Blue Mesa Ice Fishing Report-

Here you can find current ice fishing reports and ice conditions for Blue Mesa reservoir near Gunnison, Crested Butte, and Montrose Colorado.  You can also find past Blue Mesa ice fishing reports by choosing the year you would like on the navigation bar to the left.   These Blue Mesa ice fishing reports typically cover ice conditions, fishing activity, weather, and areas to be careful of.  These Colorado fishing reports are compiled first hand by our fishing experiences and trips on Blue Mesa.  We update these reports every time we go out or hear new, relevant information from reliable sources.  Blue Mesa typically gets its first safe ice around the Lake City bridge in early December.  It then takes until mid to late January for the safe ice to reach all the way to the dam.  We try to keep these fishing reports updated, but get extremely busy with ice fishing trips during the winter. For more uo-to-date, sometimes live, on the water Blue Mesa ice fishing reports and pictures, please follow us on Facebook and Twitter!

March 19, 2013 Blue Mesa Ice Fishing Report: Save the best fishing for last ice!

As the days are getting warmer, the fishing is on fire!  We still have lots of safe ice across the lake with 12-30″ although the shorelines are getting soft along rip rap or rocks.  There is also some open water growing daily by Red Creek Island.  The kokanee salmon and trout bite has been unbelievable with 60-100 fish being landed in a 3-4 hour span!  You can find kokanee, rainbow trout, brown trout, and even some perch hanging out along rocky shorelines in 15-50 feet of water.  The trick is to figure out what color and action the fish want that day.  Lately the Pk Flutterfish has been a hot producer as well as kastmasters, crippled herring, cabelas living image spoons and smaller ice jigs.  The Mackinaw lake trout fishing has been good as well with some nice fish being caught and released across the lake!  The standard tube jig and sucker meat has been producing.  Take advantage of these hot bites!

February 27, 2013 Blue Mesa Ice Fishing Report: Safe ice across the lake and the action has been GOOD!

My apologies for not doing a better job keeping this updated!  The Sport Fish Colorado team has been on the ice almost every day and as a result, the fishing reports have suffered.  Since I have one of those smart phones, it is far easier for me to update pictures and reports to our facebook page, so please check it out (from the link above) and feel free to ask questions or for more reports on this page!  Now for the fishing….

Rainbow/Brown Trout-  The trout fishing has been truly phenominal this winter with 25-50 fish days being fairly common!  The rainbow and brown trout have been heavily concentrated on rocky shorelines in 10-40′ of water.  Elk Creek marina and The Narrows have been a great spot to get into action!  Small tube jigs, smaller Pk spoons, kastmasters, trout magnets, and maribou jigs have all been producing lots of fish!

Kokanee Salmon-  Kokanee Salmon are a totally different animal through the ice as far as behavior goes, but the fishing for them this winter has been very good!  A lot of trout fishermen have been “accidentally” catching them in their trout spots.  There are a lot of schools wandering the open basins of the lake, but don’t be fooled!  Kokanee salmon tend to come in and feed in the shallows and a lot of times you can find these fish in 10-20 feet of water!  The pink and white Pk Flutter Fish has by far caught more kokanee than any other lure for us this winter and I’m talking LIMITS of kokanee!  Mealworms have outperformed corn and wax worms as the bait to tip your spoon or jig with.   

Lake Trout-  The lake trout bite has been good overall for numbers of fish, while the trophy bite has been a bit tougher due to a late spawn.  We are finding fish in 20-120′ of water depending on the structure and covering water is very important because these fish have been moving a lot!  Tube jigs, in the 3-5″ range, are the go to bait, tipped with the freshest sucker meat you can find!  Pk flutter fish and panic spoons have also been working when the fish are more aggressive.

Perch- The elusive Blue Mesa perch has been showing up occasionally along rocky shorelines in 10-40 feet of water with one angler reporting that he had caught well over a hundred one week!  The Yellow Perch in Blue Mesa tend to move a lot since they have become a primary food source for the lake trout, brown trout, and even rainbow trout!

January 30, 2013 Blue Mesa Ice Fishing Report: Safe ice across the lake and the action has been GOOD!

Blue Mesa has 12-30″ across the lake with the west end being closer to 12″ and the east end around the 30″ mark.  Fishing for rainbow trout and brown trout has been excellent this year with plenty of 30-50 fish days!  We have been hearing some good reports of Kokanee Salmon being caught at Elk Creek Marina and in the Narrows, but have not been out to check it out!  The kokanee have been running 10-50′ deep with most fish coming in the 15-30′ range.  The lake trout bite has been good for smaller fish and a little tough for the bigger fish.  As usual, persistence and being in the right place at the right time is KEY!  Check out our Colorado trophy lake trout video and let us know if you like it!! 

January 07, 2013 Blue Mesa Ice Fishing Report: The lake has capped!

Blue Mesa Reservoir has completely capped with the exception of a little bit of open water at Middle Bridge.  Iola has 12″, Elk Creek has 10″, Cebolla varies with 3-10″, and Sapinero just capped.  The trout fishing has been excellent with lots of browns and rainbows caught in 5-30 feet of water.  The Kokanee Salmon bite has also been good with most of our fish coming between 15-40 feet of water.  Lake Trout are scattered across the depths with the bigger concentrations being found in 50-80 feet of water.

December 12, 2012 Blue Mesa Ice Fishing Report:Ice in Iola! 

Just got back from the lake and there is 3-4 inches of ice from the inlet to a little West Stevens Creek. From this point to about a half mile west of Sometimes Island has a layer of skim ice.  The rest of the lake is still open, but our nights have been getting into the negatives all week so more ice is in the near future!