Fished a new lake for me in north central WA on Thursday afternoon/evening and Friday morning. It was mostly calm, but the wind started to pick up mid-day on Friday. The water was nice at around 60 degrees, and the water clarity was really good with about 15 to 18 feet of visibility; lots of fish were seen in that clear water. As you can see from this photo, I was the only one fishing out there.
If you've been there you'll probably recognize the lake from this photo. This lake is only planted with Lahontan cutthroats due to the alkalinity.
The fish were mostly of decent length, as seen from my Fish Size Distribution Chart:
However, about half the cutts were colored up in their spawning colorations and/or very thin, and those ones didn't fight very well. The other half were more silvery, but not overly chunky. Several of those silvery ones were much better fighters, like this one:
Most of the fish were hooked on a gray Muskrat Nymph, which I believe the fish were taking for a callibaetis nymph, although I don't know that the fish were that selective. I was using my clear intermediate line to fish the edges and shallow shoals, just casting and stripping. I also found some fish on the drop-offs about 12 feet down in 17 to 18 feet of water, casting and stripping a BH Dark Olive Rabbit Fur Leech. However, I don't know that the particular fly pattern was all that effective, as I could often see a fish chasing the fly and rejecting it or missing it 90% of the time. Still, it was fun watching the fish chase my fly.
This lake had more turtles than any lake I've fished, most of whom were sunning themselves on logs or rocks:
In the photo above, there are at least 10 turtles on this log, and I think there were more but some jumped off as I got closer.
Anyway, it was a nice outing, exploring a new lake, seeing some new scenery, experiencing some decent fishing and seeing lots of wildflowers and wildlife. There are so many nice lakes in our state, but not enough time to fish them all...
Rex
If you've been there you'll probably recognize the lake from this photo. This lake is only planted with Lahontan cutthroats due to the alkalinity.
The fish were mostly of decent length, as seen from my Fish Size Distribution Chart:
However, about half the cutts were colored up in their spawning colorations and/or very thin, and those ones didn't fight very well. The other half were more silvery, but not overly chunky. Several of those silvery ones were much better fighters, like this one:
Most of the fish were hooked on a gray Muskrat Nymph, which I believe the fish were taking for a callibaetis nymph, although I don't know that the fish were that selective. I was using my clear intermediate line to fish the edges and shallow shoals, just casting and stripping. I also found some fish on the drop-offs about 12 feet down in 17 to 18 feet of water, casting and stripping a BH Dark Olive Rabbit Fur Leech. However, I don't know that the particular fly pattern was all that effective, as I could often see a fish chasing the fly and rejecting it or missing it 90% of the time. Still, it was fun watching the fish chase my fly.
This lake had more turtles than any lake I've fished, most of whom were sunning themselves on logs or rocks:
In the photo above, there are at least 10 turtles on this log, and I think there were more but some jumped off as I got closer.
Anyway, it was a nice outing, exploring a new lake, seeing some new scenery, experiencing some decent fishing and seeing lots of wildflowers and wildlife. There are so many nice lakes in our state, but not enough time to fish them all...
Rex
