What does a Kokanee salmon look like?

Asked by: Vanessa Briggs

“Kokanee have blue backs and silver sides and unlike other salmon and trout, except chum salmon, sockeye and kokanee lack distinct dark spots on their backs and tail fins. In addition, when compared to other trout, they have finer scales, larger eyes, and deeply forked tail”.

Can you eat kokanee?

Kokanee is best eaten just before the spawning stage. Their flesh is the dazzling bright orange that many anglers long for, and it is richer in flavor than trout but softer than other salmon. If the fish is longer than 12 inches, you can fillet it. You can also butterfly it or gut-and-grill it.

Are sockeye the same as kokanee?

Kokanee are the land-locked form of sockeye salmon. Because they never migrate out to the ocean to feed, kokanee are often much smaller than sockeye. However, other than their size, kokanee have very similar identifying characteristics as sockeye.

How can you tell the difference between a rainbow trout and a kokanee?

Anal fin: Rainbow trout have a triangle shape, where the tip of the leading fin ray extends back to the rear insertion of the fin when folded down. Kokanee have rectangular shape, more rays (13 or more), and the leading fin ray tip is not close to the rear end of the fin.

How can you tell a kokanee?

Yeah well you see the kokanee is quite a bit thicker is quite deep in the militaries that are really a bit a bigger eye for the size of the fish. And he's very few hardly any spots. Maybe sometimes

Can you shore fish for kokanee?

The result is that throughout most of the year, they stay in open water, and often quite deep. The unfortunate upshot of that is that for shore anglers, opportunities to catch kokanee salmon are hard to come by. Most anglers pursue these fish by trolling the open waters of California’s deep, cool reservoirs.

How big do kokanee get?

Identification, life cycle, and development. While size range of kokanee is often lake-specific and depends on many factors, in typical populations the kokanee grows to an average size of 23–30 centimetres (9–12 in) with an average weight of 0.45 kilograms (1 lb).

How can you tell kokanee from sockeye?

There are some visible differences between the kokanee and the sockeye:

1. Kokanee are smaller than sockeye, likely due to less food supply in freshwater lakes. …
2. Sockeye are stronger swimmers- a trait that comes in handy, given their astonishing travels upstream from the ocean to far-inland riverbeds.

What do kokanee fish look like?

Kokanee are bright silvery fish with a dark blue back for most of their life cycles. As the spawning season approaches, they turn from silver to orange to deep red, and the male develops the characteristic hook-jaw and green head common to the sockeye salmon.

What is the best bait for kokanee salmon?

Popular Kokanee baits are Pink Maggots (real or synthetic), dyed-cured shrimp and dyed-cured White Shoepeg Corn. Be sure not to put too much bait on the hook as it will take away from the lure’s action. Once piece of corn or 2 small maggots on each hook is adequate.

Is kokanee a trout or salmon?

Kokanee are land-locked sockeye salmon. This means that they do not travel to the ocean and return inland to spawn, instead they complete their entire life cycle in Lake Coeur d’Alene. Their life cycle is 4 years long.

Are coho and kokanee the same?

While landlocked coho and Chinook are the offspring of ocean-run parents, kokanee are a landlocked subspecies of ocean-going sockeye (or “red”) salmon.

Do rainbow trout eat kokanee?

Kokanee are also prey for other predator fish such as Rainbow Trout and Char. On average a mature large Rainbow Trout or Bull Trout will eat 2 adult Kokanee per day! So it’s vital that whatever gear you present while fishing for Kokanee you do not mimic a threat similar to these predator fish.

What time of year is best for kokanee fishing?

Late Spring. In May and June, after rising shallow-water temperatures have forced kokanee to return to the deeper portions of a lake, you can catch them using gang trolls and dodgers trailing almost any kind of small lure (like spoons, flies, and hoochies). This is the time most anglers experience the greatest success.

What is the best time to fish for kokanee?

The best time of day to catch kokanee for most of the year is the early morning and late afternoon. Kokanee, like trout, prefer to feed during reduced light time windows. That said, kokanee will feed all day long and will prefer water temperatures in the 44° to 59° degrees, with 54° degrees being ideal.

What time of year does kokanee?

Spawning begins in August and usually runs into early February but kokanee have been found spawning as late as April. Again genetic factors and environmental factors like temperature both play a role in this timing.

Where is the best kokanee fishing?

Flaming Gorge Reservoir, Utah and Wyoming: The Holy Land… errr I mean Holy Water of Kokanee anglers. No other body of water is renowned for its big Kokanee than this giant desert reservoir straddling the border of Utah and Wyoming.

Can you catch and release kokanee?

Some anglers prefer to harvest a limit of the larger sized fish, while releasing the smaller, more abundant Kokanee in the process. Or catching and releasing once their daily limit has been reached in order to continue fishing.

Why do kokanee turn red?

The sockeye are silver in color while living in the ocean. When they return to spawning grounds, their bodies become red and their heads turn green. For the Kokanee salmon, even though they do not migrate to sea, they are still silver before spawning. During spawning period, the salmon begin to absorb their scales.

How do you catch kokanee salmon from shore?

But actually find the most effective way of catching Coakley is by bait fishing by finding the school of fish and anchor the boat on top of them and catch them that way so in this tutorial.

How do you rig for kokanee fishing?

So I've been using a lead dropper rigged system with a free sliding weight. And finally a tackle companies come out with a complete system design just to run these lead dropper systems for kokanee.

Do kokanee salmon have teeth?

Kokanee salmon are more famous for their crimson red color and large sharp-toothed jaws as seen at the top of this page. That color and morphology only occurs just prior to spawning. For the majority of their life span, the kokanee are silver and have earned the nickname “silver bullet”.

Will a salmon bite you?

Can Salmon Bite Humans? Outright attacks by salmon on e.g. swimmers have literally never been reported, as salmon aren’t the most aggressive or territorial of fish species. On the other hand, plenty of anglers have been bitten or cut by salmon teeth while trying to unhook a fish or examine its mouth and teeth.

What is the best tasting salmon?

Chinook Salmon/King Salmon



Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tschawytscha), also known as King salmon, is considered by many to be the best-tasting of the salmon bunch. They have a high-fat content and corresponding rich flesh that ranges from white to a deep red color.