2018 Blue Mesa Kokanee Fishing Report
Kokanee fishing has started at Blue Mesa. Since we focus on Lake Powell during April and early May (and don’t like to switch back and forth between mussel contaminated Powell and mussel free Blue Mesa), I haven’t yet been out on the lake but I’ll share some of the info provided by friends who are some of the better known guides on Blue Mesa.
Winter pretty much passed us by this year and water levels will be a concern this summer. The Mesa is currently at 7482 ft, about 9 ft below last year on this day and 37 ft below last summer’s high. The big concern is that the snow pack is running about 50% of last year. The Iola Basin froze this winter but the Cebolla Basin (middle) and Sapinaro Basin (dam area) did not. As a result, the trophy mackinaw fishermen have been on the water for several weeks. Guides tell me that when their mac fishermen get bored they have found the kokanee fishing to be good, with lots of healthy fish and fairly easy limits in Sapinaro.
Mussel inspection has been open at the Lake Fork ramp (at the dam) for several weeks and current hours are 6:30 am to 4 pm daily. Inspections will open at the Elk Creek ramp on April 19, with daily hours from 6 am to 8 pm. The number for the Elk Creek Visitor’s Center is 970-641-2337.
Current conditions are mild, with lows typically in the 20s and highs in the 50s and sometimes 60s. Keep in mind this is Gunnison, one of the nation’s cold spots, so conditions can deteriorate quickly. Early afternoon winds are the norm. Kokanee tackle is available at Gene Taylor Sporting Goods and several of the young dudes working at the store are experienced kokanee guides willing to share insight and strategies. I can also strongly recommend Robbie Richardson at Sport Fish Colorado for those who want a shot at a state record mac or limits of kokanees. I’ll be able to provide more detailed info once we start fishing Blue Mesa and I plan to provide regular updates throughout the summer. If you have questions, please respond here and I’ll do my best to keep readers up to date.
April 27 and 28 Good Fishing
Did well on Fri and Sat. Found fish from surface down to 42', but mostly around 18'-26'. Pink squids did real well, but lots of hits on red and green lures and squids/planktons too. Several fat healthy fish. Looks to be a good year. Concentrated on Cebolla to Lake Fork. Glass in the morning, but wind came up in the afternoon as usual.
Fishing Report Thursday, May 10
Blue Mesa remains very low and dock hands tell me they expect it to drop another 5 - 8 feet. Air temperature was 34F at the Marina and water temperature in Cebolla was 51F this morning. Every one is talking about how wonderful the weather is in Gunnison right now but afternoons are often very windy. By fishing early we are able to avoid the wind entirely.
After slow kokanee fishing for us during last weekend's fishing tournament, fishing today was a little faster and the fish were serious fighters. This year's spawners are averaging 1.3 pounds and 15 inches in length. The fishing are fat and healthy but we are seeing gill lice on some fish. We fished in Cebolla, starting at the power line and following the channel into the Bay of Chickens. We started the early morning with down riggers set at 19 and 23 but ended the day setting at 31 and 35. Lead core line was out 2 - 4 colors, going deeper as the sun rose. Downriggers were hotter than lead core today, probably because the fish have moved a little deeper. Light pink and orange were our best colors.
I've been thinking about how to share how good or slow the fishing is on Blue Mesa and thought I'd try the following four statistics: We fished today from 5:30 to 8:15, lines in the water. We hoped for our limit, 10 fish, for our dinner and for friends who are hosting relatives. We fished for 2.75 hours, or 165 minutes, to catch our 10 salmon so we averaged 3.6 kokanee per hour and 16.5 minutes between salmon. We also caught 2 small salmon and 6 small brown trout, all released, so for the 18 fish we caught in total, we averaged 6.5 fish per hour and we averaged a fish every 9.2 minutes. This isn't fast enough on average to keep you jumping (although we had a successful triple today that kept us busy for a while) but it isn't slow enough to get boring either. I'm guessing we may get down to a fish every 5 minutes by June. I'm also curious what the catch rate is like for other fishermen.
Kokanee64
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50' on Blue and Watermellon
We had 2 boats going over the weekend. And we came in cold and figured it out by Saturday night. Fish were deep and picky! Nice fish with many at 17" +/-. Threw back multiple shorts say under 14" knowing there are better fish out there. But we had to work for them. Wind pushed most boats off the water by late morning. Evening bite was when we did the best in the river around Hay Stack and east. Anything to stay out of the wind! Thanks for the tips kokanee64 and open info, I'm making an order today for the next trip. I like the heavier line and treble idea. Got busted off at the net with one I wanted in the box. And most fish un-hook themselves as soon as you get them in the net or on the floor! Picture of my Saturday evening daily limit, caught over 3 hours.
