Lake Chelan Fishing Report For April 13th, 2014 - From Anton Jones, Darrell & Dad's Family Guide Service

LAKE CHELAN AREA FISHING REPORT FOR 4/13/14

    What’s hot is trolling in the early morning above the Yacht Club and along the face of Manson Bay on Lake Chelan for nice numbers of Lakers.  What’s new is jigging Manson Bay. 

    On Chelan, fish Colyar Ledge above the Yacht Club from the 230 foot contour out to 310 foot contour for best success early in the morning.  Also trolling the face of Manson Bay in depths of 180 to 265 feet has worked.  In both locations fish speeds of 1 to 1.3 mph as close to the bottom as you can.  Silver Horde’s Needlefish Squiddy’s rigged with a Mack’s Lures smile blade in Glow and baited with a triangle of Northern Pikeminnow has been the “go to” presentation. 

    Jig with twin tail 3” plastic bodies in white or glow.  Identifying piles of fish and staying on top of them is the key to success.  Using your GPS in conjunction with marker buoys will help you stay on the fish. 

    Your fishing tip of the week is to understand how your sonar works and what it’s limitations are.  At great depths (over 200 feet) even the newer 3D sonars have difficulty interpreting a three dimensional world onto a two dimensional screen.  I troll locations on Chelan that sometimes have a twenty foot depth difference from the right to the left side of the boat.  The depthfinder gives you one depth…  Well, that is probably closer to accurate for the side of the boat the transducer is mounted on than the other side.  Believe what you can touch.  This is pretty much a non-issue on stable or gently sloping bottoms, but, when you’re dealing with complex, rapidly changing bottoms, it can be mind boggling. 

    The kid’s tip of the week is to be straight forward and factual when answering questions about the blood and guts part of fish biology and the process of turning live fish into food.  When confronted with kids that have little experience with cleaning fish or other ways of turning living animals into people food, I usually keep a pretty low key approach to describing the organs and skeletal structure of the fish not responding to the ooey / gooey squeamish remarks while emphasizing the respect due the person that provides food for their family.  It is an uphill battle considering the unrealistic portrayal of the process that most kids see on TV and in the movies, but I think it is worth the effort.   

    Your safety tip of the week is to check that boat plug for wear and fit.  Everyone has either done or known someone that has had the disaster or near disaster from forgetting to put the plug back in.  We actually had a leak last year from a worn boat plug that would have eventually fallen out to create the disaster if we hadn’t discovered the cause of the leak and replaced the plug.

DARRELL & DAD’S FAMILY GUIDE SERVICE