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[cool][#0000ff]TubeBabe and I hit Rabbit Gulch...9 - 3. Quite a few others joined us. Everybody caught lots of small perch...from embarassing to modest. No braggin' size. TubeBabe and I each caught one feisty 17" rainbow. [/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Easy on and off the ice. Cold nighttime temps in the mid teens are keeping the ice good. But winds are keeping the ice snow-free. 8" of hard clear ice. We were glad we had cleats. [/#0000ff]
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Nice bows! Look like footballs.[cool]
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[cool][#0000ff]Yeah, we call them "Starvation steelheads". They hit hard, fight hard and have beautiful pink flesh. Great eating. [/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]They have really changed the overall fishing experience on Starvation. Before DWR started dumping them in a couple of years ago most anglers worked hard to find a few perch and maybe an occasional walleye or smallie. Of course there have always been browns in Starvy, but they have been rare and seldom caught except right after iceout and again in late fall...cold water months. I caught rainbows on almost every trip I made there during the last year. And there are an increasing number of anglers who fish the lake solely for the trout. When you see the leftover gobs of "power putty" around the ice holes you would think you were on East Canyon or Rockport.[/#0000ff]
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Ice cleats look like required equipment unless you take Ice skates instead!! Nice bows they look fat and healthy. Too bad you didnt locate the bigger perch. A long drive but still better than working and reading about it.
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It looks like your new wobble jigs and holy jigs work well on the rainbow as well as he perch! Thanks for the report and the pictures.
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[cool][#0000ff]We had hoped to get some bigger perch but they seem to be moving deeper now. Most of the bigger fish are big females full of ripening eggs. They don't eat as much and are moving into parts of the lake with vegetation and/or incoming water flows. They spawn shortly after iceout and the spawn is triggered by the lengthening daylight hours.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]There will still be a few jumbos taken in the shallower waters but the larger groups are deeper and are more difficult to coax to bite. They may be active for only a short time...and not every day. You really have to be in the right place at the right time with something they will bite on.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Even the smaller fish were not as active yesterday. We saw a lot more fish on sonar than we felt on the ends of our lines. Typical.[/#0000ff]
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[quote LloydE]It looks like your new wobble jigs and holy jigs work well on the rainbow as well as he perch! Thanks for the report and the pictures.[/quote]
[cool][#0000ff]Yeah. TubeBabe is sold on the wobble jigs. They were the hot producer on our recent trip to Utah Lake for white bass so she insisted on having one rod rigged with a WJ. However, I traded the 1/16 oz. chartreuse model we used for the whities for a 1/8 oz. glow fire tiger one for Starvation. She got quite a few perch on it and her only rainbow.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]I caught a grundle of perch on the holy jig but my solo bow came on the white glow weightless werm I was using above the holy jig as a dropper.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Got several hard hits on larger lures, trying for big perch or walleyes. But I suspect they were hit-and-run trout. The rainbows have turned piscivorous under the ice and were in the shallows feeding on the perchlets. Both of our bows had at least two small perch in their guts...one about 5". Those were the first rainbows I have caught at Starvation with anything besides invertebrates in their innards.[/#0000ff]
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Hey TD, I was there yesterday as well. I think I parked by you, little white Chev with a BFT sticker on the bumper? I was hoping to find some of you famous lures on my truck when I got back but...... We also caught alot of the tiny ones, but enough 9 inchers for dinner. We caught 2 of the rainbows as well. I wasn't sure which group you were, so I never tried to say hi.
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[cool][#0000ff]Yep. That was us. [/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Sorry I forgot to leave the lures. Got 'em mixed up with the pixie dust. You might not have even noticed that stuff.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]I got quite a few "sub-toads" yesterday too. Kept a few to turn into future bait. The ones I processed were all first time spawning females...full of eggs. [/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]I think that if I hit Starvation again before iceout it might be at the other end of the lake...at Knight Hollow. I did well on both perch and trout up there last year late in the season. Also more walleyes up there if you can find them. They keep the main access road cleaned off for the local farmers and oil workers. The key will be access down the road into the state park area. Haven't heard whether or not it has been plowed or is passable. Another week or so without snow and it will clear itself...if not already.[/#0000ff]
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Is that the NE arm over past the dam? The pixie dust must have blown away 'cause I never seen it. It was a pretty day anyway!
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[cool][#0000ff]Knight Hollow is the driving access point for Saleratus Wash...in the NE corner of the lake. It is where the diversion canal pours in from the Duchesne River. When it is running it is a fish magnet. One of the best spots for early season walleye...and for some of the earliest big perch action too. Like Rabbit Gulch, it is "primitive". Pit toilets, no running water and no paved roads. But good for launching tubes and toons...and small boats when the water levels are up early in the year.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Here are a couple of maps.[/#0000ff]
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Have you guys hooked into any walleye over there is winter?
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Tubedude do you ever try downsizing to a size 14-16 hook (tiny ice jig)?
Something ridiculously small? I've found that sometimes you can get tight lipped perch to snack if you put something tiny in front of them. Tip with 1/3 a waxie or 1/2 a waxie.
Doesn't always work. I'd say usually it just makes it so you can catch real dinkers. But sometimes it will work for the bigguns.
Just wondering if you try it.
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[quote dkboss]Have you guys hooked into any walleye over there is winter?[/quote]
[cool][#0000ff]Walleye are notoriously hard to find and catch on Starvation in the winter. There does not seem to be any definite pattern. Someone will catch one in shallow water...fishing for perch. Then someone else will be deep jigging them out of 100 feet of water the same day. [/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]There is so much available food (baby perch) for them in Starvation that fishing for them with artificials can be difficult. They pig out at night on the dormant perchlings and just hang out on the bottom of deep channels in the daytime digesting their food. Once in a while something will trigger them to be more active during daylight hours and a few will show up. There are a lot more seen on underwater cameras than ever show up on anglers' hooks.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Short answer? Yes, there are walleyes caught from Starvation through the ice. But anybody who claims to be able to do it on every trip will lie about other things too.[/#0000ff]
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[cool][#0000ff]Some guys do use the very small jigs...usually below a heavier jig or flasher. And they do work for finicky perch...but not when there are hordes of the little ones around. Anything you drop down gets swarmed by the little fish and the big deliberate fish don't have a chance to move in, look it over and take a taste.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]In the most productive areas of Starvation right now, your sonar screen fills up with fish from the bottom to several feet above bottom whenever you drop a freshly baited jig down to them. There are some bigger fish in the bunch, for sure, but you can't find your jig among the marks of all the fish surrounding it. And the aggressive lightweights usually get there first.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]I almost never use jigs with hooks smaller than size 6 and often go up to size 2. I usually decorate with a big chunk of perch meat or lots of crawler, just to keep the littlest fish off the hook. Doesn't always work. I let the rod tip bounce and wiggle while the dinksters are nipping at the bait and suddenly the rod tip takes a big dip...a pulldown. Then I set the hook and usually have something more worthwhile. Amazingly, those tiny perch often chew the bait down to size and manage to get the hook point inside their mouths and impale themselves. [/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Whenever I try to use small jigs I usually catch nothing but small fish...at least in the shallow areas where the littlest ones hang out. But when you can find the schools of big fish, in the deeper channels, using small baits can be a better way to attract the big egg-laden females that cannot eat larger food. The other option is to use something flashy and noisy that will provoke them into whacking it. Gotta have a lot of tricks in your tackle box and know what to try on any given day.[/#0000ff]
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