9 days of Crane Prarie - report

Well, back home after 9 days at Crane. Lemme tell you how it went.
Day 1: Hit an elk on our way up Hwy. 58, totalled my little ranger. Luckily my cousin was hauling the boat in his truck and we could still go using it. Got zero fishing in.
Day 2: went to the Rock creek/Quinn channel and boated 5 fish in the morning. Heading back out for the evening bite, carb on the motor goes out next to the bouy marker, had to row back to camp.
Day 3: went to bend to file my accident report for the elk and get the carb fixed. Zero fishing done.
Day 4: motor works fine going out to Rock creek, on the way back in, carb goes out again. Had our electric motor on this time though. Trolled with that back in, landed a couple nice kokes.
Day 5-9: screw the gas motor. Fished the stumps, using the electric motor, at the entrance to the SW arm of the lake near Rock Creek CG. Landed 10-15 fish a day, total for the trip is estimated at 100 fish landed. Bows, Brooks, and Kokes. Throwing and trolling bright colored Rooster Tails worked best for us.

Overall, it was an excellent trip for fishing. But it was a horrid start to the trip.

Sorry about hitting the elk!

Fishing sounds pretty good, did you guys get any trophy size fish?

Best,

Don't tell me...the Elk ran away! Glad you at least caught some fish!!

So, you roasted some Elk over the fire?

Glad you were rewarded, with some feesh!

She passed on her own in the ditch. I didn't get any of her meat, ODFW came and salvaged her.
A friend did bring some of his elk meat up for dinner one night though.

As for the fish sizes, we were averaging 14-16 inches, at about a pound or so each.
Three 20" kokes that were 2lbs easy. One bow we caught was about 20" and 3-4lbs.
Missed more fish than we caught, had some really big fish get off too.

Nice job man! Sorry to hear about that accident, that must've been bad.

Yeah. Truck might be totalled. Haven't inspected the damage completely yet.

Poor Ranger. Glad you are ok.

Wow, what a story! Glad your not hurt.

grizzlynitemare said:

Fished the stumps, using the electric motor, at the entrance to the SW arm of the lake near Rock Creek CG. Landed 10-15 fish a day, total for the trip is estimated at 100 fish landed. Bows, Brooks, and Kokes. Throwing and trolling bright colored Rooster Tails worked best for us.

Overall, it was an excellent trip for fishing. But it was a horrid start to the trip.

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Sorry about your Ranger.

I was at CP yesterday.

Started at 9:00, near the Deschutes inlet.
First 3 casts = 2 bows + 1 brookie.
Biggest was a 17-18" bow.
Then the bite turned off.

Floated worms off bottom with about a 4ft. leader.

The bug hatch was in the late morning (keep your mouth shut or you will be eating them for lunch).

Ended up with 4 fish and missed a couple.
The fish are fatter than I expected for this time of year.

Was Red a color that worked for you?

Sounds like your fishing trip was Hit and Miss. Get it? Okay, bad joke. I'm glad to hear that no one got hurt.

sunsalem said:

Sorry about your Ranger.

Was Red a color that worked for you?

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Probably gonna pick up a new truck this weekend, If everything goes well.

Mostly we were throwing bright colors.
My cousin couldn't keep them off on a rainbow w/ a gold blade.
His friend did well on bright green w/ a gold blade.
I killed them on an orange rooster, gold and silver blade (silver bladed one is now feather-less and bent to hell. Gold one's paint was stripped by a huge hit and has teeth marks on it)

fish face said:

Sounds like your fishing trip was Hit and Miss. Get it? Okay, bad joke. I'm glad to hear that no one got hurt.

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My kind of humor

grizzlynitemare said:

Mostly we were throwing bright colors.
My cousin couldn't keep them off on a rainbow w/ a gold blade.
His friend did well on bright green w/ a gold blade.
I killed them on an orange rooster, gold and silver blade (silver bladed one is now feather-less and bent to hell. Gold one's paint was stripped by a huge hit and has teeth marks on it)

Click to expand...

Thanx for the info....those are some of the same colors I use there.
For some reason when you said "bright," red came to mind.:blushing:

BTW, I was there yesterday too and did much better.
Amazingly, the very same thing happened as last time: 1st 3 casts = 3 fish.:yikes:

Floated worms off the bottom and drifted 'em under a bobber when the wind came up.
I used a gold Thomas Bouyant a bit and managed to hook what looked like a 3lb. bow, but it threw the hook on a jump.
We ended up with about a dozen fish.
The biggest at about 5-6 lbs. (Cranebow), with equal numbers of Bows and Brooks.
All fished were released to fight another day.

The wind became severe around noon, with white caps in the main body of the reservoir.
It made fishing nearly impossible.
Left at 3PM.