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Jigging at the Iron Works in Cebolla
Jim,
I continue to see people fishing Iola but Iola is so shallow now and the water so filled with algae, I wouldn't bother to fish around Old Stevens. Perhaps the canyon areas just east of the Elk Creek Marina is worth investigating.
Cebolla seems to be the destination for most fishers the last couple of weeks and the Iron Works area, see photo below, is the only place most people are investigating thoroughly. This area is where the Gunnison river channel is close and roughly parallel to Highway 50 on the north shore of the Cebolla basin. You can see several boats clustered up over a school of salmon. The hills for a mile or so west of the steel structure supporting the highway are worth watching for big horn sheep. Attachment 9488
As jigging becomes better, the scrum becomes thicker and tempers sometimes flare because only boats directly over the school are catching fish and unless the school is huge, most people are not over fish. People start getting frustrated and forget their manners. Think of it like this... You prepare a wonderful picnic basket and take your family to an empty picnic table in the local community park. Three other parties immediately descend on your table, and one party moves your picnic basket to one end of the table and make themselves at home at the other end. The other two parties hover over your shoulder and when you pick up your basket to distribute the food to your family, a hovering "guest" places his basket where your's once set. The third "guest" askes if you have any potato salad to share. How does one respond to this? As Jerry Garcia said, "We can share the women, we can share the wine. We can share what we got of yours cause we done shared all of mine."
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Most of the boaters jigging for fish can't locate and park directly over a school of fish, which can be somewhat depressing to watch. A surprising number don't even look at their sonar screens. They "hunt for fish with binoculars", as a guide told me, by watching other boats catching fish; then they descend. Several years back we decided to never approach other boats fishing over a school and when boats descend on us, we pick up and find another school. If we don't, we get surrounded as shown in the photos above, and can't even get out of the scrum when the fish have moved from under us. Most times this works out OK for us and we are able to catch 1-3 fish from a school before being shoved out of the way to find another Some days we don't find another school before the wind picks up. Some days, when I throw a marker buoy out near fish we drove over and start circling back around to get right over the fish, other boats race me for my buoy. A guy once roared in on plane, did an emergency stop, picked up my buoy and started jigging. When I got through his wake and was close enough to ask for my buoy back, the guy said, "you ought to see the big school we just found." On those days I have to recall my mother's advice about good manners. I'm happy to share pretty much everything I know about jigging salmon, in part, because I'm an educator and that's what I do, and in part, because it means more boats can find their own salmon and fewer boats follow me around. If you look at last year's fishing reports, I provided quite a lot of info about jigging, and I'll be proving more once we start jigging. Best of luck on your upcoming trip. Trolling is still pretty good during the short early morning window using glow beads by themselves or paired with red, blue or orange beads. Try shallower in the morning (47 - 60) and deeper as light increases (60 - 90).
PS. Mary thinks the bigger fish are deeper, but it is a real dog's breakfast down there. There are more trees on the east end of the iron works area than the west end. Tight lines. Roger
August 28 Blue Mesa Fishing Report
After two weeks off the water it was nice to head out to the lake this morning. It was shocking to see how low the lake has gotten. The lake is dropping about 4 inches per day and is at 41% of full pool, down 65 ft total. Friends on the dock reported that fishing success has gradually slowed and this morning's fleet was down to 20 boats. We fished for about 2 hours before the wind blew us in. We found small schools without too much difficulty and picked up singles and doubles, taking a total of 6 fish. The 4 bigger fish, all males showing a little red and pronounced hooked jaws, weighed 1.6 pounds each. We felt like we would have taken a limit if the wind had held off for another hour. The weather is great, the crowds are thinning and there are still a few good fishing days ahead of us. Tight Lines.
September 5 Blue Mesa Fishing Report
Last week we had a couple of good days on the lake, one day boating 15 when we went with guests. We don't normally fish weekends due to crowds but took a new freshman at WSCU out on Saturday. Fishing was slow but we managed to get 6 before the wind blew us off the lake. We went out Tuesday and fished pretty hard, and never had a bite. We were on several small schools only to watch them dive for the bottom as soon as our lures were in the school. We set our lures on backs a couple of times but these fish weren't the least interested in our magic.
I believe there are still many fish around the Iron Works but they are schooling deep and are often around the old dead standing trees that are now in the jigging range due to very low water. We lost two lures and lights in the trees on Tuesday. It is pretty clear that the best days are well behind us but I'm hoping for a few more good days once the rainy (finally) weather clears out.
Most fishermen seem to have given up, as there were only about 30 boats out on Saturday and on Tuesday I counted only 12 boats. We're smoking fish today for a friend who will take them all to England on Monday. We'll be pulling the boat before too long to get it ready for fall fishing at Lake Powell. The season at Blue Mesa is coming to a close -- but maybe not quite yet. Regards, Kokanee64