The days are cooler now, and many anglers prefer to fish in these temperatures rather than the heat of summer. Fall days are often clear and calm, and there are many great options available to anglers this time of year.

My brother in law Tom Verschuren and I headed up to Banks Lake on Friday. This is one of our favorite things to do. We’ll fish for walleye, and if they aren’t biting we will switch to bass fishing. We launched at Northrup and drove the boat over to Barker Flats. When we arrived, I discovered that I had left my walleye box at home. We always bring some bass rods and tackle along when we fish Banks, so no problem. We ran over to the far side at the southern shore of Barker and went to work. We started off casting three- and four-inch Senkos in the watermelon with black and red flakes and were catching fish right away. I decided to switch to Zoom lizards in the same size but the green pumpkin color and had even better success. We like to fish for bass off the shoreline opposite the boat launch at Million Dollar Mile, but when we approached the point at the main lake, we saw that the wind had kicked and wanted to stay in the calmer water. I ran the boat further up to an area that we hadn’t tried before, and we were glad we did. Smallmouth were abundant here and eager to hit our lizards.

Most of the smallmouth were half-pounders but we did get a few larger fish. I hooked the biggest fish of the day, and instead of netting it, I tried to hoist it into the boat by grabbing the line. Guess what, it broke the line. I had a counter along and decided to keep track of the number of fish we caught and released. When the counter hit 50 we packed it in and headed for home. What a fun way to spend a day! This week’s photo is of a typical smallmouth from Banks.

I had planned to spend a couple of days on Omak Lake last week, but the forecast for high winds prompted me to cancel the trip. The forecast for the coming week doesn’t look good and I may have to cancel again. I have fished this Colville Reservation Lake several times in the fall and have had some spectacular days. The Colville Tribe typically plants 40,000 cutthroat in Omak Lake every year, so I know there will be plenty of fish waiting for us. The launch at Nicholson (Beer Can) Beach is very rough, but I managed to put my 20-foot Smoker Craft in the water here. There is a large bay just around the corner from the launch, but I often just make the run down to the bottom end of this 10-mile long lake to start fishing.

I look for about 100 feet of water and am not surprised to see the depth sounder screen loaded with marks. It is not unusual to see a lot of the marks at a consistent depth, which is usually the thermocline. I will put my downriggers down either right in the middle of these marks or just below them. I like to run a variety of plugs and darting lures and the rods are bouncing all the time.

My friend Jim Passage brought a fly rod along last fall and put his flies on a sinking line out the back of the boat in a holder, and he was very busy. You can flatline plugs or spoons and catch fish this way, too. We had fished the afternoon the day before and had caught and released over 20 fish in a few hours. We had done about the same the next morning. I noticed some large marks right off the bottom, so I dropped my rigger right on top of them. I had a large darting plug on the line and the rod started bouncing almost immediately. I popped the line off the clip and before we released the fish we measured it. It was a 28-incher.

Another Colville Tribal lake that I have fished many times is Buffalo Lake, which is just ten miles from the town of Coulee Dam. It is a very pretty place to fish and gets very little pressure. It is known for great trout fishing since it gets generous plants of rainbow. This spring it received 2,000 1.5-pound rainbow, 5,000 ½-pound rainbow, and 250 7-pound triploid rainbow trout! The fall fishing for kokanee can be terrific here and the lake is also loaded with largemouth bass. I would like to make a trip or two to Buffalo Lake this fall.

Rufus Woods is also a good bet for the fall. The Colville Tribe released 45, 000 triploids in the reservoir, starting in February this year. The fish averaged around 2 pounds when they went into the lake, so many will be 4 to 6 pounds by now.

There are some great options available to anglers here in Central Washington right now. The Hanford Reach fall salmon fishing is just taking off, with a sharp increase in catches recorded in the past week. Last year, the walleye fishing on Potholes Reservoir was terrific, and I can’t wait to get down there to see if I can repeat the great catches of really nice fish this fall. The fishing for smallmouth and largemouth bass is also this time of year, and the big bluegill and crappie also go on the bite. Another fishery that is just getting going is the sturgeon fishing on Lake Roosevelt.

You can learn about all of these fisheries along with some great tips on what to use and where to go by getting a copy of my free E-Letter. In the Fall issue I touch on fall salmon fishing, with links to some great videos. I also mention the walleye fishing on Potholes Reservoir with photos of my favorite rigs. Included is a link to a video on fishing for sturgeon on Lake Roosevelt. You can get all of this for free by logging onto www.fishingmagician.com and click on the Free E-Letter button on the Home Page.

Weather can be a factor when trying to plan fishing trips this time of year, but there will be plenty of sunny days this fall for some great days on the water!

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