Lake Washington perch in MARCH

[TrackerPro16]

Thanks for the info! Read the report. Thank you for a good one! Hope to get out this weekend...

[bigfishguy]

It's there now. :-)

Every report has to be approved by the administration people. Only admin can approve them. Usually takes a couple hours to approve one as Mike or Aaron are notified that there is a report, then they have to have time from their work to get to it. If they are out fishing for the weekend, the reports don't get checked and approved until the weekend is over.

We appreciate all the work you guys do to keep this web site free of bad posts.
It's too bad that people apparently post so much bad stuff that this severe vetting of posts is even NEEDED in the first place.

[bigfishguy]

Thanks for the info! Read the report. Thank you for a good one! Hope to get out this weekend...

The last few weeks have been "winter cold", what with snow being a threat almost every day.
The water was around 43.5 degrees, and I think they start to spawn at around 45 degrees, and the weather looks to be heating up drastically, so I'm wondering if the great winter bite (fish are highly schooled, and deep, and seem to be in predictable winter locations) ENDS when that spawn starts. They move shallow (i.e. away from these deep winter locations) when they spawn. So I'm wondering if hitting around 45 degree water drastically changes the perch locations, and therefore you WON'T do well 0.8 miles north of the Seahawk's practice field in 70' of water (until sometime next winter)? Anybody know?

[G-Man]

I lay off the perch once they start to soften up and look a little pale due to ripening up for the spawn. If you still want to fish for them, your best bet is to start out in the deep water and work your way in until you find fish. They don't like rapid depth changes so they will slowly work their way up into to the weeds to spawn. The lake's shallow waters will stay cool, and oxygenated enough for spawning purposes, well into May, so you'll have some that go early and some that go late. Once they spawn, you'll find them hanging around in the shallows near the weed line through summer and into early fall. Once if starts to cool off again, they work themselves back into the deep water, following the thermocline as is slowly decends and eventually dissapates when the lake turns over.

[bigfishguy]

Great, advice, G-man.

[Shad_Eating_Grin]

I lay off the perch once they start to soften up and look a little pale due to ripening up for the spawn. If you still want to fish for them, your best bet is to start out in the deep water and work your way in until you find fish. They don't like rapid depth changes so they will slowly work their way up into to the weeds to spawn. The lake's shallow waters will stay cool, and oxygenated enough for spawning purposes, well into May, so you'll have some that go early and some that go late. Once they spawn, you'll find them hanging around in the shallows near the weed line through summer and into early fall. Once if starts to cool off again, they work themselves back into the deep water, following the thermocline as is slowly decends and eventually dissapates when the lake turns over.

Thanks for this info.

Questions: the weedbeds in Lake WA is usually mifoil that starts right at the water's edge along the shore, and could go dozens of yards offshore, depending on the change of depth. Are the spawners right in and amongst the stalks of weeds, in the water column above the weeds, or just outside of the weeds where the weeds end and the deeper water begins?

[G-Man]

The spawn takes place in the weedbeds. The perch lay long, ribbon like, clusters of eggs, suspended amongst the weeds that you'd swear could only be from a fish many times their size. When fishing for them, you'll want to focus on the weed edge and out towards deeper water. The small fish will hang in the weeds for cover with the large fish working the edges for anything that ventures out into the open. Of note, the weeds are also where the stickleback make their nests when it's time to spawn and where the crayfish hang during the warmer months of the year.

The perch are still in 60+ feet of water, I hooked a few while out on Friday targeting cutts and squawfish.