Even since the Colville Tribe opened their reservation to non-tribal members, I have been trying to get up to Omak Lake. I have been fishing this lake for over 20 years and it’s one of my top favorites. The Lahontan cutthroat that inhabit the lake are the abundant, and produced the state record, set by my old friend Dan Beardslee, at just over 18 pounds. I traveled to Omak with my fishing buddy Rollie Schmitten last week and we fished Friday evening and Saturday morning, largely due to the hot temperatures in the region. We caught fish that first evening, but most importantly, we found out where good numbers of fish were hanging out, and a couple of lures that they liked. We ran down to that spot at the east end of the lake the following morning and put out a large Flicker Shad and a Mirro Lure. We did change to one of my favorite plugs at one point, but we figured that we caught and released a fish every nine minutes. The average size was about 17 inches, and we caught one that was 26 inches and probably weighed 6 or 7 pounds. We had released 30 by 11:00 a.m. and headed home.
Omak Lake on the Colville Reservation offers terrific fishing for Lahontan cutthroat trout.