The West Kootenay Fishing Report is provided by Kerry Reed of Reel Adventures Sport Fishing Charters in Nelson, go to reeladventuresfishing.com or call 250-505-4963.
August is here and it’s been an amazing summer of fishing so far!
Because July was a mixed up month for weather, it has actually prolonged our fishing season on the lake. The cooler weather and large amounts of rain has kept the water a bit cooler than normal, and the fishing has been good.
Our groups have been experiencing some fantastic days on Kootenay and Arrow Lakes. Most days have seen between six-to-12 fish coming in. Rainbows between two and six pounds and bull trout from two-to-10 pounds have been caught lately. It’s that time of year when the tourists are thick as well, and we have been having a blast with lots of young families and new fishers. We always love sharing our passion with the young ones. Hope to see our future generation out in the outdoors and enjoying what we have to offer.
With the hot weather, we will be concentrating on earlier starts in the morning to beat the heat. The bull trout have been pretty consistent this past week, and the rainbows are still coming up to feed once in a while.
Looking forward to the rest of our summer trips.
Columbia River: The river has been on fire. There were a few tough days due to the extreme change in water levels, but for the most part its been fairly consistent.
Walleye fishing has been good, and will continue to get even better as we get into September. And the rainbow fishing has been pretty good, especially in the evenings.
The usual rainbows between two and four pounds and Walleye between two and five pounds have been coming in. I’ve even seen a few walleye up in the seven or eight pound range lately. We’ll probably see some even bigger ones in the fall.
Our favorite time to fish the river is coming up, so stay tuned for our fall reports.
What are they biting on ?
On the lakes, its been a lot of down rigger action. Bull trout have been hitting on the usual flasher & hoochie combo. Our favourite being the Gibbs/Delta STS or Lemon Lime flasher with green spatter-back hoochie. The fish are deep right now. We have been fishing between 100-and-180-feet down with great success.
On the river its been a mix of fly fishing or spin casting. The dry-fly fishing has been pretty good in the evenings still, and we have been drifting with indicators and nymphs during the daytime with good success. On the spinning rods, we have been using jigs tipped with worms for the walleye or bottom bouncers with worms, and our favourite croc spoons for the rainbows.
All in all, its been a great couple months of fishing on all of our waters.
Stay tuned for more reports.
Tight lines …