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How To Catch Kokanee
Kokanee Fishing Techniques
Fishing for Kokanee Salmon has never been more popular. Every week thousands of fishermen target thishighly prized fish in the Western lakes and reservoirs. The techniques for catching kokanee have also beenrefined as more guides and professionals seek them and as big money kokanee derbies gain in popularity.These chapters present an accumulation of material from three of the top kokanee fishermen in NorthAmerica.
Phillip Johnson
Author, kokanee researcher and founder of Kokanee Power, a non profit kokaneerestoration organization.
Guide and manufacturer of kokanee lures and attractors.
Guide and top winner of kokanee derbies. We will address kokanee techniques in severalsections.
1. Fundamentals
Most kokanee are taken on small lures or bugs trolled either by themselves or behind a kokanee dodger.Kokanee are attackers. Some large solitary fish are very territorial. They will attack strange intruders aslong as they believe they have the advantage. If kokanee feel they are outnumbered they will stay awayfrom your lures. In some bodies of water you will find kokanee tightly schooled. In others they will befound almost one by one.
Kokanee are unlike any other fish. They are primarily plankton feeders, andalso feed on tiny mysis shrimp. Since they do not readily feed on minnows, lures or standard bait,kokanee must be targeted specifically. Larger kokanee are very territorial. Kokanee are attackers. Whattriggers this attack seems to be the right style of lure in the right color for the moment. Corn and scentseem to be the final key to triggering an attack.The material presented here will give you some proven guidelines to follow for taking kokanee. However,kokanee can be very unpredictable. What works one day may not work the next. If you’re marking fishand not catching them don't be afraid to experiment. Good Luck!
2. Downriggers, Rods, Reels and Fish finders
Rods and ReelsThis is a personal preference. Most fishermen choose rods in the 7 to 7 1/2 foot range, either light actionfiberglass or graphite with a sensitive tip tapering to a more powerful butt. Level-wind reels are preferred.1
Buy the ones with the best drags you can find. The Kokanee will not wear your drags out. Lowering your lures down the downrigger will. A worn drag soon gets herky-jerky. This will pull your line out of the sensitive downrigger release clip you'll need to catch kokanee. A bad drag willdrive you crazy, and cost you lots of fishing time. Spinning reels are not popular with the experts. In thehands of an inexperienced angler a spinning reel can cause excessive line twist while fighting a fish andcan cost you fish. Since no casting is involved in this fishery a level-wind reel is quickly mastered by all.Most kokanee fishermen will use line in eight to ten pound test both for main line and leader. Greencolored line is preferred. On rare occasions (in extremely clear lakes) the experts will go down to six- andeven four-pound leaders, but only if absolutely necessary. Be careful of the new "no stretch" lines. Theycan create too much pull on a kokanee's soft mouth.Electronic Fish FindersThis is an absolute must for serious lake trolling, and especially so for chasing kokanee. This may be painful to hear, but many fish finder models do not work well for kokanee. What you need in a fish finder for kokanee is lots of power and pixels. The power is necessary for your fish finder to shoot a wide cone.The wider the cone, the more area under your boat you can read. If you purchase an inexpensive fishfinder ($150 to $300 range) they usually come with an 18 degree cone. This is fine for shallow water bassfishing. But when you set your fish finder to read between 20 to 100 feet of water an 18 degree cone at 20feet will only read a 6.36 foot circle, at 40 feet a 12 foot circle and a 100ft a 32 foot circle. Wider conesare preferred so that you can see kokanee that may only be twenty to thirty feet down. Furuno hasavailable a 48.6 degree cone. This powerful cone reads a circle 17 feet wide at 20 feet, 34.5 feet wide at40 feet, and 86 feet wide at 100 feet. It is critical to know if you are passing over kokanee, and if they arenot biting your lures. The more area you can see under your boat will enable you to make the decisions onwhat to use and what to change. You must have power and pixels to get the electronic information youneed. The detailed pixels will allow you to distinguish kokanee blips from king salmon and rainbows.Fish finders cannot read through air. Most fish have air bladders. The locator beam put out by your fishfinder passes through water but cannot pass through air. Fish finders read the air bladder of a fish, and theimage is bounced back to you. For their size kokanee have very large, cylindrical air bladders that run theentire length of their body cavity. The air bladder on a king salmon is long and thin because it is partiallyatrophied or collapsed. It is a longer broken up image on your fish finder. Rainbows have larger bladders but a completely different shape than a king or kokanee. A better fish finder can accurately read andconsistently distinguish between the electronic image of a kokanee, king or rainbow. Once you get used toit you can selectively target kokanee and not waste your time with other species.
