Blue Mesa Fishing Report: the lake is open to boating and Gunnison County opens to everyone May 27!

Blue Mesa Fishing Report: the lake is open to boating and Gunnison County opens to everyone May 27!

The fishing on Blue Mesa has been excellent for all species!  We are still seeing some good casting opportunities for rainbow and brown trout, excellent trolling for rainbow trout with plenty of salmon action mixed in (they are big!) and some GIANT lake trout!  Blue Mesa has been open for 10 days now and the fishing has been equally good all across the lake.  The marinas are slowly, but surely working to be open to the public and can help in some instances currently.

Trout- can be found casting the rocky shorelines, especially early and late in the day.  The number of rainbow trout appears to be very good as trolling for them in the top 15′ of the water column has been excellent most days and a lot of times they are getting to your presentation faster than the kokanee salmon!

Salmon- we haven’t spent a lot of time chasing salmon yet, but the times we have fished for them have not disappointed!  They seem to be holding in the top 30′ of the water column most days and so far they are a lot more spunky than they were last year, which is an encouraging sign that the gill lice aren’t hitting them so hard they appear lethargic!  One thing that we have been impressed with is the size of the kokanee for this time of year; there are some really nice fish showing up!

Lake trout- the cpw tournament for the smaller lake trout is still going on and while it was a big hit through the winter, we have not seen as many people focused on smaller lake trout so far this boating season.  This tournament was very effective through the ice and if this continues, it should take the place of CPW’s spring and fall netting for the smaller lake trout. This is good news because it means that bigger lake trout and other species won’t get caught in their nets and end up as accidental fatalities!  Although nobody was able to capitalize on the boating ice-off bite on Blue Mesa, the lack of pressure has proven to help the current lake trout bite for fish of all sizes!  ***Remember, it is advisable to release all lake trout over 24″ to help protect Blue Mesa’s trophy lake trout population!  These fish can live to be over 60 years old and provide lifetime memories for many anglers if cared for and released properly!

**This Blue Mesa fishing/boating report is brought to you by Robby Richardson, owner of Sport Fish Colorado and land Specialist/realtor for Central and Western Colorado! If you are searching for or would like to sell your Colorado Outdoor Property please reach out to Robby at (970) 784-6555.