Empire Lakes?

[gmcnair]

How have you been doing on the trout?

They seem to school in certain areas. Was there a few days ago and seemed like the fish were at the north end of the big lake. Went to the west parking lot and a fellow was doing well casting spinners.

 

[jawjacker]

Big Bass Story

Big Bass Story

Empire Lakes has definitely gone down quite a bit since I used to fish there as a kid. It used to be so full of bass, blue gill, and yellow perch you would have no problem catching them all day long. About 10 or 15 years ago odf&w killed off all the weeds in certain area's to accommodate trout fisherman and I noticed a rapid decline immediately after that. The biggest bass from the lake's that I have seen weighed on a scale with my own eyes was 7 & a half pounds. Unfortunately it was removed along with several other large specimens that were obtained by illegal means. Their are still some big bass here and there but they are very tricky to catch & spook extremely easy. A few years after they poisoned the aquatic vegetation I caught a really nice bass back by the college on an oxblood fat ika rigged backwards on a 4/0 ewg. I was all by my self so I woke up this drunk bum that was passed out about 30 yards from were I caught the fish and had him take a few pic's of me on a disposable camera. He was swaying back and forth and kept saying that's a really nice fish so I just swayed with him and hoped for the best. I gave him a couple singles I had in my wallet for his next round and I was on my way. I wound up getting a decent picture of the fish but I had to crop the photo cuz I was at the edge of the frame. Lots of fun and memorable things happened at those lakes over the years. Good luck to anybody that attempts to catch a bass out of there.

 

[zugbug33]

Empire lake

Empire lake

Hi my name is jacob i live in reedsport . anyways yes you can eat the fish and you can fish in there i fish with my fly rod and i have caught some pigs outta there .

 

[thefishfinder]

jawjacker, that looks very similar to the fish i caught there about 4 years ago. ive caught and released some monsters in that lake growing up. i havent fished it for bass in the last year or so.....however ill be out there very soon.

 

[Ahab]

Empire Lakes were stocked last Friday, April 26th. 3,000 fish into Lower, and 3,000 into Middle. The Middle stocking went into some net pens for a kids fishing event over the weekend, and then the fish that were left over after the event were released from the net pens into the lake. Probably estimated at a couple thousand.