Cascade

[Dwayneb]

Hello from Utah,

I'm sure this has been asked before, but I thought I would try to get some first hand information.  I am a retired military vet living in Utah and would like to come up to Cascade for some perch fishing.  I grew up in Michigan fishing the Great Lakes for perch with my dad.   Unfortunately, over the past 20+ yrs my military travels have kept me from enjoying good consistent perch fishing.  I'm settled in northern Utah and would appreciate anyone who is willing to share knowledge to improve my chances on finding some of the better perch Cascade has to offer.  Given the fact it will be around 800 miles roundtrip, it would be nice to have some success....any help would be appreciated...

thanks
Dwayne

[k2muskie]

First of all Dwayneb thank you for your service...we too are retired military in northern Utah.  If you can pick up a fish and go map you can order on line.  This map will give you lake info and also the bottom contour showing breaks, flats, and other things like where rivers meet...great map and that's how we got our start fishing Cascade.  Fishing these areas will produce for you...again breaks, flats etc fishing right on the breakline or a little off has worked for us.  Lures we used were Perch Pounders, Lindy Darters, VMC, Sonic Bait Fish, Rapala Rip'n Raps tipped the lures with a snippet of crawler or maggot or Perch Eye.  Having a flasher is also nice as it will allow you to see if there's activity below. 

Also stop in town at Tackle Toms he is very friendly and always has latest info.  Right now from my friends who fished Cascade this past Saturday conditions are a bit to be desired...lots of snow creating a slush monster 10-12"...makes getting around a bit interesting even for sleds...Wish you all the best we have another trip planned in a couple weeks and hoping the conditions improve a bit...

[IDFisher]

I would also add to get away from the main access points.  These places have been fished to death and if you catch anything there they will be tiny and you will have wasted your trip.  There are lots of places that dont get fished so bring a snowmobile or some snowshoes and go where few people have gone and you should do well.  15 - 20 feet of water has been the ticket for me.  Good luck.

[SteveM]

I don't mind sharing what I learned with a fellow vet.  I fished Cascade for the first time this past weekend with my son.  I have fished perch in Montana all my life before moving here.  Tom at Tackle Tom's was great in getting me going in the right direction for the lake. He has a great selection of lures, jigs, and gear in stock.  We caught 10 in about 5 hours, all between 11-3/4" and 14", with most right at or just under 14".  We fished 5 poles each.  The bite was really light and I think we missed more than we caught.  We caught 6 on dead sticks and 4 jigging, but we started jigging later in the day.  We did best using a fire tiger waxy jig from Contraband baits tipped with maggots.  We suspended them right off the bottom and fished them under slip bobbers so we could see the bite.  Anything that looks like perch fry should do ok.  We tried a few different colors and nothing at all on anything that didn't have perch colors.  We used Chubby Darters in perch colors jigging right off the bottom.  They seem to come through in schools, which was different than the steady action I am used to perch fishing, so when you catch one, watch your other poles.  We parked past Poison Creek on West Mountain Road where the road takes a 90 Degree turn and walked out from there towards Sugarloaf.  We were about 400 m out from shore in 20' of water.  LOTS of slush on top of the ice, about 15".  5-6" of ice under that.  Snowshoes saved us.  If we were careful we were able to stay on top of the slush for most of the day.  Nothing to anchor our pop-up ice shelter to, so we were only able to use it when the wind died down.   Hope this helps. 

[Dwayneb]

I appreciate the info Steve, sounds like you had a decent trip...

[Dwayneb]

First of all Dwayneb thank you for your service...we too are retired military in northern Utah.  If you can pick up a fish and go map you can order on line.  This map will give you lake info and also the bottom contour showing breaks, flats, and other things like where rivers meet...great map and that's how we got our start fishing Cascade.  Fishing these areas will produce for you...again breaks, flats etc fishing right on the breakline or a little off has worked for us.  Lures we used were Perch Pounders, Lindy Darters, VMC, Sonic Bait Fish, Rapala Rip'n Raps tipped the lures with a snippet of crawler or maggot or Perch Eye.  Having a flasher is also nice as it will allow you to see if there's activity below. 

Also stop in town at Tackle Toms he is very friendly and always has latest info.  Right now from my friends who fished Cascade this past Saturday conditions are a bit to be desired...lots of snow creating a slush monster 10-12"...makes getting around a bit interesting even for sleds...Wish you all the best we have another trip planned in a couple weeks and hoping the conditions improve a bit...

K2,

I watched your video, excellent job by the way...Congratulations on being retired and thanks for your service.  I hope to make it up there within the next few weeks, I do have a snowmobile so that may help a bit but wow that's a lot of slush...

[Hardwater hunter]

Dwayneb. Look up tackle Toms Facebook  page. He just posted some promising  new ice conditions.
And thank you along with all active  and retired service men and women that are on this site.