who couldn't or wouldn't make it elsewhere.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Let me know when you are ready to hit the hard deck...if Deer Creek DOES freeze this winter.[/#0000ff]
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Glad you found some slimers to play with, I too remember the days when the banks of Deer Creek were litered with dead and rotting perch and I also kept perch back then. It was a great place to take a youngster to catch their first fish. A worm a hook and a sinker cast from shore would almost guarantee a perch within minutes. Opening day of fishing, yup you could walk across Strawbeery on the boats. Well gettin away from the post. Sorry no perch but wont be long, great pics of Timp.
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Didn't start fishing DC as early as TD but we did start when I 1st got stationed here in early 1976. I believe the lake opened for fishing around Memorial day weekend. We use to catch alot of perch then, the kids were small and enjoyed catching them from shore. We used to camp on the flats near Charleston bridge. We also caught some nice bass out of DC as well. [fishin]
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[cool][#0000ff]Largemouths used to be both plentiful and large...BS (before smallmouth). [/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Spooning for them in the fall was how I learned a lot more about the perch migrations too. [/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Fond memories of anchoring up off Charleston and soaking "Pokey Bait" in the river channel. Caught lots of trout and perch too on that stuff.[/#0000ff]
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One of my greatest fishing memories EVER was from Deer Creek. My Grandpa took me and my two cousins and we fished for perch near the Island. Early 80s It was absolutely magical for an 8 year old. We caught so many perch, so fast that it seemed like we couldn't do anything wrong. All three cousins remember that day like it was yesterday. Fishing took on a different meaning for me that day. I learned how to bait my own hook that day along with removing the hook. Doing things yourself for the first time as a child always creates ownership and satisfaction.
Hooked for a lifetime, priceless.
So i'm always a DC perch fan.
Sure hope the white bass don't take off.
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"Sure hope the white bass don't take off."
[cool][#0000ff]Without a major forage base...like threadfin shad, shiners or lots of chubs...it might be difficult for them to ever stage a major explosion. There are already plenty of predators in the lake to eat baby white bass...as a check from that end...but not enough young of the other species to create a whitie haven. And the other species also compete for whatever available food there is.[/#0000ff]
[#0000ff]Most of the lakes I have fished around the country that have white bass populations also have a good balance of other predators to keep them in check. They typically provide another fishery without taking over the lake...even in lakes with tons of shad as a forage species. The difference is that when there IS a good forage base the white bass get BIGGER. [/#0000ff]
[#0000ff]Deer Creek has helped foster a fishing passion in many a youngster. Always better to have a kid catch a bunch of fish...no matter the size or the species...than to wear them out on a full day trip without catching anything. Better to have them sunburned and exhausted from catching fish than to have to tell everybody..."I think I had a nibble".[/#0000ff]
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bob showed me a spot a few yrs back this time of yr. was on the west bank. steap bank cliff with a shelf in 50 ft. they were with small eyes.
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[cool][#0000ff]There are several small areas along that steep bank...and out a ways from it...that attract both the wallies and the perch. But they sometimes hold so tight to the bottom that it is tough to read them on the "average" sonar. Even with a flasher when ice fishing you sometimes have to get them stirred up before a few come off the bottom and show up on the display.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]In the "olden days" the whole lake bottom was covered with perch. The first few years Deer Creek was open to ice fishing it didn't much matter where you drilled your holes. You would catch perch. I had days when I drilled a series of holes out from the steep rocky banks to the north of Walsburg...in water from about 30 feet out to about 70 feet. I would walk from hole to hole, dropping down and seeing who was home. Sometimes I caught fish out of just about every hole. And you could look around and see other newbie ice anglers putting perch on the ice all over the lake.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Pretty tough to do that anymore. And you need live minnows to get the walleyes to bite. Oh, wait a minute. This is Utah. Delete...delete.[/#0000ff]
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they were tight on the ledge that day. we dropped the aqua veiw down and cheated from bobs old blue. ya kinda like rockport in the old days before doug killed it with his show and gathering.. never been as good since.
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+1, ifishutah. Thanks so much for sharing that! I have a lot of similar memories from fishing reservoirs like Deer Creek here in UT, with my grandpa.
I too am hooked on fishing for a lifetime, from my grandpa teaching me to fish.
LOVE IT!
Love perch too, but have never once caught a Deer Creek perch. Walleye, bass, rainbows, bluegill, yes. Not a perch. Have caught them in Pineview, at Starvation, etc...but never in Deer Creek. I think I just don't know how they move around, sorta like what Tube Dude was explaining, at Deer Creek.
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My buddy and I were headed up to Strawberry to do some fly fishing from our kick boats. As I passed Deer Creek I saw a personal craft on the dock getting ready to launch with many poles and gadgets. I looked at my buddy and said that must be TubeDude. I was right. Sorry your trip was not more productive. You should have come with us to the Berry. My buddy caught a real monster cut at 24 inches and almost 5 pounds. The biggest cut I have personally seen come out of the water.
Anyway it was interesting to note the fish had semi lock jaw at Deer Creek. They did not bite as well at Strawberry either.
Next week might be better.
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[cool][#0000ff]You shoulda honked as you went by. I mighta waved back...might have even used ALL my fingers. I get a lot of hassle from folks who just don't understand. Heck, I don't even understand a lot of things. Getting worse all the time.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Not likely I would have joined you on Strawberry. Glad it has been fishing well and glad folks are catching so many fish...and the bigguns too. But I was on a mission (perch search) yesterday. It was not so much that the fish had lockjaw but that they have moved out of the areas I normally catch them. Ya cain't ketch 'em where they ain't.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]I usually don't fish Strawberry because of car trouble. My car won't turn off Highway 40 at Strawberry because it knows that Starvation is just a bit further up the road. I ain't opinionated but my car is.[/#0000ff]
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Daughter and I have both caught walleye in Deer Creek...on worms.
Go figure. [
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