June 5, 2022

“You can’t catch a fish if your line is not in the water.”

Days like today are the ones I will remember for a long time. I’ll remember today through photos and videos, but also by what I’ve stored in my memory bank that will last a lifetime and will get richer as time goes by.

We started our day thinking the family would be fishing together in hopes of catching a limit of kokanee for the smoker. Unfortunately, Sarah and Ethan decided to stay home before our departure due to a late night last night on their mother and sons date night. I hate to say it, but Sarah will not be able to out fish me if she keeps on staying home. Those “secret” Spitfire hoochies can’t catch fish if they’re not in the water.

Kokanee fishing has become a fun way to interact and learn from like minded individuals. When we arrived at the lake, we met up with a few members who were leaving the lake and a few that were fishing. It’s always great to chat with everyone. In fact, we chatted so long that I started thinking, “I can’t catch a fish if my line’s not in the water.”

After some great conversations we started on our way. We drifted for a while as we tied on our starting jigs of the evening. I even casted a jig a few times while waiting for Austin to tie his jig onto his line. It felt great to be drifting on the water. People were everywhere, but the “right” kind of people were on the water which made the start of our night that much sweeter. Kayaks, paddle boards and boats were drifting all around us. Thankfully the water was still cold enough to ward off most water sports watercraft which helps the enjoyment level of the lake stay in a quality zone that can only be defined as soothing.

Once our jigs were tied, we headed over to the same spot I caught 3 kokanee jigging the night before. This time, the wind proved too difficult to jig in due to the lack of an electric motor with an anchor lock feature. I found myself wishing I had bought the MotorGuide electric motor with anchor lock mode that I was thinking about getting. We were bound and determined to jig up some koaknee tonight, so we decided to head over to a bay where we could gain some refuge from the wind. I have also had great spring action there in the past and was planning my angle of attack as we rolled across the waves coming at us sideways.

When we arrived at our second location, we marked some kokanee right away but had no takers. We would quickly give in to switching over to our trolling gear, but before we did I had to fix one of the downrigger cables as it was frayed and kinked in one spot. I was happy to have all the spare parts and tools needed to change the cable, because I was not willing to risk loosing a downrigger ball due to a flawed cable.

As we started trolling away from our location and into the wind swept lake again, we let out our lines with the presentations I was using yesterday on them. Austin started making two set ups that we would switch to right away and they proved to be effective for the evening when combined with our scented corn we had from this past ice fishing season.

During our troll over to some of our “go to” locations Austin quizzed me on my saying that I’ve always told the boys. He said that you actually can catch fish if your line is not in the water. Of course, I was not on my A game and forgot about noodling for catfish south of the border. Fun fact, but you will never catch me sticking my hands into muddy water in hopes of catching a catfish and not a snapping turtle. I spent the next while thinking about other fish you can catch without a line in the water. What would you catch?

When we finally found where the kokanee were hanging out, Austin suggested we use the figure eight technique to try and catch a limit of fish. We did just that and caught quite a few fish on our green setup. A Simon dodger and a green Paulina Peak Tackle micro hoochie was the top producer of the night. Most fish seemed to be at the 25ft to 32ft range, so we set our downriggers to 25ft and 28ft.

The wind eventually got worse as we were pushed around and constant corrections were the only way to stay in a straight line. When we hooked a fish, we would focus on landing it and not where we were going. Our fishing path seemed to resemble a snail’s movements and it felt like we were leaving a trail behind us as we trolled around all over the place and back again.

The addiction is definitely real and I enjoy being able to share it with you and my family.