is there catfish in the SR at Lewston?

[idahoron]

My daughter is going to go to school there in a couple of weeks. I was wondering if there was catfish there? Might make the long drive a little better. Ron
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[Got_Bait]

You mean Lewiston Idaho right? I don't know if there is catfish in there or not. I know that they have them below Hell's Canyon dam, and there isn't any other dams between there and Lower Granite. I'll tell ya what I would be doing though if I was going to be in Lewiston within the next couple months: trying to catch some steelhead out of the Clearwater there. It is the only place open for harvest in Idaho right now (a 2 mile stretch from the mouth up), and steelhead meat looks and eats like salmon meat for the next 2-3 months.
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[idahoron]

I am going to have to find out more about the cats there. Me and Steelheads don't get along. Ron
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[iliketofish]

Hey, I grew up there and I used to fish for channel cats in the snake. I wouldn't exactly call it great fishing, and I think the biggest one I ever caught there was about 18 inches long, but if you've got a hankering for mister wiskers, you can find some there.
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[idahoron]

Thanks! My daughter is going to be going to school there. I figure that when I go up there she might want to fish with me, or my other two might want to fish on the trip. My plan is to go to Asotin and float with the float tubes back to Lewiston. That would give us about a 6 mile float. I am not too worried about size. If you got 18" fish chances are bigger ones are there. If not they will be fun too.
This has lifted my spirits about her going to school there thanks. Ron
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[iliketofish]

Floating might be the way to go, I was always bank fishing in town, but you just might find the good spots. do you just bottom bounce, or what is the trick to floating for kitties?
Another thing that is fun there is the pikeminnow bounty thing. (I assume that's still going on) I would catch some of those occasionally, and they pay you for them. There are also some big smallies (and a ton of babies) there if you can find them, but more people fish for those.
Good luck, and I hope you get some pics like you usually do, I'd be interested to see how it goes.
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[idahoron]

Ya we normally just bottom bounce with the least amount of weight we can. We use trout for cut bait, cats seem to love trout for cut bait. Ron
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[LoveMyLavro]

Ron,

You will do well with cut bait. You will most likely be catching smallmouth bass and northern pikeminnow. I have heard of good catfishing farther down the river on the Washington portion of the Snake River.

If you put in with float tubes you will really have a chance to fish some great spots around Asotin. Look for the creek coming in down from Asotin. You will have good moving water. Be certain to be visible to other boaters. That stretch of water has A LOT of powerboat traffic. The water gets wide a slow below Hells Gate State Park. From that point down you will be fishing mainly rip rap. Not too much current. A good put in would be just up from Asotin and take out at Hells Gate Marina. The little creek just down from the swimming area at Hells Gate produces some excellent 4-5lb. smallmouth for me every Memorial Day.

Use some of those npm as cutbait. They are easy to catch and there is an abundance of that species in that stretch of river.

Don't overlook the marina area within Hells Gate State Park. The shore is lined with excellent smallmouth. I have picked up perch and crappie out of the marina area, too.

Fish the red bouy, too. Its the marker bouy at the entrance of Hells Gate. I picked up several cats from there years ago.

Like what one of the other posters said earlier. You will have a hard time finding big cats around there but its fun looking for them.

Have a good time.
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[idahoron]

Thanks for the help guys. I am not worried about setting a new state record when I fish there for cats. I would like to just bend some rods.
Speaking of state records. The state record catfish was caught in Mann lake. I see on the map that there is a Mann lake east of Lewiston. Is that the same lake? Ron
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[iliketofish]

That's the same lake. so you could try that. I only caught one there at about 5 lbs. there are TONS of medium size crappie up there, or at least there was when I was in high school, and pretty good largemouth fishing.
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[Troll]

As a former guide on the Snake thru Hells canyon and on trips that ended in Asotin, you be careful.

The current may be slow, but there are thousands of cubic feet of water flowing through there and it has power. Power that you can't see.

I had a 12' raft get sucked into a whirlpool and it took a rope from another passing boat to get us out. So be careful.
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[idahoron]

Thanks for the heads up. DId you ever catfish in that area? Ron
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[Troll]

No, most of the time that we were that far down river, the guests had already been jet boated out and we were just getting gear on the trailer for the trip back to Grangeville.

Only when we were on the Salmon, were we that far down. The guests get picked up at the confluance of the Snake and Salmon and jetted back to Pittsburg landing for a van ride out while we took the gear downstream for recovery.

Farther upstream it was tons of big smallmouth bass and Sturgeon.
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