A trout is a trout...

Whether you are fishing in Canada, the U.S. or Argentina a trout is still a trout. They all exhibt the same feeding tendencies no matter what hemisphere you are in. This week, during a stay in Southern California, I was able to sample a couple of the local stillwaters. Being December, the local lakes have been stocking rainbow trout, some upwards of over ten pounds. Now there was a time in my life that I totally disregarded this fishing, the unclean pen raised trout were thought as unworthy of my respect. Times have changed, many of the lakes now stock trout that have literally been put on a treadmill of sorts, have mostly full fins, and put up a heck of a fight.

Anyhow I am getting off of the point.

Lake Cuyamaca is situated in the hills above San Diego at 4000. Most of the fish landed here were on the small side, 10 to 12 inch's, but you do get the occasional fish over 19 inch's. It's a nice drive up there, sometimes you will see turkey and deer on the side of the road. Once you found the fish they were relatively easy to get to bite, midges under the indicator in seven to nine feet of water proved their undoing.
Miramar lake on the other hand, seems to have fallen through some sort of loop-hole in the stocking process. For whatever reason this lake as been stocked strictly with "Nebraska Tailwalker" rainbows, so we are not seeing any of the standard DFG 10 to 12 inch fish. In this lake the trout have been readily turning to the natural fodder and become quite opportunistic in their feeding habits. Much of the lake is rimmed with tules and at this time with the lake almost full, the outside edge of the tules is about 10 to 12 feet. What this is doing is making the stillwater anglers life a little bit easier by creating a living curtain or wall which these bigger rainbows patrol throughout the day. In the earlier morning hours the type 2 line, towing a small leech or attractor type pattern works well enough, then as the sun comes up fish tend to settle down and attractors with a midge dropper work well under the indicator.

IP takes up the slack

Island Park Reservoir, November 2010

For the past ten days fall fishing has been a struggle for me. Access issues, lots of snow, freezing lakes, just to name a few, but fortunately in this area of south east Idaho we have more than a few stillwater options. Island Park reservoir came through all of these issue with some numbers of rainbow and cutthroat trout and also some fish of decent size. This can be an unforgiving lake for certain times of the year, in

the spring time with high water the trout can be hard to locate and a lot of foot work has to be done. In the fall with the lake at a much lower state, the fish tend to be more concentrated and hang more towards the main channel in the slightly warmer water, deeper water than that of the shallow coves. Deep points or shear drops are key structures that hold fish this time of year and faster sinking lines, type 3's and type 4's will get you into the bigger fish. This past week it seemed that you had to get a larger, dark leech pattern down to the 10 to 18 foot level near some sort of a rocky(plenty of basalt drops around) area, hang-ups were frequent, but at least that is telling you that your flies are in the right zone.

Pyramid lake rendezvous

Its on. Come one, come all. Join us at Pyramid lake starting March 27 thru April 2. Stand on a ladder, throw the rope, catch a 15 pounder.

General announcement....

Not that I am soliciting, but for those that purchase flies from me. I am going to be tying the majority of Pyramid patterns used this year, midges, Woollys, beetles and tadpoles and maybe a few new ones, in the next few weeks. If you need to purchase Pyramid pattens from me please get e-mail or call and place your order soon, within the next couple of weeks. This also goes for larger orders for fly shops.

My e-mail address is:

bruce@bigfishhappen.com

Pyramid List of flies:

Wooly Worm- sizes 2,4,6
Woolys are tied with two whiting hackles to make more durable.

Black/Chartreuse
Olive(caterpillar)
White/Chartreuse
Black/Purple
Midnight Cowboy
White/Pink
Black/red tag foam tail

Tadpoles- size 6
Black/olive
Pink/white(Princess)
White/Chartreuse(sleeper)
Black/Purple

Beetles-size 6
White/Chartruese(popcorn)
Chartruese (foam)/White (big fish)
Black/Olive
Black/Purple
Tan/White

Midges- size 10, 12, 14
These midges are made with wire bodies and ribbing, they are relatively heavy and tied on a long shank hook.
Chartruese/sliver
red/black(tiger), white bead
black/silver(zebra), black bead

Good morning to all,

The real trick is to throw the heavy line and get the fish to bite it. That is when you know you are doing everything correctly. Right location, right time of day, right fly line, right depth, right fly. Its easy to get bit while using lite line, but isn't it more of a game to get bit on the heaviest line possible? Besides it has the two fold effect of being able to land a big fish once you have it on and the big diameter line allows you to land it in a shorter time frame to make the fish easier to revive.