Lake Washington perch in MARCH

Warmwater fishing fans
Forum rules
Forum Post Guidelines: This Forum is rated “Family Friendly”. Civil discussions are encouraged and welcomed. Name calling, negative, harassing, or threatening comments will be removed and may result in suspension or IP Ban without notice. Please refer to the Terms of Service and Forum Guidelines post for more information. Thank you
TrackerPro16
Commander
Posts: 387
Joined: Sun Jan 08, 2017 4:44 am

Re: Lake Washington perch in MARCH

Post by TrackerPro16 » Fri Mar 10, 2017 8:09 pm

Thanks for the info! Read the report. Thank you for a good one! Hope to get out this weekend...

bigfishguy
Petty Officer
Posts: 35
Joined: Thu Jan 26, 2012 12:08 pm

Re: Lake Washington perch in MARCH

Post by bigfishguy » Sun Mar 12, 2017 7:57 am

Amx wrote:It's there now. :-)

Every report has to be approved by the administration people. Only admin can approve them. Usually takes a couple hours to approve one as Mike or Aaron are notified that there is a report, then they have to have time from their work to get to it. If they are out fishing for the weekend, the reports don't get checked and approved until the weekend is over.
We appreciate all the work you guys do to keep this web site free of bad posts.
It's too bad that people apparently post so much bad stuff that this severe vetting of posts is even NEEDED in the first place.

bigfishguy
Petty Officer
Posts: 35
Joined: Thu Jan 26, 2012 12:08 pm

Re: Lake Washington perch in MARCH

Post by bigfishguy » Sun Mar 12, 2017 8:01 am

TrackerPro16 wrote:Thanks for the info! Read the report. Thank you for a good one! Hope to get out this weekend...
The last few weeks have been "winter cold", what with snow being a threat almost every day.
The water was around 43.5 degrees, and I think they start to spawn at around 45 degrees, and the weather looks to be heating up drastically, so I'm wondering if the great winter bite (fish are highly schooled, and deep, and seem to be in predictable winter locations) ENDS when that spawn starts. They move shallow (i.e. away from these deep winter locations) when they spawn. So I'm wondering if hitting around 45 degree water drastically changes the perch locations, and therefore you WON'T do well 0.8 miles north of the Seahawk's practice field in 70' of water (until sometime next winter)? Anybody know?

User avatar
G-Man
Admiral
Posts: 2685
Joined: Mon Jul 14, 2008 9:01 am
Location: Bellevue, WA

Re: Lake Washington perch in MARCH

Post by G-Man » Sun Mar 12, 2017 2:56 pm

I lay off the perch once they start to soften up and look a little pale due to ripening up for the spawn. If you still want to fish for them, your best bet is to start out in the deep water and work your way in until you find fish. They don't like rapid depth changes so they will slowly work their way up into to the weeds to spawn. The lake's shallow waters will stay cool, and oxygenated enough for spawning purposes, well into May, so you'll have some that go early and some that go late. Once they spawn, you'll find them hanging around in the shallows near the weed line through summer and into early fall. Once if starts to cool off again, they work themselves back into the deep water, following the thermocline as is slowly decends and eventually dissapates when the lake turns over.

bigfishguy
Petty Officer
Posts: 35
Joined: Thu Jan 26, 2012 12:08 pm

Re: Lake Washington perch in MARCH

Post by bigfishguy » Mon Mar 13, 2017 5:12 am

Great, advice, G-man.

Shad_Eating_Grin
Captain
Posts: 757
Joined: Sat Sep 29, 2007 12:20 pm
Location: Renton, WA

Re: Lake Washington perch in MARCH

Post by Shad_Eating_Grin » Sat Mar 18, 2017 11:56 am

G-Man wrote:I lay off the perch once they start to soften up and look a little pale due to ripening up for the spawn. If you still want to fish for them, your best bet is to start out in the deep water and work your way in until you find fish. They don't like rapid depth changes so they will slowly work their way up into to the weeds to spawn. The lake's shallow waters will stay cool, and oxygenated enough for spawning purposes, well into May, so you'll have some that go early and some that go late. Once they spawn, you'll find them hanging around in the shallows near the weed line through summer and into early fall. Once if starts to cool off again, they work themselves back into the deep water, following the thermocline as is slowly decends and eventually dissapates when the lake turns over.
Thanks for this info.

Questions: the weedbeds in Lake WA is usually mifoil that starts right at the water's edge along the shore, and could go dozens of yards offshore, depending on the change of depth. Are the spawners right in and amongst the stalks of weeds, in the water column above the weeds, or just outside of the weeds where the weeds end and the deeper water begins?

User avatar
G-Man
Admiral
Posts: 2685
Joined: Mon Jul 14, 2008 9:01 am
Location: Bellevue, WA

Re: Lake Washington perch in MARCH

Post by G-Man » Sat Mar 18, 2017 6:20 pm

The spawn takes place in the weedbeds. The perch lay long, ribbon like, clusters of eggs, suspended amongst the weeds that you'd swear could only be from a fish many times their size. When fishing for them, you'll want to focus on the weed edge and out towards deeper water. The small fish will hang in the weeds for cover with the large fish working the edges for anything that ventures out into the open. Of note, the weeds are also where the stickleback make their nests when it's time to spawn and where the crayfish hang during the warmer months of the year.

The perch are still in 60+ feet of water, I hooked a few while out on Friday targeting cutts and squawfish.

Post Reply