August 4, 2015
Fishing Time: 7:45 a.m. – 1:30 p.m.
Rating: 6
Weather Conditions: Sunny with clear skies
Bait: Drop Shot with Strike King Green Pumpkin Dream Shot and Quick Drop 1/4 ounce weight; Strike King Green Gizzard Shad KVD 1.5 Flatside
Rod: Megabass Orochi XX Drop Shot Rod; Abu Garcia Medium Veritas 2.0 Winch Crankbait Rod
Reel: Shimano Sustain; Shimano Curado I
Line: 7-pound Sunline Super Sniper FC; 12-pound Yo-Zuri Hybrid
Total Bass Caught: 10
Final Weigh in Weight: 5.50 pounds
After a slow outing at the Potholes, I was anxious to get back to Lake Sammamish and put some bass in the boat, so I got up nice and early to give it a try. I hadn’t been near the sunken forest in a while, so I decided to start by fishing the docks over in that area. I cast my drop shot around all of the docks, but was unable to get a bite, so I decided to change it up and target some largemouth. Since largemouth like to hang out near vegetation, I headed down to fish the lilies and grass around the state park. The water was extremely clear, which allowed me to spot a steep drop off from a grassy flat. I ran my crankbait down this drop off and instantly my lure was hammered by a largemouth. I set the hook and landed a 0.5 pound largemouth. I figured that there would be a few more bass hanging out at the drop off, so I cast back over to it a few more times. On my third cast, I hooked into another 0.5 pounder. I tried it a few more times without any luck before moving on to fish a sunken log. I cast my crankbait so that it ran parallel to the log and was able to land yet another 0.5 pound largemouth. After that it got really shallow, so I motored down a ways to fish the lilies. I cast my crankbait to the edge of the lilies and then slowly retrieved my lure. By doing this, I was able to land 4 more 0.5 pounders and one 0.75 pounder. After having so much success with the lilies, I went and located another patch of them to the right of the state park. I fished these for a while, but didn’t have much success until I came to the end of the weed-line. I cast just to the right of the lilies and as soon as my lure hit the water, a bass jumped up and grabbed it. I set the hook and was able to land a decent 0.75 pound largemouth. I was impressed by how aggressive that largemouth was, so I cast right back to the same spot and hooked into another bass. This one was smaller and only tipped the scales at 0.5 pounds. At this point, I was extremely excited because I have been searching Lake Sammamish for largemouth bass for the longest time and today I was able to land 10 of them within an hour. This gives me hope that the population is returning to the lake. Unfortunately, that was the last patch of lilies on the south end, so I decided to go back to my trusty drop shot and try and target some smallmouth. I worked the whole right side of the lake, trying everything from my favorite double decker to the v-shaped dock, but I wasn’t even able to manage a nibble from the smallmouth. I tried for about an hour and a half before I decided to call it quits and head in.