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Cle Elum Lake Report
Kittitas County, WA

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Details

06/16/2019
71° - 75°
Downriggers
Mackinaw
Herring
Sunny
Spoons
All Day
06/17/2019
3
10067

Cle Elum has my attention as a close, “go-to” destination for a shot at big lakers. I’ve caught some nice fish out of this lake and wanted to share my experiences with a couple NWFR members. So Sunday, Father’s Day, I was happy to take out rseas and Randy Rauscher to share in a day of targeting big lakers.

We hit the road at 4:40am and had the bot in the water and fishing by 6:15am. Initially it was a little windy but as the morning progressed the wind died down and made for a pleasant morning of fishing. The wind really kicked into gear at 1pm, as strong as I have ever seen on Cle Elum.

We ran 5 rods, day off the bottom on downriggers, two off planer boards using 5 oz to target suspended fish, and one on a slide weight stacking off a downrigger. We basically rotated a variety of lures and bait.

Our first fish cam around 7am on a spoon off the bottom downrigger. It was Randy R’s first ever laker, pretty cool to be able to help him get his first lake trout. I think he might be hooked!

Action was not super fast this day but around 9am the port planer board was violently jerked back and pulled under water. Considering this was a bigger, 12” plus planer board I knew we had a big fish on.

The fight of lakers on Cle Elum is much more fun than Chelan – we fished the “Mac Bar” in 80-110 feet of water and that means no air bladders exploding, just good old head shakes and even some line stripping runs. This fish give me a great fight but we got him netted. At around 8-10 pounds it was a sweet fish. We would have released it but the hook had impaled the fish bad and it was bleeding. Unlikely to survive, we kept it.

We worked the bar until the wind came up, rseas had a couple of drive-bys and some fish on that came off. 1pm we called it a day. The wind was so strong I was able to practically surf the boat on to the trailer. As rseas commented, “you get one chance Mike and if you miss…”. Pretty tense but I got the boat on without issue.

Give Cle Elum a try sometime – it has beautiful scenery, some big fish, and zero fishing pressure. BTW, we weren’t targeting kokanee but did see some BIG schools on the fish finder!


Comments

Larry3215
6/17/2019 7:05:18 PM
Hi Mike, Nice report! We have wanted to try Cle Elum for years and your report might just motivate us to give it a go. Can you give any more details on the gear you were using?
Mike Carey
6/17/2019 7:08:46 PM
wow, I totally forgot... we tried everything but spoons were what we got our fish on. That said, if you search my past reports on Cle Elum you'll see I've caught them on a variety of gear. It never hurts to bring a bunch of stuff and see what works!
alfafish
6/17/2019 9:17:59 PM
One of my favorite lakes! Was there fishing for Mack's last week on my kayak, only managed a few small ones (24-26") but using an ultralight rod is still a lot of fun. Got some real nice ones last year, I'm hoping all the netting in the fall/winter didn't get too many of the nice fish.
Larry3215
6/17/2019 11:25:23 PM
I just heard that Wish Poosh launch is closed. What ramp did you use Mike? We have a 20 ft aluminum boat similar to yours.
Mike Carey
6/18/2019 6:03:08 AM
Wish Poosh ramp is open. Only the camping is closed, due to falling tree risk in the campground.
MoonValley
6/25/2019 7:25:46 PM
Mike -- Have any trouble getting your boat around that corner on the road into the launch? I drove my car out there today since I'd never been there, and wanted to see what the lake level was. The launch looks decent, but may not be for too long. I have an 18' sled and I think it will clear the corner okay, but it looks tight.
Buckass
6/18/2019 7:54:35 AM
I have a 22’ aluminum boat with a deep V. Is the Wish Poosh launch deep enough to launch and is there any other launch that would maybe have a dock
rmrauscher
6/18/2019 8:15:24 AM
Think the Wish Poosh launch would be fine at this point. But as the lake drops thru the summer maybe not in another month or so. Not aware of any dock launches.
Mike Carey
6/18/2019 8:34:01 AM
Yes. No socks at any of the launches.
Buckass
6/18/2019 7:57:34 AM
Just curious. Didn’t see Wish Poosh on the map. Is there another name for it?
rmrauscher
6/18/2019 8:16:41 AM
Google it. I just did and it comes right up.
MoonValley
6/18/2019 8:25:28 AM
Yep -- Google Maps. It's just 12.8 miles up 903 from I-90.
Buckass
6/18/2019 8:37:47 AM
Appreciate the reply’s. Thank you
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Available Guide

Available Fishing Guide:
Website: Darrell & Dads Family Guide Service

Phone: (509) 687-0709