Nov. 1st - Bear Lake Fishing Report

[BearLakeFishGuy]

[font "Comic Sans MS"][black]Fishing at Bear Lake[/black][/font]
[font "Comic Sans MS"][black]Tuesday, November 1, 2005[/black][/font]
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[font "Comic Sans MS"][black]The lake trout spawning has peaked and the fishing on Bear Lake has been good, but spotty. During this time the lake trout are really not interested in eating, so you have to entice the fish to hit your lure or bait out of aggression. Some days the "catching" has been better than others, but overall quite a few fish are still being caught. As the spawn winds down, the fish should start to feed prior to winter and the fishing will improve. Both lake trout and cutthroat trout fishing are very good in November and December on Bear Lake.[/black][/font]
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[font "Comic Sans MS"][black]Anglers have reported some success lake trout and cutthroat trout by jigging off the rockpile area in 35-45 feet of water. The anglers who are trolling are doing best off the Utah State Park marina on the west side of the lake and off South Eden and Cisco Beach on the east side of the lake. When jigging, try using tube jigs or curly tail jigs in ½ to ¾ oz. sizes. Try different colors until you find one that works the best. White and green are popular colors to start with. Also, using "superlines" such as Spiderwire and Fireline when jigging will allow you to feel soft bites a lot easier in deeper water. [/black][/font]
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[font "Comic Sans MS"][black]When trolling, the best luck has come from fishing shallow, rocky areas. Some fish are being caught in water less than 10 feet deep. The most popular and productive lure has been flatfish in the U-20 and larger sizes. Crome or white colors typically produce the best catches. Use flatlines in the shallowest water, but in water deeper than 10 feet, try using bottom boucers in front of the lure or use lead-core line to get the flatfish right down on the bottom. Downriggers can also be used, but make sure to set the downrigger ball drag to a light setting so if you hang up a ball in the rocks you don't lose your cannonball, lures and break a boom on the downrigger. [/black][/font]
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[font "Comic Sans MS"][black]The UDWR has completed a project of placing four piles of rock into the lake to improve fish habitat. These piles are located approximately 200 yards apart starting just north of the Utah State Park Marina. The rock was placed at approximately 30 feet in depth (the same depth as the top of the existing "rockpile" off of Gus Rick Point). You may notice several buoys on the new rockpiles off the marina as well as rockpile area north of Gus Rich Point and along Cisco Beach. These buoys are connected to egg sampling traps and habitat productivity devices. Please try to avoid fishing immediately around these sampling areas so that you avoid snagging the buoy lines. [/black][/font]
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[font "Comic Sans MS"][black]The Cisco Beach boat ramp is available for launching all sizes of boats, but you need to make sure you keep an eye on the weather since there is no protection from the wind if you choose to launch at Cisco Beach. The State Park marina has plenty of depth and is open to launching all sizes of boats. Beach launching smaller boats is going to be difficult this year due to the increased water levels. The water has inundated the shallow shelf along the western Bear Lake shoreline and it is difficult to beach-launch boats this year. The current lake elevation is 5907.8' (approximately 4.5' higher than last year at this same time).[/black][/font]
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[font "Comic Sans MS"]By the way, I noticed BLM fishing the big pond today. Maybe he'll post something this evening![/font]
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[Theekillerbee]

Hey Scott, thanks for the update. A big thanks to all those that were involved in the making of the "quad piles". I'm sure it was quite the project.
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[wiperhunter2]

Thanks for the update Scott. Are they planning on letting the buoys stay on the new rock piles? When you said,
"These buoys are connected to egg sampling traps and habitat productivity devices." does that mean there are future plans to do more habitat improvement? Thanks for the info.
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[IdahoNative]

Thanks for the report. I am real glad to hear about the elevation of the lake. Lets hope for another good winter
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[BearLakeFishGuy]

In order to justify the cost of the project we need to "prove" with data that fish are using them. This includes lake trout, Bonneville whitefish, cisco, Bear Lake whitefish, and Bear Lake sculpin. The first four fish can be sampled with egg traps, fry traps, and netting. The last can be sampled with diving and direct observation. There are no current plans for additional piles, but if these work out to the benefit of the native fish, then perhaps down the road there could be another project either on Bear Lake or elsewhere. Anyway, hard data will be the proof of the usefulness, so please be patient with the bouys for the foreseeable future. I talked with the grad student and they agreed to make the bouy lines as tight as possible so they don't drift around all over the place and hamper fishing.
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[BearLakeMack]

[font "Comic Sans MS"][black][size 3]Yes, we did fish BL today. Man, it was tough! Petty caught a 9 lb. mack and a sucker and I caught a cutthroat. I had two hits on the pile with no hook ups. I talked to the gents in the blue and white boat. They trolled most of the day and caught one cutt. Another troller never had a hook up.[/size][/black][/font]
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[font "Comic Sans MS"][black][size 3]The macks are still stacked on the pile but you are right. It is slowly thinning out. Those buoys aren't a problem for jiggers but trollers really need to be attentive. You see some guys cutting it real close, trolling right next to the buoys.[/size][/black][/font]
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[wiperhunter2]

Thanks Scott, interesting info, if I understand you correctly they are planning on diving for the direct observation during the sculpin spawn, is that right? When do the sculpin spawn, is it after the cisco run?
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[BearLakeFishGuy]

The Bear Lake sculpin begin spawn in April. They lay eggs that are attached to the underside of rocks. Can be in water from 1-50 feet in depth, but prefer the shallower rock at Cisco Beach and off the marinas. However, they do use the rockpile area and should use the new piles of rock that were put in a few weeks ago. Visibility for divers is a big problem in depths over 30 feet. You might have 12-18" of visiblity at that depth due to all the suspended calcium carbonate in the water, but diving is the only way to know for sure if they are using a particular area of rocks. Incidentally, CaCo3 is the same mineral that reflects blue light which makes Bear Lake look so blue.
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[Bigfishrule]

So how big are these sculpin? They make some pretty fine nets.
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