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Elephant Butte Lake Fishing Report

Updated Fri, Oct 23, 2026 from live gauge and weather data

New Mexico's big water: a desert reservoir with the state's best stripers, white bass and walleye.

2/5
Slow. The wind owns today.24 mph gusts make boat control the real battle.
Flow
1 cfs
Air / High
79 / 80 F
Wind
SSW 16 mph

Sources: USGS gauge 08361000, Open-Meteo, solunar calculated for these coordinates.

Satellite view
Friday
23
October 2026

Today's Fishing Report

Generated this morning from live readings: gauge, weather model, sun and moon. A fresh report is published here every morning.

2/5Slow. The wind owns today.24 mph gusts make boat control the real battle.

Elephant Butte Lake lines up a genuinely fishable day across the board. The release below the dam is running 1 cfs, on the rise. Today brings clear skies, wind SSW around 16 mph, steady pressure near 1009 hPa and a high of 80. Water sits around 74 F for the season (estimated). With the waxing gibbous, the solunar majors run 9:47 AM-11:47 AM and 10:14 PM-12:14 AM: the windows to build the day around.

The plan, species by species

Striped bassExcellent

Use electronics to find shad schools in open water, and watch for birds working over bait.

Largemouth bassGood

The main feeding season after the spawn: work moving baits along weed edges, points and wood, and follow up with a soft plastic where a fish swirls.

Catfish (blue, channel)Good

Spawning season from late May into summer: Iowa DNR suggests drifting bait under a float along riprap and snags where males guard nests in cavities.

CrappieFair

Early in this band crappie are spawning in protected coves; afterward they move to docks, brush piles and standing timber near deeper water.

Tomorrow: Cooler at 71 F with a rain chance. The solunar majors shift about 50 minutes later.Next report: Sat, Oct 24, 6:30 AMHow this report is made β†’

Before you go

New Mexico requires a fishing licence from age 12, from $49.00 for residents. What a New Mexico licence costs and where to buy it β†’

Chasing largemouth bass here? Check the size and bag limits with NMDOW before you keep anything. The season dates for New Mexico, read off the agency, are on the New Mexico seasons page.

Water and weather

Live readings from RIO GRANDE BELOW ELEPHANT BUTTE DAM, NM.

Flow, last 30 days

USGS gauge 08361000.

1543701 cfs09/2310/0310/1310/23

Today’s flow against 110 years of October 23

At 1 cfs, the flow at USGS gauge 08361000 (RIO GRANDE BELOW ELEPHANT BUTTE DAM, NM) is below the 5th percentile for the date: much below normal. In half of the 110 years of approved record the daily mean on October 23 was below 11 cfs; the highest was 2,790 cfs and the lowest 0 cfs.

p10 1median 11p90 825

Percentiles of the daily mean flow for this date, from the USGS Water Data Statistics API for gauge 08361000; today’s reading is the latest instantaneous value. Classes follow the ones the USGS used on its WaterWatch maps (retired at the end of 2025): below 10th, much below normal; 10th–24th, below; 25th–75th, normal; 76th–90th, above; over 90th, much above.

Right now

Latest readings

Air temp79 F
High / Low80 / 58 F
WindSSW 16-24 mph
Pressure1008.7 hPa, steady
Sky / Rain16% cloud, 33%
Sunrise / Sunset07:19 / 18:25
MoonWaxing Gibbous, 91%
Water temp (seasonal)~74 F est.

Bite planner

Hour-by-hour bite forecast for today. Tap a bar to see why.

5 AM8 AM11 AM2 PM5 PM8 PMsunrisesunset

Which day to fish Elephant Butte Lake this week

The best day on Elephant Butte Lake this week looks like Sunday Oct 25, at 4 out of 5, against 2 today.

Best day this week: Sunday, Oct 25 β€” good at 4/5, falling pressure, usually the best window of a week.

Today, Oct 23 β€” Tough

24 mph gusts make boat control the real battle.

Solunar majors
9:47 AM-11:47 AM and 10:14 PM-12:14 AM
Minor period
4:10 AM-5:10 AM
Sun
07:19 to 18:25
Moon
Waxing Gibbous, 91% lit
Sky and wind
Rain, 24 mph
Rain chance
33%

Forecast-based scores, less reliable further out: how the score is built.

Species guide

The species that matter on Elephant Butte Lake: seasons, structure and how to fish each one. Today's ratings live in the report above.

Largemouth bass illustration

Largemouth bass

Best: the spring pre-spawn and the fall feed

A warm-water sunfish of lakes, reservoirs, ponds and slow river backwaters that holds tight to cover: weeds, logs, rock ledges and docks. In Texas, TPWD surveys rank it "by far" the freshwater fish anglers most want to catch. The main feeding season after the spawn: work moving baits along weed edges, points and wood, and follow up with a soft plastic where a fish swirls.

Striped bass illustration

Striped bass

Best: spring and fall inland; on the coast, during the seasonal migrations

The largest of the temperate basses, a sea-run fish of the Atlantic and Gulf coasts that now also lives in reservoirs across much of the country after hatchery stocking. Inland, it follows schools of shad and herring through open water. Use electronics to find shad schools in open water, and watch for birds working over bait.

Catfish (blue, channel) illustration

Catfish (blue, channel)

Year-round, best at dusk and after dark

Three big catfish share most of the country's rivers and reservoirs: the channel catfish, the most widespread; the blue catfish, the largest; and the flathead, which hunts live fish. All feed mostly on or near the bottom. Spawning season from late May into summer: Iowa DNR suggests drifting bait under a float along riprap and snags where males guard nests in cavities.

