Lake Granby, just outside the town of Granby in Colorado’s mountains, has long been one of my favorite fishing destinations. Granby provides year-round fishing opportunities, but no season draws me up there more than ice fishing. Having the largest biomass of lake trout in Colorado, a good population of brown trout and an abundance of rainbow trout in the 14- to 16-inch range, Granby provides good action for ice anglers of all skill and experience levels.
Bernie Keefe, a top guide at Granby, joined me on my radio show to update the current fishing conditions on not only Lake Granby, but other lakes in Jackson County. There is some fantastic fishing action going on in the area.
Granby is one of the largest lakes in Colorado. Because of the volume of water it takes a fair amount of cold weather to cool the lake and form ice. This has been an unusual winter with intermittent cold and warm spells and now significant snow. The lake capped over a couple weeks ago but warm winds that followed played havoc with ice conditions.
Since then there has been a mix of fairly good ice with a number of open water areas. The recent snow complicated things even more. The snow covering the frozen areas can insulate the ice from further freezing. The weight of the snow can also form a slush layer under the snow and on top of the ice, which can make moving around the lake difficult. The snow makes it difficult to identify marginal ice conditions.
The fishing on Lake Granby is very good, but extreme caution is advised as you venture out on the ice. Never assume there is good ice. Check as you go.
Most of the surrounding lakes in the area seem to have good ice because they are smaller in size.
Keefe did a rundown on fishing in the area: Willow Creek is fishing well for rainbows shallow and some Kokanee in deeper water. Wolford Mountain Reservoir is good for rainbows. Green Mountain Reservoir is fishing well for lake trout. They are sight fishing for rainbows near the shore in crystal clear Grand Lake and catching trout deeper. Williams Fork is fishing extremely well for rainbows with a number of large lake trout up to 40 inches showing up.
As for Lake Granby, the ice should get better as winter progresses but please use extreme caution. Granby not only has a phenomenal population of rainbow and brown trout shallow, but as I stated earlier, the largest biomass of lake trout in the state. There are a number of fish in the 18- to 20-inch range. Once you find them it is not uncommon to catch 20 or 30 in an outing. This size lake trout is prolific and I encourage you to harvest a few. The exciting thing at Lake Granby, at this time, is that the big lake trout are in the same areas as the smaller ones which means a 20-pound fish, or bigger, is possible at any time. A friend of Keefe’s recently caught six fish between 30 and 40 inches over a short period of time.
Continue reading – http://www.denverpost.com/2017/01/11/wickstrom-lake-granby-fishing/
By Terry Wickstrom –Outdoor writer and radio host, Terry Wickstrom, is a regular contributor to The Denver Post. Join Terry every Saturday morning at 8 a.m. on FM 104.3 The Fan for all your outdoor information and you can also follow him on Facebook at “Terry Wickstrom Outdoors.”