Montana Fish Report

Sunny days are here again, afternoons feels like spring time this past week, morning have been cold, averaging 15 to 19 degrees, with more sunshine weather in the forecast for the next few days. Roads are mostly dry, still some ice and snow in the shaded areas. Canyon Dam is open and plenty of parking. Fishing pressure is still light, however there were plenty of trolling boats out there this past week taking advantage of this unusal nice early January weather..

Canyon Dam, and south along the east shore to the Dorado Inn, has the best water clarity.

With surface temps at 36 degrees, these fish are moving slow in the morning, but after that sun hits the water and surface temps climb, things begin to pick up.

Water Clarity is poor this time of year, attractors are only going to help fish see your offering. Seps UV Silver 04 Dodgers with a threaded and injected crawler 16 inches back, rigged to down 10 feet down in the morning, then adjusting down to 10 feet off the bottom during the afternoon has been attracting rainbow and browns in equal numbers. Just keep your speed down to about 1 mph or less, if possible, try to keep that dodger action nice and slow.

Bank fishermen are working the Geritol Cove area at Canyon Dam with some success floating baits off the bottom, or Trophy Trout injected crawlers 42 inches under torpedo bobbers.  Most of these fish have been rainbows in the 1.5 pound class with a occasional larger fish. Also several bigger browns in the 5 pound range have been hitting white and yellow jigs from boats anchored in deeper water, like the Snag, and Red Banks, both of these spots are within .5 mile from the Dam on the east shore.

The Hamilton Branch powerhouse is still running brown water into the east basins north end, and water clarity is poor right now. Also with the counterclockwise rotation of Hamilton Branch flow into Lake Almanor, this brown water is flowing through Big Springs and down the peninsula along the famous A-frame area, making clarity rather poor around most of the east basin.

Don't expect water clarity to improve much going forward into 2011. Record amounts of snow in the higher elevations, 189% above average, and sunshine this week insure that creeks and streams will be flowing.

If your feeling adventurous, parking at the vista point on Hwy 36, and hiking down the hill to Bailey Springs is usually fantastic this time of year. Big rainbows are always close by, crawlers with a floating marshmallow, or chartreuse Power Bait and a split shot, and just float it off the bottom. The hard part is getting back up the hill.

Lake levels continue to rise. Five percent of Almanor is iced over, this ice is contained in shaded areas. Doug Neal (530) 258-6732 http://www.almanorfishingadventures.com