I was fishing a lake in Maple Valley (Sometimes I leave Covington but not often and not far) and my buddy caught a perch that must've weighed close to a pound. It was the biggest perch I've ever seen until he caught another one and then I caught one, all of them around a pound each. Am I wrong or is that pretty big for a perch? Are they spaning right now maybe? My first fish of '08 a big perch....gonna be a good year, maybe when I hit the Cedar I'll catch an amazing sucker!
Same happened to me maybe a week and a half ago. Not as big as yours but I wasn't hitting squat on a floater so got out the type V to scrape the lower cover. Perch everywhere. After 10 or 12 I decided the trout were a lost cause and moved on. A pound is definitely big for a perch but I know they can get that size. I've seen bluegill and smallies get that size as well, just not very often. Perch would be fun if they didn't give up so fast.
Glad someone found some perch. Went to my local lake yesterday to fish for some perch, bass and crappie Amie and I have caught there in past years. Not a strike and never saw a one. Amie did catch 1 nice 12" rainbow back in the heavy weeds. In the past I have caught 30 plus pan fish every summer day out there. I even was there as the sun went down and still never saw a fish even dimple the surface. Kind of wondered to myself on if the fish died off this past winter do to the large amount of decaying vegetation or if its just the low front that was coming in. Also we never saw the eagles that have lived and fished the lake for years which is very strange. Still it was a pretty evening out on the lake but it looks like I may have to drive further to fish the rest of this summer. No more driving down the hill to wet a line.
Pat, that's funny you mention an Eagle because there was one perched on a tree right above us and when we would toss the perch back in the water he would dive down and try to get them. They sunk to fast for the big guy though.
Crap! A couple of weeks ago, I caught one that must have been well in the 3 lb zone. Maybe more? At first, I thought it was a big brown--up until I got it to the surface. Yeah, I'd say the lowland lakes are suffering from perch crowding the formerly trouty zones. Perhaps the current cold nights and cool days might have put the trout back in their older haunts. Then again, I'd hate to waste the gas to find out the hard way. --Dave E.
About 5 or 6 years ago, I decided to see what all the fuss about pay-to-play lakes was about, so I booked a day at Isaak Ranch (won't make that mistake again). I only caught 2 rainbows all day and I couldn't keep the giant perch off. These things were all deep-bodied and averaged around 3 pounds. It would have been an easy place to rewrite the IGFA record book for perch on every tippet class had I not been there to target big 'bows and browns.
