What's Biting
I'll periodically post fishing reports that could be of interest to you in planning your trip to Lake Palestine.
Check this page often for updates.
Article, 16 Jul
Updated: Wed Jul 18, 2018
Article, 16 Jul. Two weeks ago I made my annual trip to Alaska. I've been going up there for 23 years now, all fishing in the salt water of Prince of Wales Island area, and this was my 13th time to stay at the Sea Otter Sound Lodge.
This lodge is by far my favorite because of the "family run" atmosphere and the fact that the fishing is done self-guided in smaller boats. You can look at the lodge at their website, and you may have seen the construction and installation of the new main lodge building, built on a 116 foot barge, on the "Building Alaska" programs about a year and a half ago.
This fishing package takes 7 days including travel time, and includes 5 days of fishing.
Travel to and from Ketchikan must be arranged and purchased separately, and the package actually begins and ends there.
On arrival at Ketchikan, the first night is spent in a hotel, part of the package price, and early the next morning a float plane trip of about 35 to 50 minutes, also included in the package, takes guests the 100 miles out to Heceta Island, where the floating lodge is located. The flight out there is a real adventure, flying though green valleys with tall trees on the slopes either side of the aircraft, and over and near cloud shrouded peaks and bays.
On arrival at the lodge, after a short breakfast, license purchase, and orientation, experienced guests are free to get their gear, including wet weather clothing, boat assignments, tackle and bait, and get out on the water, usually by 9 AM or so, if there were no delays to the float planes caused by weather.
Rooms at the lodge are normally for 2 persons, as are the boats, but 3 person groups can be accommodated easily. Each room has a separate bathroom and shower, and plenty of comfortable quilts and blankets on the beds.
There are two meals per day provided at the lodge, breakfast and dinner served "family style", and a boat lunch is provided in the morning to allow guests to stay out on the water from 7 AM to 5 PM.
The usual targets for fishing during the week I am up there include silver salmon, also called coho, but this year there were almost none of these.This was because of a weather phenomena in the Gulf of Alaska called "the blob". This is a warm water event that occurs about every 25 years, a coincidence of currents, tides, and temperatures that killed a lot of the base forage food like plankton, and therefore heavily effected some of the salmon groups.This was the first time in fishing that area in 23 years that I did not catch a single salmon.
Knowing the silver salmon were not available, we targeted other fish, halibut, ling cod and rockfish, all very exciting fish to catch and good on the table. Although I did not catch a keeper lingcod, I managed to hook plenty of rockfish, black, yellowtail, and yelloweye, and halibut, two 30's, two 60's, and an 82 pounder.
Caption for pic: This is my 82 pound halibut, caught on my light salmon rod and reel, 20 lb mono, and a 3/0 hook. A 25 minute fight, this one wore me out.
Newer Fishing Reports
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Older Fishing Reports
If you're interested, you can see what the conditions on Lake Palestine were like on:
