Kokanee Salmon Thrive As Lake McClure’s Newest Fishery   By: Dan Bacher August 13, 2007 More Articles by Dan

Lake McClure has provided anglers with top-notch king salmon, rainbow trout, black bass, crappie and catfish action for decades. This year, for the first time, anglers can add hard-fighting kokanee salmon to the list of gamefish that they can battle in this southern Mother Lode reservoir, located on the Merced River 27 miles northeast of Merced.

The California Department of Fish and Game’s San Joaquin River Fish Hatchery stocked the lake with plants of 20,125 kokanee in the spring of 2005. The agency followed up the initial plants with 3,930 kokanee in 2006 and another 12,500 kokanee this year, according to Greg Paape, hatchery manager.

“We are now planning to stock McClure every year with kokanee,” said Paape. “McClure has deep, cool water where the kokanee are able to thrive throughout the hot summers.”

The Department has planted the kokanee in different lakes in the San Joaquin Valley foothills to see how they do, noted Paape. The kokanee didn’t do well in Pine Flat or Isabella lakes because the water becomes too warm during the summer. However, the kokanee at McClure, after being planted only two years ago, are providing an exciting new fishery, as evidenced by the recent fishing success of anglers like Bruce Hamby of Sierra Sportfishing.

“We’re catching limits of fat kokanee by 8:30 or 9:00 am most days,” said Hamby right before the Fish Sniffer went to press last issue. “We’ve boated four fish weighing 2 pounds so far this season.”

After hearing of the superb kokanee fishing at McClure, I was eager to give this lake a try, so Hamby and I set up a trip on Friday, June 13. I hadn’t been to the lake since the spring of 2002 when James Pagani and Sparklefish Lures and I caught easy limits of rainbow trout.

We got an early start on the lake, with Hamby launching his boat at Barrett Cove at 5 am. Fishing with us was Ron Wilson, fellow outdoor writer and former columnist for the Modesto Bee who is now retired, concentrating most of his time fishing and hunting.

“We caught some kokanee while rolling shad for king salmon last year,” explained Hamby. “Then this year the kokanee bite exploded, even though they planted only 20,000 fish in 2005.”

Hamby began putting out his Loomis rods and lowered his rigs, Uncle Larry’s spinners and his homemade hoochies behind Vance’s Dodgers, near the dam at 50 to 60 feet deep. Within five minutes, the first rod was bouncing with the bite of a kokanee. I grabbed the rod, popped the line off the downrigger and battled a fat, hot kokanee to the boat.

Hamby netted the fish, a fat, brawling kokanee around 15 inches long. For the next couple of hours, Ron and I had a great time hooking these silvery torpedoes.

Wilson hooked one particularly hot kokanee that went berserk, running towards the boat and making a series of leaps before it spit the hook. “You put too much muscle on that fish,” said Hamby. “Take your time. These fish are hot!”

I also lost a couple of hefty kokanee, in addition to catching my limit. “Let them run – these fish have real soft mouths,” he coached after I lost one “monster” sockeye. “I have the drag set just right for fighting them.”

We stayed on the water an extra hour trolling silver/blue Excel lures and Vance’s Sockeye Slammers in the hopes of catching a king salmon or rainbow to fill out our limits. However, the last three fish we landed, like the previous 12, were kokanee and we were off the water by 10:30 a.m. with full limits of fat fish.

Although most of the kokanee hit from 60 to 80 deep, one grabbed the hoochie at 110 feet! We caught our fish in the A frame house, McClure point, spillway and Temperance Bay areas.

Hamby is a strong believer in using different types of scent at different times of day. “Early morning we're starting out with Pro- Cure fresh water shrimp, and later switching to Pro- cure Carp spit and Anis combo scents,” he tipped.

I’ve always had exceptional time fishing with Hamby, whether it’s for striped bass at New Hogan, king salmon at Don Pedro, or rainbow trout at Camanche. His knowledge of the Mother Lode lakes, combined with his attention to detail such as using different scents, has always made a trip with him a real learning experience.

Although Hamby is excited about the potential for McClure’s kokanee fishery, he is concerned about the relatively tough fishing for kings and rainbows that he has experienced so far this summer at McClure. Hamby averaged 10 kings averaging 4-1/2 pounds each during his trolling adventures last August, September and October. Anglers also bagged rainbows in the 4 to 4-1-/2 pound class.

This year Hamby and his clients have caught some kings and rainbows while kokanee fishing, but his largest king to date this year went only 2-1/2 pounds. Nor is he seeing the big numbers of kings that anglers saw last summer and fall. Hopefully, the king salmon fishing will pick up this August like it did last year.

The DFG stocks the lake every year with both king salmon and rainbow trout. The Department planted McClure with 36,464 kings and 17,300 pounds of catchable rainbows in 2006.

If you want to catch large numbers of spotted and largemouth bass, McClure is hard to beat. A slot limit is in place like at Lake Oroville. All bass ranging from 12 to 15 inches long must be released, while fish under 12 inches and over 15 inches may be kept.

“My son and I caught and released 26 bass in 2 hours on a recent trip,” said Wilson, who regularly fishes the lake for its abundant bass. “Sixty percent were largemouth, while rest were spotted bass. We caught the fish from the bank to 40 feet deep with Senkos and Keeper worms in crawdad patterns.”

Two days earlier Ron and his son, Ron Jr. caught and released a 7 lb. largemouth, as well as fish in the 2 to 4 pound class and lots of small bass. The lake also has a decent population of smallmouth bass.

Crawdad and shad patterned Senkos, Keeper Worms, jigs and other baits consistently produce the best bass action on the reservoir. Wilson likes to use 082 crawdad pattern and a 101 B shad pattern Keeper Worms for his bass.

Other species found in McClure’s rich waters include bluegill, crappie, channel catfish and threadfin shad, the lake’s main forage fish. Wild brown trout are also found on McClure and in the Merced River upstream from the lake. For more information on guided salmon and trout trips, call Bruce Hamby at Sierra Sportfishing,  209-599-2023.  

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