There was a lot of good news for salmon anglers last week. Fishing both sockeye and summer run chinook opened in many locations throughout the Columbia River basin. Boats were busy on the water at many popular salmon fishing destinations and success was very good. I had a walleye trip planned to Banks Lake and although I had a rough start, it turned out to be a great day.

Rollie Schmitten arrived at my place at 6 a.m. and saw that I had a flat tire on my boat trailer. He said he had other things to do that morning and left. Then I got a text from my other fishing buddy Dennis Beich and he said we could take his boat. I caught Rollie before he left town and we threw my gear in the truck and raced off to Big Wally’s to meet Dennis. We got some ice, loaded our gear in his boat and off we went.

We launched at Million Dollar Mile and for quite a while wondered if we should have just stayed home. We had a few bites but didn’t have a single fish in the cooler by noon. Then the wind picked up and the walleye bite came on. Rollie and Dennis had the motor oil colored Smile Blade on Slow Death Hooks on their rods and I was using the Dutch Fork Butterfly Blade in the Blue Tiger pattern on mine. The walleye were loving them. We still missed quite a few bites, but the walleye turned aggressive when the wind picked up. We even managed to scoop up the fish in the tiny trout net that Dennis brought along. Many of the walleye were 18 to 21 inches and really didn’t fit. We managed to wriggle them in and didn’t lose any.

Dennis was trying to keep our boat in 27 feet of water and struggled to keep our boat speed under control. The wind had us trolling as fast as 1.8 mph at times, but it didn’t matter. The walleye kept biting. I had only brought four dozen nightcrawlers and was starting to get concerned about running out. I was even saving parts of worms that weren’t too badly damaged. I think I had maybe a half dozen left when we decided to pull the plug. It was about 2:30 when we reeled in and headed for the launch. We had 16 nice walleye in the live well. They ranged in size from 14 to 21 inches, with the majority in the 16-18 inch category. This week’s photo is of me grinning with a nice walleye from the trip.

I am a believer in watching the phase of the moon when planning fishing trips. I contend that better fishing is had when the moon is in the darker phases. I schedule our annual tropical fishing trips during the darkest phase. Well, last Friday shot that theory down. The moon was close to full and the walleye didn’t care. I will be less reluctant to go when the moon is full, but I will blame the moon if I have a bad trip! I admit that myself and others just go when we can and try our best to catch fish.

Earlier in the week I was on Potholes Reservoir with my long-time fishing buddies Brian Neilson and James Lebow. We hadn’t been on the water together yet this season and since the weather forecast looked decent we gave it a try. Brian Nielson and James Lebow and I have fished Potholes many times over the years and both of them have been fishing Potholes for decades. Brian even guided on the reservoir for many years. In spite of their long experience there is always a heated debate about where we should look for fish. We all have to put in our two cents about where the walleye should be. As a result, we fished a dozen different spots and all produced about the same results. We got a bunch of bites but only landed one walleye. We could have looked for the habitat boxes and fished for crappie and bluegill and got a bunch. The bluegill on Potholes are real whoppers and crappie fishing here has been terrific. We didn’t even encounter any largemouth or smallmouth bass which really surprised us. They are abundant in Potholes. We usually get several while walleye fishing.

I am not ready to give up on Potholes. Just like any other walleye water, there are good and bad days and if you aren’t playing you aren’t going to win. I will be bringing along some alternate gear though. The fishing for crappie and bluegill around those habitat boxes is just too good to not try while I am there. The bass fishing on Potholes has been especially good the past couple of seasons too. I love to fish for largemouth and smallmouth and when the walleye bite is slow it is a terrific thing to do.

I wanted to be sure that we were getting a good return of sockeye, as predicted this season before I did my summer E-Letter. When I saw the forecasts were being met and even exceeded, I dedicated the free E-Letter for summer to sockeye fishing. People seem to get more excited about a good sockeye fishery than even a good summer chinook return. Both are going to be terrific this year. The summer chinook forecast was for 39,000 for the upper Columbia and it has been upgraded to 65,000, the best in several years.

In this issue I have included maps of the best locations and photos of the gear to use. If you would like to receive a free copy of the E-Letter just go to my website at www.fishingmagician.com, and click on the Free E-Letter button at the top left hand side of the home page. I’ll make sure that one is sent to you.

I will be planning several fishing trips to fish for sockeye and summer run kings this season. I will be spending as much time as possible on Lake Wenatchee if that run comes in by late July or August. There are other good fisheries to take advantage of over the summer though. Walleye fishing on Banks Lake for one. I also have wanted to get up to Lake Roosevelt for walleye. It’s a beautiful place to fish and the daily walleye limit is 16, double the number for Potholes or Banks.

I will look for you on the water this summer. It’s going to be great fun!