3/18/13 Stampede Reservoir

Today, we made our first trip to Stampede, the news traveled fast that it was open. The road was clear with only a couple patches of snow. The ramp was in good shape other than a little ice but nothing a 4×4 couldn’t handle. We launched about 6:30 AM and headed straight across from the ramp and started fishing the same are we hooked all the nice Mack’s last year.  We made a couple quick passes before quickly switching over to Rapala’s and targeting browns. We gave this a couple hours without and hits. The lake was like glass. We switched back to Pro Troll Sting Fish and worked our way back into 60’ of water. At 10:00 with still no fish in the box I was getting concerned that it was going to be one of those days. About then, we got a little breeze and a ripple on the water and that’s all it took. Before we knew it we had 5 Mack’s in the box. The biggest was 10lb.The other weighed in at 9.5 lb, 9 lb, 5 lb and one that went about 2 to 3 pounds. All these fish were caught on a size 15 Pro Troll Sting Fish fishing the bottom in 60’ of water. Three of these fish were stuffed with 6” Kokanee. The water temp started out around 37 however we found 42-degree water in the shallows behind the island.