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My son Bo and I traveled to Summit Lake mainly because I knew that pleasurer boaters didn’t come out until at least 9am but I was wrong it was 11am which is when we quit.
We started fishing close to 7:30am and there were only a few people trolling. It was the start of more than a week of mid 80’s to above 90’s sunshine. The water was 72 degrees so it will rise with those temperatures.
It was windy most of the time which made it hard to tell if we had bites due to the chop on the surface of the lake.
The fish finder showed consistent fish between 30-40 feet. My Water Wolf camera also showed that.
All fish we caught were kept with damage done to their tender jaws and eyes. All fish were about 6-8 inches. All fish, but 2, that I saw on the camera were the same size. Maybe even smaller since I think they couldn’t open their mouths wide enough to bite the hook. This lake use to have a healthy supply of trout. I knew it lost its kokanee for a few years but I didn’t know about the trout. I did c&r a little trout. When I came home I looked at the plants of trout on the WDFW site. Only 2750.

All small kokanee were used in the culinary arts

Hunter757

7/24/2018 7:39:30 AM

That's a good looking pizza!! I bet it was good, sorry to hear about the small fish seems to be the new normal this year glad you got out to enjoy this weather!!

billyl

7/24/2018 11:04:08 AM

Thanks for report. Did not know that the lake was reopen.

grubowski

7/24/2018 12:19:47 PM

Word is they want to re-establish the native cutthroat in Summit. I’m wondering if that’s the reason for dialing back the rainbow plants.

Toni

7/27/2018 4:29:10 PM

No cutthroat. This is what he said of the lack of trout "The catch rate on rainbow trout does not surprise me. As you noted we stocked few fish relative to the ~40k we typically plant in Summit Lake. As a response to algae blooms in the last couple of years we have planned stocking events around algae reports from Thurston County Health. This year the plan was to stock 2000 fish ever two weeks for the first 6 weeks of the season. This would have totaled ~6000 fish heading into summer and would allow us to avoid a significant investment in a lake that may be closed for much of the summer. Our first stocking event occurred one day prior to opening day and fueled an excellent fishery. Unfortunately tests of water quality lead to advisories to avoid contact with the water and a dramatic decline in fishing effort at this lake. The decision was made not to stock Summit Lake and focus efforts on other systems where public access and fishing effort was more predictable." James P. Losee Fish Biologist, South Puget Sound WDFW

grubowski

9/2/2018 5:07:59 PM

Wish I’d seen this closer to when it was posted. When I fished there in May a homeowner came out to talk to me and said he was friends with a biologist who works on the lake. He told me they were working on possibly removing barriers on an inlet creek to allow the cutthroat to more easily enter the lake. Apparently he was mistaken.

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