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Having purchased a new tow vehicle, I decided to give it a mountain pass trial and make it a day at Lake Kachess. The plan was to launch at the Forest Service park and run down south towards the dam to let the wife out in her kayak and fish while I followed her north back to the launch. This typically gave me just one shot at a school of fish that I would mark on the sonar, but as I found out as the day went on, there were plenty of schools to be had. I don't typically target the middle of the lake, I prefer to fish closer to shore in about 200 to 300 feet of water and worked out well as my wife was hugging the shoreline. It took a little while to determine the pattern of the day, but one I found it, the action was steady. Today the fish seemed to prefer a teardrop style dodger and shrimp fly hoochie in hot pink, tipped with unscented shrimp and gulp maggots. I never bothered to see if they were liking the shrimp or the maggots, it's a one rod only lake and I didn't have too much time to play around. Most of the action was around 60' on the rigger, with some action as high as 30 feet and as low and 90 feet. Only by catch of the day was one pike minnow that I kept and will be put to good use as bait. Not much else to add with regards to the fishing other than I ended up with 8 fish and probably could have easily landed my limit had I worked the schools over that I found for a few passes. The size of the fish were between 10" and 12", which is actually a pretty good size for the lake. Kudos to the fish and game department for staggering the fish plants so that there aren't too many fish for the given food supply. All in all a great day out on the lake and the new tow vehicle was more than up to the task, so mission accomplished.

A word to those who would look to give the lake a try for themselves. The Forest Service park is only open from the Memorial day weekend through the Labor Day weekend and a Northwest forest pass gets you in for free, otherwise you need to pay at the front gate. The lake is getting more and more popular with the recreational boating crowd so get to the launch early to ensure you have a place to park. I'd rather see a lot full of fishing boats than wake boarders, PWCs and ski boats. As with most of the "pass" lakes, the wind does pick up in the afternoon so if you are in a smaller boat keep that in mind.

The Quadfather

7/30/2018 10:47:00 PM

72.6 water temp on Kachess, Geez. Tasty looking Kokes.

Mike Carey

7/31/2018 6:47:35 AM

the I-90 lakes are very under-utilized for kokanee. thanks for the report.

G-Man

7/31/2018 8:26:51 PM

The kokes were great and felt ice cold when I pulled them out of the net. The meat was not a red as I'm used to seeing, but that did not have an effect on the flavor.

I think Kachess is the more stable of the big three I-90 lakes as it is the last to get drawn down (much like Rimrock), so the lake is near full pool during most of the summer months. The State used to dump half a million kokanee fry per year in the lake, and with the limited food supply that comes with our alpine lakes, resulted in stunted fish. All three lakes have had reduced plants, with Cle Elum now going au naturale in an attempt to restore native sockeye runs.

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