lake roosevelt Fishing Report 2024

The Polaris Supreme docked at Fisherman's Landing August 19. Tom Rothery skippered the five-day trip with 24 anglers, and remarked that this Dan Heil memorial trip was the 23rd for the charter group. Jeff Hoover of Richland, WA won first place and took over the top spot in the jackpot and for the best bluefin of the season. "He fought for 45 minutes," said Geoff. "He was the strongest fish I ever felt, and my best fish ever. He beat me up!" Hoover said he baited a sardine on a 3/0 Super Mutu hook. He used 40-pound line, a Penn two-speed reel and a Seeker Black Steel 6470 rod. Bob Hagan of Ramona was second for a 38-pound Opah that erred on a sardine. Mike Myer of La Mirada won third place for a 37.6-pound albacore, but declined to stand in the lineup, so Gene McKenna of San Jose stepped up with his 30-pound dorado.

Hello everyone, The conditions for these Yellowtail are improving. It was a dramatic improvement today, the wind switched back to more westerly and the fish seemed happier with the change. We started our day picking at these Yellows until late morning. We then headed offshore to look for Tuna. Late in the day we found a nice foamer of Yellowfin and Bluefin Tuna. We caught a few, both on the surface lures and the live bait with a torpedo sinker rig. We are hoping this tuna gets with it here soon. Will report again tomorrow, Team Supreme

"The bluefin are still biting," said Mike Pritchard. "It's 8:30 in the morning and we have outstanding Bluefin fishing. It looks like everybody in this area is doing very well on the Bluefin. It's a good time to hop on a boat."

Lifting one of these fish completely off the deck after the long battle may be the toughest part ! Another amazing day of local big fish for captain Matt and the guys. 35 anglers. 20 bluefin tuna. Same tackle suggestions as earlier posts. If you do not own a 2 speed reel. Please rent one from Seaforth Sportfishing when you check in for the trip in the morning.

Sep. 19

We didn't start fishing today till around 2:00 in the afternoon. Before that we traveled up in very cool dirty looking fishless water as we expected. Everyone slept in and chilled out while the crew did some maintenence on the boat and did some repairs on monday details. After the boat was in tip top shape we ate fish tacos and got ready to fish. We didn't find any wide open yellowtail fishing but we scrached out an afternoon. We caught 3 a round on mostly good grade yellowtails with a few cows mixed in. 35 pounders is about what they were. So we're traveling up now in good weather to the yellowfin/dorado grounds. We could use a top off on some yellowfin and we can use some more dorado and then we'll have most of a day to fish for the bluefin before we head for home.

Friday, August 19th, 2011

Hi friends. Just finishing up our day here on the Supreme. Gear is broken down, tackle is stowed top-side, and the boat is scrubbed from bow to butt. We began our day with a blind Bluefin jig strike and managed to land a few bait fish when we started to meter them pretty solid under the boat. After losing the majority of the fish we hooked, the school bailed and we soon followed. The Yellowfin weren't far behind and we managed to put together a really nice day on fish in the 12-25 lb. range with one standout landed by Henry "Blue" Maine. Henry's Yellowfin looks to go about 55 lbs. and no, it was not a Big Eye. Blue's our boy and we're very proud of him. Anyhow, most of our fish came on blind jig strikes and every now and then we'd see a nice sonar school of them and have on-the-corner type fishing. With all the action and chaos, and I do mean chaos, we have a very healthy load of tuna in our holds to compliment our Yellowtail catch from yesterday and our five Albacore from Wednesday. Everyday, things are looking more promising and more promising with Bluefin, Yellowfin, and more reported Albacore being caught, this offshore tuna thing might just be getting started. We'll see but with two straight solid tuna trips in the books, we'll be looking for a third tomorrow when we take off for five days. The weather is a bit rolly but without too much wind to jack things up and as of now (1700), our traveling weather is just fine.

So that's all. We're shooting for a 0630 ETA tomorrow morning. There will be eight long-range boats from all three landings arriving and departing tomorrow so we'll be on the hustle. We'll be dropping off Ryan and friends and picking up Joe Beck and the Bob Vance crew for a five day ocean-going party and we shall welcome them with open arms. We'll chat with you tomorrow. Take care and happy Friday.

-Team Supreme-

Thursday, August 18th, 2011

Hi friends. We arrived to the southern Yellowtail grounds this morning to find that things were not right. We managed a few OK drifts but we didn't see the life that the boats saw in the days prior. No shortage of fish, that's for sure, they were just too scattered out and weren't in the right mode. In the afternoon, we made a run to the northern grounds to find a little bit better sign of fish and we ended our day having a couple decent drifts on some 15-22 lb. 'tails with an occasional cow mixed in. We also caught/released some dandy Calico Bass and tagged one nice Grouper. A little bit better surface iron action today than we've seen all year and our master of ceremonies, Ryan, had himself a good day until Barry broke his favorite surface iron. All in all, it was a fine day of Yellowtail fishing. Our weather was prime all day, excellent bronzing conditions as it was hot and sunny.

