Cisco Run now On!

Photo Courtesy Guy Perkins

There is no longer any ice on Bear Lake. The Utah State Park Marina has frozen over and you cannot launch boats at the marina. Boat launching is possible at the First Point ramp and Cisco Beach ramps. The courtesy docks have been removed at First Point and Cisco Beach due to icing problems. There are a few inches of snow along the east side at this time.

The cisco have finally showed up along the shoreline at Cisco Beach. Today was the first day we have sighted any cisco, so the run should begin to improve over the next few days. The cisco fishermen who were at the beach at first light did not dip net any fish since the cisco came in along the shore around 8:30am. We did not see any cisco off the Utah State Park marina as of today. Anglers fishing from boats have been able to snag limits of cisco off the “rockpile” area in just over an hour. They are also catching some nice sized cutthroat and whitefish while fishing for cisco. Other anglers boat anglers will catch a limit of cisco over the rockpile and then move farther off shore into water that is 60-80 feet deep and use tube jigs tipped with cisco to target lake trout and cutthroat trout. Remember, the limit on cisco is 30 fish (daily and possession) so count your fish carefully. Also, remember that a person may not possess a multipoint hook with a weight permanently or rigidly attached directly to the shank (commonly called a snag hook) or a weight suspended below a multipoint hook unless the hook is on an unweighted dropper line that is at least three inches long.

Anglers (both boat and shore) have been doing excellent for cutthroat trout and a few lake trout off the east side near 2nd Point jigging and South Eden jigging and trolling. Try depths of 40-70 feet. Use 3/4 -1 ounce jigs tipped with cisco, sucker or carp meat when jigging. The trollers are using downriggers with small flatfish and rapala-style lures with rattles in them. You can fish from shore at the Utah State Park marina and anglers are picking up a few rainbow and cutthroat trout. Try powerbait or mealworms under a bobber or spoons and spinners casted from shore. There is currently about 8” of snow along the west side of the lake.