Crappie illustration

Crappie

Best: the spring spawn; summer around docks, brush and the thermocline

Two slab-sided panfish, the white crappie and the black crappie, that gather around submerged timber, brush piles, docks and bridge pilings in lakes, reservoirs and slow river backwaters. Texas Parks and Wildlife counts crappie as the state's most popular panfish. Early in this band crappie are spawning in protected coves; afterward they move to docks, brush piles and standing timber near deeper water.

When to come: the Elephant Butte Lake calendar

Activity by species and month, and how the water warms through the year. Tap any cell.

Species activity by month

1 = slow, 5 = peak. Current month highlighted.

J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
Largemouth bass
Striped bass
Catfish (blue, channel)
Crappie
SlowPeak

Water temperature through the year

Typical surface temperature for this water type; today is around 74 F (estimated, not a reading).

5060708090JanMarMayJulSepNovOct, ~74 F now

Angler reports

Real reports from real anglers, reviewed before publishing. The water log below tracks each day automatically.

No angler reports yet this weekBe the first: your report helps every angler who checks Elephant Butte Lake today, and we feature the best catch of the week.

Water log, last days

Auto-logged from live data
Thu, Oct 22

3/5 Fair. Fish the windows. A steady pattern: dawn and dusk carry the day. Striped bass led the card at excellent. High of 82 F, wind to 18 mph.

Wed, Oct 21

4/5 Good. Solid day ahead. Stable-to-falling pressure and workable wind line things up. Largemouth bass led the card at excellent. High of 82 F, wind to 11 mph.

Tue, Oct 20

4/5 Good. Solid day ahead. Stable-to-falling pressure and workable wind line things up. Largemouth bass led the card at excellent. High of 75 F, wind to 11 mph.

Where roughly, what depth, what bait. Skip anything you want to keep secret.
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Before you go

License

New Mexico requires a valid fishing license for adults. Buy online from the state agency; one-day options exist for visitors.

Regulations

New Mexico license. Stripers: no limit. Walleye: 5 per day. Confirm with NMDGF.

Access

Marina del Sur, Dam Site, Monticello Point and Rock Canyon ramps: usability shifts with level.

About this water

~36,000 acres at typical levels on the Rio Grande, Sierra County, NM. USBR dam completed 1916.

Fishing Elephant Butte Lake: the full guide

The Butte's big three

Elephant Butte is New Mexico's largest lake: a Rio Grande desert reservoir that swings dramatically with the water years and fishes through all of it. Stripers headline (fish to 50-plus in the lake's lore), white bass school everywhere, walleye ply the points, and largemouth work whatever brush the current level floods.

Chasing the pelagics

Striper and white bass life revolves around shad: dawn boils in coves and over the channel from late spring through fall (spoons, topwater), deep bait-ball marking in winter. The Narrows and the upper flats concentrate fish as levels drop; rising water spreads everything into new brush. Check the level trend here first: it is the whole strategy.

Desert bass on the rebound

The Butte's fishery tracks its water line: recent wetter cycles refloated ramps and re-flooded salt cedar, and the largemouth-and-white-bass engine responded fast. Spring wolfpacks roam the flooded brush of the Rio Grande arm; summer moves the action to dawn topwater off the rock points and islands. The lake's white bass schools remain the everyman staple: find birds, cast slabs, repeat.

Common questions

Why does the lake change size so much?

It is the Rio Grande's main storage for downstream irrigation: wet cycles fill it toward 40,000 acres, droughts shrink it under 10,000. The fish concentrate as it drops: locals without fanfare prefer low years.

Are Elephant Butte's ramps usable at current levels?

It changes with each runoff year: the state park posts which ramps reach water. Marina del Sur and Rock Canyon typically persist: verify before towing across southern New Mexico.

Is fishing good at Elephant Butte Lake right now?

Check the daily report at the top of this page: it is regenerated every morning from live data. Today's read: Slow. The wind owns today. 24 mph gusts make boat control the real battle.

Nearby waters

Black River136 miBig Lake (White Mountains)137 miBluewater Lake152 miCochiti Lake172 miShow Low Lake175 miFool Hollow Lake181 mi

Where this page's numbers come from

River and reservoir readings
USGS 08361000 β€” RIO GRANDE BELOW ELEPHANT BUTTE DAM, NM
Read from the USGS Water Data API (api.waterdata.usgs.gov). Latest value timestamped 2026-10-23 at 19:00 UTC.
Weather and pressure
Open-Meteo forecast model
Queried at 33.2386, -107.1748 in this water's own timezone. A model, not an observation.
Moon and solunar windows
Calculated on this site
Astronomical calculation from these coordinates and the date, not a third-party feed. How much weight it deserves.
The written guide on this page
Pablo Ruiz Quintero
How this page was made. The daily report is computed by our scoring engine from live readings; nobody types it. The written guide was drafted with AI assistance. Unlike our newer pages, it does not yet list the official pages its facts were checked against: that audit is under way, and anything it cannot verify will be taken out. Pablo Ruiz Quintero sets every guideline, the data-verification system and the minimum standards a page must meet to be published, reviews page structure and approves what goes live; the responsibility is his, and the AI carries out the work. We work this way because it is how one person can keep every page current with named sources. Errors are published in the verification log; the full policy is in the editorial policy.

Readings refresh on a 30-minute window. The full method, with every figure and its source, is on how our reports are made. Something wrong here? Tell us and it goes in the log with the date.