This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2012, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
I spent time with Ryan fishing the Gorge and the Green last week working on an upcoming story. We had an awesome day on both the Gorge and the Green. Look for an upcoming story.
Here's a report from Ryan Mosely, Flaming Gorge Project Leader for the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources from this past weekend.
After buying a Wyoming AIS decal ($30 for Non-residents), I made a trip up reservoir to test the waters north of the border with my counterpart from Wyoming Game and Fish, Craig Amadio. After the windy cold front we had last week, the reservoir surface temps dropped back into the upper 40s, but no worries as the "coldwater" fish didn't seem to mind.Our intentions were to catch kokanee and we boated several while trolling 15-20 ft with planer boards. We also managed a few bonus rainbows, one of which was about 3lbs, along with some feisty lake trout pups. We caught the fish on a variety of tackle and no one combo appeared to outperform another. Successful gear included Rocky Mountain Tackle (RMT) dodgers in hyperplaid, Bahama-mama, and fusion followed by RMT squids in double-glow pink and pink cotton candy. We also caught fish on Radical Glow tubes in radical red and pink Wedding Rings rigged with the same dodgers. Trolling speed was around 2.0 mph.What was most surprising that day is the kokanee bite actually picked up around 11 a.m., when we had three of four rods hook-up almost at once. Kokanee are notoriously an early morning bite, but the late morning bite was a welcome addition. Most of the kokanee were around 15-17 inches, indicative of the abundant Age-3 year class in the reservoir this year.Picture ident - Craig Amadio with a big rainbow trout.