Downriggers
Downriggers are an absolute must for successful kokanee fishing. On light tackle kokanee are spectacular fighters. To enjoy this fight downriggers are a must. You can purchase dependable hand crank downriggers from as little as $80 dollars to the fancier electric models ranging from $300 to $800 dollars.
There is very little pleasure trolling for kokanee with a tuna rod, lead, a three footlong tandem flasher blade combination and a lure tipped with bait. With this type of heavy tackle all2
enjoyment of fighting a fish is lost. In fact the rod required to haul all this junk around is so stout thatmost often the angler does not observe the initial strike and trolls a hooked fish around for hours.Eventually they reel up a drowned, dead fish. With a downrigger, not only are you placing your baitedlure at the precise depth where you are marking fish but upon a strike the downrigger release clip popsyour line free allowing you to freely fight your fish on light tackle. Since you are trolling extremely slowfor kokanee a four, six or eight pound trolling ball is all you will need. Be sure to use enough weight tomake your downrigger cable run straight up and down while trolling. If your cable is running back at anykind of angle you will not be trolling the depth you are reading. Finned or rudder type downrigger ballsare popular. Be sure your weight is vinyl or powder coated. Bare lead should be avoided because it canreact electrically with your downrigger wire and spook fish. Black downrigger weights are the mostcommon but some fishermen feel they get more strikes using with red colored weights. The release usedon your downrigger is also important. Kokanee have soft fleshy mouths and hit very light. Most typicaldownrigger releases have too much tension for kokanee. You need a release that can be consistently beadjusted as light as 1/2 lb of release tension.Electricity on Your Downrigger WireFlowing from your boat down your downrigger cable is an invisible electrical current. If the voltage is justright it will attract kokanee to your lures. If it is too high or toolow you will repel kokanee. Kokanee are extremely sensitive to these electric charges and most expertsnow use a black box to regulate the charge on the downrigger wire. Every serious kokanee fishermanshould measure the amount of electrical charge his boat puts out through the downrigger cables. To dothis you will need a volt meter capable of reading from zero to one volt. With your boat in the water andthe downrigger lowered a few feet into the water, clip the meter's positive lead to your downrigger cableand the negative lead to your battery or a ground point on the boat. If you measure over 7/10ths of a voltor below 4/10ths positive you are repelling fish. The ideal voltage for kokanee is about .65 volts althoughsome fishermen will run a little lower (.60) and get good results. For a complete discussion on how to testyour boat and correct for voltage that is too high or too low go to theBlack Box sectionon this websiteand click on Chapter 3 describing how to test your boat.Another important step is to insulate your downrigger ball from your downrigger cable. This should bedone in addition to vinyl coating your lead. Lead downrigger weights can frequently contain tin or other metals that can cause an electrical reaction with your downrigger wire. The result is a repellant electricalcharge right where you don't want it. Insulating the ball from your wire with nylon snaps (Scotty #1009)or a piece of heavy monofilament will help see that you have a neutral electrical zone around your ball.
3. Lures and Attractors
There are hundreds of kokanee lures on the market. Some of them are fished by themselves and a lot of them are fished behind a dodger or multi bladed attractors. Some of the most popular lures are:3
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