Eklutna Tail Race

I talked with two other guides today and both had heard that the first king salmon of the year had been caught at the Eklutna Tailrace the day before yesterday. I have not hear of a definite catch from the sporting goods stores but would not be surprised in the slightest. The water at the tailrace has come up due to the recent warm weather and snow melt. I would expect quite a few fish to start coming in over the next two weeks in the lower Matanuska-Susitna rivers and streams. The Yentna River Drainage is reported to be ice free with the exceptions of some bank ice according to Eric Johnson jr. at Northwoods lodge. The water level is also expected to be higher than last year due to a "normal" snow fall in the drainage. I am planning to head up the Yentna later next week for a memorial weekend Pike fishing trip and will provide a full report on conditions and fishing. The early fishing has been spectacular in the past and I am sure that this year will not be any different.

Fishing forecast

The Big Susitna tributary strems, Talchulitna, Lake Creek, Deshka, Talketna, and Little Susitna rivers are expected to have good returns of King and Silver Salmon in 2008. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game, ADF&G, showed that most of these rivers either met or exceeded escapement in 2007. The return on the Deshka river is forecast to be down this year but the ADF&G is still expecting a Deshka King Salmon return of over 20,000 in 2008, Spawning escapements topped 40,000 fish for coho salmon that should return to both Deshka and Little Susitna River in 2008. This will produce some phenominal fishing in late July through August for Silver Salmon.
The ice is moving on the rivers and most of the lakes re almost ice free. I expect many of them to be navigable in just over a week. This is dependent upon the wether but the 5 day forecast for the Matanuska-Susitna Valley looks good. We had some great trips ice fishing for Pike this winter and are expecting this fishery to continue to produce for us in 2008.

The fishing season is upon us and the forecast looks great and we are ready to get fishing.

Greg

Cabin Construction

We have been up to the lake working on the cabin several weekends this winter. We have had some varied luck ice fishing. I think we have had 4 pike through the ice that were over 40 inches and put 3 of them back. There is alot of snow and ice this year and the conditions should be prime for salmon and pike fishing this summer.

Greg

Pike Fishing 9-8 & 9-9

I took an overnight pike trip for my last trip of the season. The water was within 12" of the lowest I had seen it since early this spring. My clients, a husband and wife from New York state, were great. It was raining from the launch in the am until well after dark. We fished with a wide assortment of lures and caught well over 50 fish. We were hunting for a large pike of mountable quality but never found one. We did catch two pike that were in the mid 30" range and wer pushing 10-12 lbs, of which we only got one picture of, the gentleman of the duo forgot to hit the record button on the camera (I could not resist reminding him of this, they read the blog). The rest of the pike were in the 5-8 lb range with a few smaller fish. I was fully expecting to catch larger fish I am not sure why we didn't, they may be cruising the deep or feeding on dead salmon or the smaller fish out ran them for our gear. We spent a nice dry evening in the cabin and visited about hunting and fishing in New York and Alaska.

The second day was nice, little to no rain and the lake had come up 8" to 12" due to the rain and incoming creek water. The fishing was good until about 11:00 am and then it slowed own to a crawl. We left the lake and had a great trip home, we saw lots of eagles and tons of ducks. The river had come up aproximately 3 feet, this made the trip home a lttle faster but we had to watch for logs and debris in the water.

Have a great winter,

Greg Giauque
Alaska Susitna Charters

Little Su 8-26

I fished for Silver salmon on the Little Su today. I took four clients up river from the landing on a foggy and cool morning run. We found groups of fish, 15 to 250 fish schools. The fish were very reluctant to bite and were not very aggressive. I was just plain miffed at why we were not able to catch more fish. This was a group of very good fisherman that were willing to try fly fishing, spinners, eggs and plugs. We put in a full day of fishing to catch 5 Silvers, one bright fish, three in good shape and one that had turned pretty red. A few of the fish would follow the lures but never commit while others woud move out of the way of everything including eggs. I am guessing that with the low numbers of fish in the river these fish have seen just about everything that can be trown at them. It may also be that the low water is warmer and the fish are lethargic, whatever the reason the catching was poor today. This will likely be my last salmon trip of the season, I have a pike trip on the 8th-9th and will post our results after the trip. I will start writing again next spring when we pick up the ice fishing and early salmon trips.

Pike Fishing 8-17

I took two clients pike fishing today. The weather was very good with the exception of heavy fog on the river in the morning. We caught over 30 pike and had at least that many other fish on but lost hem for one reason or another. We did not catch any of the huge lunkers but had a fish that looked to be in the high 30" to low 40" range follow our lures three times. The fish looked to be very healthy and fat. The fall feeding should be starting and we have a few weekends left for either day trips or overnight Pike fishing trips.

Little Su 8-14

I fished the Little Susitna River this morning with three clients. We used both eggs with bobbers and mepps spinners. Of the eight fish we landed 7 were on spinners and only one on eggs. We fished several spots catching one at each until we found a large school of fish that were willing to strike and complete our limits. There are more fish in the river every day but the numbers are still much lower than I expect for this time of the year. I visited with another guide and he thought the mid point of the run was just now hitting, based on a surge of smaller fresh fish, the river and the fishing would be consistant for the next couple of weeks. We caught a few fish today that were turning red and are seeing more red fish in the holes every day although I saw fish brought in from down river that had sea lice on them today. We have openings for fishing in the afternoon and weekends this week.