Spar Lake
The Spar lake campground is located in Northwest Montana in the Kootenai National Forest. At 3,300 feet in elevation this campground is surrounded by tall fir trees and offers campers and fisherman a quiet and relaxing outing. Spar is located 2.5 miles East of Troy. This majestic lake is a short 17 miles South on Lake Creek Road 384. The water level on this lake can be very different from one trip to another due to rumors of suspicious underground caverns… you should check the boat ramp before you launch to make sure you have a straight shot on solid ground.
This is “Grizzly Bear” country so be mindful while launching your boat. Make sure someone has a good eye on the Dash-Hound too!
Lets talk about the fishin!
Lake Trout, lots of em. They seem to be between 18-22 inches mostly. They make a nice fish fry back at the cabin so long as you don’t freeze the fishy smell in. Catch em and cook em! Set your down-riggers to varying depths between 50 and 100 feet. The lake is pretty deep but make sure you don’t drag your balls on the bottom. LOL! We have had a lot of success using wedding rings, ford fenders, and a worm. If you feel like going the extra mile throw a piece of white corn on the end of that bad boy.
This lake appears to be a directional lake. We have found that your chances for getting bites increase exponentially if you are going in a clockwise direction on the lake. The hot spot is clearly directly across from the boat launch but you might as well make big clockwise sweeps of the lake if you wanna catch some fish.
If you want to catch rainbows they appear to be closer to the surface. We have caught a few of them by long-lining or fish the Northeastern part of the lake at depths ranging from 10-30 feet. We still have some more learning to do before we can steer you in the right direction for bows on Spar.
Lake Koocanusa
Lake Koocanusa is a reservoir in Montana that stretches all the way to British Columbia. This 90 mile long lake was formed by the damming of the Kootenay River and the Libby Dam in 1975. The Libby Dam is 422 feet tall and just a short 16 miles upstream from Libby. Don’t let that fool you though, it’s a drive from the lil cabin in the woods to the boat ramp in Rexford. The drive should take you about an hour and a half if I remember correctly. This lake accounts for 13% of the water in the Columbia River System. This lake gets it’s name from the merging of the Kootenay River (Koo), Canada (can), and the USA (usa).
Lets talk about the fishin!
Cutthroats, big ones in the winter time. Lake Koocanusa is home to a variety of fish species. Sport fish include rainbow trout, west slope cutthroat, brook trout, kokanee salmon (blueback), burbot (ling), whitefish and Kamloops. Kokanee seem to be suffering a little as of lately but they are clearly dominating in numbers compared to other fish in the lake. You won’t think much of these little guys but you should hang on to a few of them for your fish fry back at the lil cabin. We still have more to learn on this lake before we can advise much more.
The rainbow trout limit for the lake is 5 daily (10 in possession), with only 1 over 22 inches; the limit for brook trout is 20; and the limit for cutthroat trout is 3. The limit on Kokanee is 35 daily, 70 in possession. The limit on burbot (ling) is 5 daily and 5 in possession (the lake is closed to burbot (ling) fishing from January 15-February 28th).