01-15-2018, 05:06 PM
Bear Lake is all open water. Boats can be launched at the Utah State Park marina, 1st Point, Cisco Beach and Rainbow Cove boat ramps in Utah AND courtesy docks are in the water at all locations. There is also boat launching available on the Idaho side of the lake at their East Shore State Park ramp and North Beach ramp.
There have been no sign of cisco along Cisco Beach as of this morning (Jan 15th), however, boat anglers are reporting they are just beginning to catch one or two cisco off the rockpile by jigging. Anglers are doing good to excellent for cutthroat trout and some lake trout by jigging off the Gus Rich Point/Rockpile area as well as off 2nd Point and Cisco Beach. Trolling should also work well in these areas. If you are jigging, use tube jigs or swim baits in various colors in ½ to 1 ounce sizes and 3-6” long. Try tipping them with cisco, sucker meat or Gulp minnows. Reliable colors are white, green and motoroil. If you are trolling; use flatfish in U-20 or similar sizes or minnow type lures in #9-13 sizes. Cutthroat trout and lake trout can be found in any depths at this time of year, so if you are trolling parallel to shore, try close to shore in 10’ of water or less and keep moving all the way out to 80 feet or more. Pay attention to your sonar, once you locate fish, target that depth strata. Shore anglers are doing well along Cisco Beach both bait fishing and casting for cutthroat trout. Fly anglers are also able to do quite well at this time of year with large flys such as egg-sucking leaches or articulated bunny flies. Reports from this weekend show that anglers are also catching some Bonneville whitefish off the rockpile using smaller jigging spoons (castmasters, buckshot, Hopkins, etc) and tipping their lures with worms or Gulp worms. You can even add a small dropper ice fly about 8-12” below the main lure and tip that with a maggot.
The cisco run could begin any day, but more likely it will begin around January 20th, plus or minus a few days. Since it will very likely be open water conditions, you should plan to bring up waders to keep you dry and which also allow you to get into the water a little ways from shore. It is also advantageous to have a second person jigging a lure with no hooks on it to attract the cisco closer to your net. When you scoop the cisco, you can scoop up the attractor lure and now worry about it tangling in your dip net.
Remember, you can only dip net your own fish. Party fishing (dipnetting cisco for another angler) is illegal. The daily limit for cisco is 30 fish. The trout limit is two fish. Cutthroat trout with a fin clip may be kept; Cutthroat trout with all fins intact must be immediately released. Large Lake Trout take a long time to reach large sizes, and while they are legal to keep, many anglers are encouraging other anglers to release them.
Garden City Community Fishery Pond
The pond is frozen, but ice conditions may not be safe in all areas. Use extreme caution if you decide to try to ice fish right now. The fishing should be good for rainbow trout using small ice flies tipped with a maggot. Please use the self-service creel cards and let the UDWR know how you did fishing.
Laketown Reservoir
Laketown Reservoir is partially ice covered and fishing has been good in the open water area using bait, flies or spinners. Use extreme caution if you decide to try to ice fish right now
[signature]
There have been no sign of cisco along Cisco Beach as of this morning (Jan 15th), however, boat anglers are reporting they are just beginning to catch one or two cisco off the rockpile by jigging. Anglers are doing good to excellent for cutthroat trout and some lake trout by jigging off the Gus Rich Point/Rockpile area as well as off 2nd Point and Cisco Beach. Trolling should also work well in these areas. If you are jigging, use tube jigs or swim baits in various colors in ½ to 1 ounce sizes and 3-6” long. Try tipping them with cisco, sucker meat or Gulp minnows. Reliable colors are white, green and motoroil. If you are trolling; use flatfish in U-20 or similar sizes or minnow type lures in #9-13 sizes. Cutthroat trout and lake trout can be found in any depths at this time of year, so if you are trolling parallel to shore, try close to shore in 10’ of water or less and keep moving all the way out to 80 feet or more. Pay attention to your sonar, once you locate fish, target that depth strata. Shore anglers are doing well along Cisco Beach both bait fishing and casting for cutthroat trout. Fly anglers are also able to do quite well at this time of year with large flys such as egg-sucking leaches or articulated bunny flies. Reports from this weekend show that anglers are also catching some Bonneville whitefish off the rockpile using smaller jigging spoons (castmasters, buckshot, Hopkins, etc) and tipping their lures with worms or Gulp worms. You can even add a small dropper ice fly about 8-12” below the main lure and tip that with a maggot.
The cisco run could begin any day, but more likely it will begin around January 20th, plus or minus a few days. Since it will very likely be open water conditions, you should plan to bring up waders to keep you dry and which also allow you to get into the water a little ways from shore. It is also advantageous to have a second person jigging a lure with no hooks on it to attract the cisco closer to your net. When you scoop the cisco, you can scoop up the attractor lure and now worry about it tangling in your dip net.
Remember, you can only dip net your own fish. Party fishing (dipnetting cisco for another angler) is illegal. The daily limit for cisco is 30 fish. The trout limit is two fish. Cutthroat trout with a fin clip may be kept; Cutthroat trout with all fins intact must be immediately released. Large Lake Trout take a long time to reach large sizes, and while they are legal to keep, many anglers are encouraging other anglers to release them.
Garden City Community Fishery Pond
The pond is frozen, but ice conditions may not be safe in all areas. Use extreme caution if you decide to try to ice fish right now. The fishing should be good for rainbow trout using small ice flies tipped with a maggot. Please use the self-service creel cards and let the UDWR know how you did fishing.
Laketown Reservoir
Laketown Reservoir is partially ice covered and fishing has been good in the open water area using bait, flies or spinners. Use extreme caution if you decide to try to ice fish right now
[signature]