So we're currently making way back up to finish our trip up with some tuna. A couple boats started located some actual schools of those Yellowfin tuna and we're hoping to do that tomorrow as well. Our weather is a mild chop with some breeze but we're just fine with it, as long as it doesn't freshen up. We'll chat with you tomorrow.

-Team Supreme-

Wednesday, August 17th, 2011

Good evening everyone. Like I began last trips report, I just wanted to reiterate just how quickly things can change out here on the ocean. The prior Bluefin zone that yielded us and the entire fleet a spectacular catch just a couple days before was absolutely starving for life and we never saw nor caught a Bluefin tuna today. Also, the gorgeous weather that we had been blessed with for the better part of a week was now windy, cold, and a bit choppy. The day was looking very bleak to say the least as it took us hours to land our first fish of the day, a Yellowfin tuna in the 15 lb. class. It was very slow for the morning time and all the way through lunch time. Single jig fish here, single jig fish there and with that, the announcement was made to get the Yellowtail gear ready as we would be traveling southerly for the remainder of the day to be in a position to do some Yellowtail fishing tomorrow morning.

It wasn't too long after we pointed the Supreme on our coastal course that we started getting blind jig strikes on the Yellowfins. We would consistently start jigging up double and triple jig strikes and when we finally hung a few bait fish, things got a little interesting. One of our best stops of the day was for nine Yellowfin and five Watermelons. Watermelons: a little Tommy Rothery terminology for you. These fish have been eluding the fleet for quite some time now and in traditional years, we catch these Watermelons later in the season in August/September. Not the traditional setup to find these fish in, with a Yellowfin school in warm water but for whatever reason, they were there and we managed to land five of these beauties. What is a Watermelon you ask? Albacore tuna in the 30-40 lb. class. That's right, we caught some slug Albacore today. What an awesome surprise and not only caught some, we also metered a few on the fathometer. Could this be the start of something or were they just lost souls hitch-hiking with their Yellowfin counterparts? Who knows but this next week in long-range fishing will be very interesting. Will it tell the tale if it will be the epic, super tardy Albacore season of 2011 or just a nice surprise here or there for the fleet? We'll see. Nonetheless, our first Albacore of the season were a welcome sight. We missed those beautiful specimens and we definitely took a few minutes to stare down the fish on the deck and appreciate what beautiful creatures they are. Hopefully, there are more to come.

Although we scored a decent day jigging up Yellowfin in the 12-18 lb. class, we maintained our course and our gameplan remains the same to fish Yellowtail tomorrow. It's not like we saw school after school after school. All of our jig fish were blind jig strikes and we never saw anything to get us really excited. We did have a couple stops where they rushed the boat and we had chaos on the corner but like I said, it was mostly a troll-fest today. All in all, we had a fine day and we're looking to had some 'tails to go along with our 'fins and we'll try the tuna fishing thing the day after tomorrow. Take care and wish us luck.

-Team Supreme-

Tuesday, August 16th, 2011

Hi friends. We awoke not-so bright but very early this morning to start our day. Being the 0530 boat getting into the landing, we had to bust it into overdrive so that the Shogun, Searcher, and three 1.5 boats could unload their passengers and fish as well. In a timely manner, the Heil group and their bounty of Bluefin, Yellowfin, Yellowtail, Dorado, Halibut, Calico bass, and Barred Sand bass were successfully unloaded and we bid the boys farewell until next season. Just an awesome trip for those guys, hard to beat if you ask me and we all busted butt to find them some fish and find some fish we did - and then some. Big fish honors go for the top three Bluefin tuna; The one and only Mr. Joe De Marco -- 45.4 lb. BFT. Jim Chivas -- 41.4 lb. BFT. And last but not least, our very own Mark Clark's son, Chace, took third with his 40. 2 pounder. Good going to the gang and to Chase, remember the invaluable advice that you're Uncles' Richie and Drew gave to you. Anyhow, back out for another trip and we welcomed aboard the wildest charter-master known to man, Ryan "Black Cloud" Christianson and his group from Let's Talk Hook-Up.

So four days with the man, the myth, the legend, Ryan and his closest friends. After the tackle seminar, Ryan raffled out some goodies and Mr. Jimmy Houston won the big prize of a Shimano Tyrnos reel. Reports are sounding like a Yellowfin take-over from the previous Bluefin zone and we're going to go see what's shaking down that way and see if we can't locate the Bluefins that were M.I.A. today. If we can't locate the short-fins, we'll stay busy with some of those Yellowfins and decide our next move from that point on. Weather is great, got plenty of bait, and we'll be in the zone tomorrow...early, not late. Take care.

