Lake Powell Bachelor Excursion (pic heavy)

[creekychub]

I happily got married to my long time girlfriend this summer, but before that my buddies and I took a long road trip from Nebraska down to Lake Powell. Lake Powell is a HUGE reservoir located on the Arizona Utah border. It is a dammed up portion of the Colorado river that eventually leads to the grand canyon and lake Mead.

Lake Powell is know for its recreation and sight seeing but also for the great fishing, especially striper fishing. Powell has a limited amount of baitfish and a population of striped bass reproduces too efficiently. You are encouraged to keep all the stripers you catch and we ended up catching a ton! The way to catch a bunch of stripers at this lake is the saltwater method of chumming the fish up. We caught a lot with cut anchovies and once the school was active and near the boat, we switched to artificials (mainly 3.5" swimbaits on lead-free jigheads from hawnjigs!).

View attachment 2
View attachment 3

LOTS!! of doubles
View attachment 4
View attachment 5
View attachment 6
View attachment 7

We even hooked up with 6 fish at one time!!

View attachment 8

The Net-Man had a workout the whole trip!

View attachment 9

Celebratory Shotgun



This was the first day haul... A few walleye and channel cats in there for good measure. The second day's catch was over 150 stripers!! We were so busy cleaning the fish we forgot to snap a picture .

View attachment 1

Just to note, Harvest of large predator species (especially stripers) is 100% encouraged at this lake so the ecosystem doesn't crash. The only prey species at the lake are threadfin shad, which only grow to about 3", which means they are food during their entire lives. From some of my pictures you can easily make out unhealthy and emaciated fish due to low food supply, so we were doing our part to make the lake healthier overall. (That's what I call catching your fish and eating them too!)

Overall what an excellent fishing experience not to mention being surrounded by stunning scenery. I would recommend anyone wanting to experience non-stop action for sport and for the pan to check this place out!

 

[Bucko]

looks like a sweet trip! catching some big stripers is definitely on my list to do someday.

 

[JUNGLEJIM1]

It sounds like a blast, those stripers look a bit on the lean side. Great trip and congratulations on your marriage.

 

[Pup]

Looks like you had a blast. Bet you had quite a few "fire drills" going on.

 

[eyecrosser]

Nice haul. Congrats on your marriage and trip. Now you need to take your new bride there and get her hooked on fishing

 

[Hawnjigs]

Well, congrats all around and I have some questions:
1. The high tide line looks way up the cliff - how low is current water level and is it worrisome?
2. How good eating are the stripers?
3. Is shore fishing any good?
4. Didya get any bigger ones?

 

[waynesburgjay]

Nice work. How deep is that lake?

 

[BucktailJiger]

Nice work. How deep is that lake?

average 132-135 ft max 560 ft but is at a record low this year due to the drought .

 

[creekychub]

wbjay- Yeah we were fishing in +200' of water! The fish were ~115' down and we chummed with cut up anchovies to get the fish to rise to ~30-40 feet where we could start catching them. There were spots of over 350' deep, it was pretty crazy. Standing on the dam and looking down to the Colorado river was really intense, I found out I'm a little afraid of heights... or maybe the semi-trucks crossing and shaking the bridge was what did it...

Hawn- 1) The locals said that the water was over 100' low, That would be the high tide line you're talking about. I didn't really hear concern from anyone about the lake level, but I didn't really ask. I would think it is pretty low even by severe drought standards.
2) The stripers taste great, really neutral fish that is the right mix of firm and flaky. Can be prepared any way, I've fried it, blackened it, pan seared it, Great on a taco!! I'm going to make some stew or chowder when the weather starts turning cold here in NE.
3) Shore fishing access is very limited, the lake is basically a dammed up smaller version of the grand canyon, (Glenn Canyon is where the dam is located). Steep cliffs make up the majority of the lake, and there are few roads that even get close. With that being said, there is access near the two marinas on the southern edge of the lake. There were a few guys catching some smaller stripers right off the public marina while we were unloading the boats one evening. But overall access was very poor from what I saw.
4) The average fish we caught was right at 25", the longest was over 28". Nothing huge as far as stripers go, but still great fun on the lighter gear we were using.
*side note*, I've caught Wiper (white bass X striped bass) of the same lengths that fought much harder that these stripers, possibly due to being skinny and hungry? I'm not sure, I'll have to catch some stripers that aren't so skinny to compare. Just some food for thought...

 

[Hawnjigs]

In general fish with thick wide slab bodies seem to have more pulling muscle than more streamlined elongated ones? Walleye comes to mind as an example, but then again there are bonefish...

25" good eaters sounds waay respectable. Bout how many lbs is that size?

Geez, 100' low would dry up all the Plains reservoirs.

 

[Radtexan]

Looks like an awesome trip creeky !!!! ? thats the way to have a Bachelor party,,,,,,,,,,,,,,coulda upgraded the Busch Lt some

 

[creekychub]

The good beer was back at the house, the Busch was just our way of staying hydrated :icon14:.

We didn't weight the fish but based on this chart We were catching a lot of 6ish pounders...

 

[ragged edge]

Looks like a good well planned trip you had. Did you leave any fish for seed? lol

 

[toadfrog]

I'll take a all the skinny strippers 'OOPS' I mean stripers I can get .

 

[StumpHunter]

That had to be a fun time!!