01 Oct September 2017 Fishing Report
We would like to thank everyone that fished with us this year! We met many great new folks and reunited with many longtime friends. We’re looking forward to next year and wish everyone a wonderful fall and winter.
As a whole we were happy with the trout fishing for the month of September, it brought us many fun days and challenged us with a few curve balls. Fortunately the cuve balls were faily navigable keeping the head scrathing at bay. As always when conditions change and mother nature interjects one is forced to learn from that situtation and come out the other side smarter.
Early September
The beginning of September greeted us with the start of the Red salmon spawn, and the tail end of the King salmon spawn. This provided us a large playground as we were able to find good fish from just below Skilak Lake all the way to bings landing. Each year early September is a dynamic time as multiple species are in some form of a spawning cycle. Each species has its own specific spot and pattern allowing us a ton of water to fish and target big fish on the move.
Mid September
As the month progressed the amount of food in the river was becoming evident as the bites became sporadic and very hard to pattern. More food allows trout to be ultra selective on when and what they want to eat. Boat pressure also became a large factor in dictating the mood of trout.
We were convinced that there was a pattern out there that would consitently put us on good fish. It took a few days of experimentation, but once we found it the trout confirmed our idea. The number of fish we were catching went down, but the size and quality went way up.
The bows were literally attacking this pattern, as hard hits and screaming drags became a daily occurrence.
Late September
The end of the month was shaping up to be a good one until mother nature interjected and the Snow Glacier ice dam broke producing a large volume of water to enter the Kenai, raise water levels, and drastically washed and displaced food down the river. The rising water brought a big decrease in water temp as well, creating chilly rainbows that had to relocate to find food. The bows overall morale at this point was fleeting and produced some challenging fishing. This trend of tough fishing persisted into early October where decreasing water levels and spawning Silvers turned the trouts frown upside down.