-Team Supreme-

Wednesday, August 24th, 2011

The boat's E-mail program is down at the moment but Tommy called in to say that fishing for yellowtail was very good on Tuesday and they left them biting. Today they fished tuna and had very good fishing on two stops for bluefin and yellowfin. The weather is up but Tommy says that the passengers are hanging in there. The boats eta tomorrow is set for 7:00 am and hopefully the E-mail issues will be taken care of. Any changes in the eta, please call the office at 619 390 7890. Thanks, Susan.

Monday, August 22nd, 2011

Hi folks. We rode with the wind and swell last night and found ourselves in the familiar Yellowtail spots. Our first spot of the day produced quality sized Yellowtail on long drifts. This mornings fishing was a yo-yo fisherman's paradise on the Polaris Supreme as we hooked most of our fish on the heavy jigs. We didn't exactly set the world on fire with our numbers but we always managed a handful or two on every drift until after lunch when things finally dried up. It took us a couple of hours to locate something that we liked and our last couple hours of the day were spent bent. Sonar schools of Yellowtail charged the Supreme with reckless abandon and it was as good as it gets there for a while. This particular spot was surface iron-friendly so that's always exciting and we finished our day on a high note. The fish we caught this morning were in the 18-22 lb. range and the fish this afternoon were a notch smaller. Big fish of the day was a 30 pounder caught around dinner time by Dan "Re-Ride" Burns.

So that is all. Just another solid day of Yellowtail fishing and with the offshore weather still on the up, we're going to spend a half day here tomorrow and then move on up the line back to the tuna grounds. Fishing sounds the same as it has from the area. If you're the lucky boat, you're pumped. If you're not, well, it's going to be a long day. Anyhow, we're going to give it a try for our last day of fishing but before we get too ahead of ourselves, we need to do some more work on Yellowtail. Wish us luck.

-Team Supreme-

Sunday, August 21st, 2011

Good evening friends. It sure felt like a slow day from the tuna grounds today but judging by the scores from the other boats, we did just fine. Some boats would've killed for our score and some boats would've said that we did have a slow day, so we were smack-dab right in the middle and the range of scores was quite large. Some boats really had a tough time of it today and some boats were the lucky few that managed to get a nice hit on the Yellowfins. We had a slow morning with a jig strike here or there and then mid-day, we had a couple of schools that rushed the boat and we had a nice whack on 'em to boost the count and our morale. But other than a few more jig strikes later in the day, it was a mediocre day and with the weather up and forecasted to stay up, we're heading down to do some Yellowtail fishing tucked behind an island somewhere. With the lack of sign for most of the fleet, we feel that the fish in the area are just weather sensitive, so we'll give them some time to regroup and will give them a try later in the trip when things hopefully settle down with the weather.

So that is all. Our traveling weather is decent and we're getting prepared for an island invasion of some sort. Wish us luck and we'll chat with you manana.

-Team Supreme-

Saturday, August 20th, 2011

Good evening everyone. We arrived to Fisherman's Landing this morning promptly at 0630 and busted out the usual routine of unloading passengers/gear, unloading fish, refueling, cleaning, outfitting the bunks with fresh linens, loading groceries, and loading a whole new batch of passengers and their gear. This morning, there was no particular order to all of our chores as eight long-range boats returned to the various landings and we just wanted to get the heck out of that mess at the top of the docks. Kudos to the "Red Shirts" as they were just as busy as us unloading gear, unloading fish, organizing carts, pushing carts, and loading everyone in a civilized manner. Anyhow, here are the big fish winners from Ryan Christianson's Let's Talk Hook Up four-day adventure: Henry "Blue" Maine - 58.8 lb. Yellowfin tuna, Kiyoshi Nakagawa - 34.0 lb. Albacore, and Kevin Graff - 31.8 lb. Albacore. Congratulations to the gang and we issue a big thanks to Ryan for putting on a fine trip.

Later this morning, we departed on our annual Bob Vance/Joe Beck five-day extravaganza with a bunch of their good pals. We tried fishing the local-local zone but for fear of losing our title of being a "long-range" boat, we decided to motor on down to the hot area from the past couple of trips. Reports still sound good on the Yellowfin tuna and one boat saw a few schools of those bigger Bluefin and they managed to land some 60 lbers. We'll be giving it a go tomorrow morning at first light. Wish us luck and take care.

-Team Supreme-

Today's numbers were better. We had a lot more fish, just not a real good size to them. The albacore and bluefin are around 12 lbs. with a few bigger. The yellowfin are bigger, around 25-30 lbs. Weather is still good. Thanks for checking in. Tommy and crew