I was down at Bonneville this weekend too and the shad fishing just plain SUCKED!

This is the traditional peak of the run and the dam counts were insanely high, but for some reason the shad just weren't biting on the WA side? We caught about a dozen or so each in an afternoon, but it should have been a fish every other cast like previous years.

My theory: The current created by the new smolt flume has radically changed the way the shad migrate over the dam on the WA side. That, coupled with the cloudy weather and weak current flow from the WA powerhouse added up to create lousy fishing conditions overall.