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 By Dan Bacher Managing Editor The Fish Sniffer Newspaper
Tahoe is a lake of superlatives, the deepest lake in California, the third
deepest in North America and still one of the purest anywhere. To the fisherman, it provides some of the finest and most consistent fishing for mackinaw available in the state.
Mackinaw trout, Salvelinus
namaycush, are the big predators of Lake Tahoe. After being introduced into the Tahoe from the Great Lakes in 1886, they rapidly displaced the native, legendary Lahontan cutthroat, leading to the extinction of
the cutthroats by the late 1920's. The mackinaw are now the most popular sport fish species at Lake Tahoe, since they provide good action for anglers using the right methods year round.
Fred Bennett of Orangevale, the winner of the Fish Sniffer Web Site Survey in August, and I found outstanding mackinaw trout action during a fishing adventure to
Lake Tahoe on October 29 while fishing with Tim Hennessy of Tahoe Angler Sportfishing.
Fred and I arrived at the dock at the Tahoe Keys Marina at 6:30 a.m. It was my
second trip of the season to Tahoe, and Fred's first trip for mackinaw on the lake. The wind was beginning to blow after Hennessy drove his 28 foot boat out into the
main lake, but it looked fishable, at least for a while.
We started trolling with J-Plugs, tipped with live minnows (Lahontan Redsides) in the
Ski Run area of the south shore at around 165 feet deep. We were using downrigger rods with 17 pound test Silver Thread line; Tim prefers these over the
heavier wire line rods because they allow you to experience the fight better.
"I'm fishing with the J-Plugs because you get the larger fish on them," said
Hennessy. "There's a 'sea mount' here where lots of quality fish are holding."
Brent and I agreed that we would alternate on grabbing the rods when they were hit
by a hungry mackinaw, with him taking the first fish and I taking the second. We were in the water less than ten minutes when Fred hooked up the first fish of the day at
6:16 a.m. After a tough battle, Fred landed a 6-1/2 pound mackinaw.
The second fish hit at 6:25 a.m. I reeled in the trout, a quality 5 pound mackinaw. As
the sun rose, clouds from an evil-looking approaching weather front blocked most of the sun's rays. The wind continued blowing, although they didn't deter us from our pursuit of mackinaw.
At 6:50 p.m., Fred hooked into the big fish of the day, a 7 lb. 4 ounce mackinaw. We had a lull in the action until a fish popped off the line on the downrigger and I battled
a chunky 5.2 pound mackinaw to the boat. We had caught four quality fish by 7:10 a.m.; that's a pretty good fishing for anywhere.
Now we switched techniques, moving over to the other side of the lake at Camp
Richardson to try our hand at jigging. "The fish we catch jigging are generally smaller than those you catch trolling," Tim noted. We jigged for over one hour at Camp
Richardson; Tim hit several fish while using a chartreuse silver Crippled Herring, but all came unbuttoned. I also hooked a fish with a silver/chartreuse Crippled Herring for a few seconds.
However, it took Brent, the "jig king" for the day, to actually boat the first jig fish, a 4 pound mackinaw while working a silver/blue Bomber Jig. He followed up 30 minutes
later with another 3 pound mackinaw. "The fish fight really hard on the jigs," commented Fred after he landed the second fish.
Tim finally landed a fish, a 1 pound mackinaw, before we called it a day around 11:30 a.m. It was a fine day of fishing, with Fred and I keeping our limits of two fish
each. On one of the fish that we released, Captain Tim stuck a syringe in its air bladder to allow it to revive, but the other fish we released back into the lake without need to put a needle in the air bladder.
We were fishing at one of the tougher times for mackinaw at Tahoe, when the mackinaw are beginning to spawn, and still found fine action on quality fish.
After we finished fishing, Fred and I made a trip to Taylor Creek, where the U.S. Forest Service operates a trail and underwater viewing area, to see the kokanee
salmon spawn in progress. There were thousands of colorful kokanee spawning throughout the short stream, pointing to good kokanee fishing in the lake in coming years.
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