Where to Anchor? Where to Cast.

Wetswinger

Wetswinger

Beneath the surface of the mud, there’s more mud.
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On my local lake, the bottom slopes from the shore to 40ft deep in about a 100 ft. linear distance. I've been indecisive on the best strategy to fish it. Because of heavy timber downfall, fishing the bottom parallel results in snags. So I tend to go farther off shore when fishing parallel to shore. As far as fishing this drop off, do you find it better to anchor farther out and cast to shore or come in close and cast out.? I only seem to have success here when fishing deep..I typically use a full sink type 5, countdown style with minnows, buggers and leech..
 
My philosophy: I prefer to cast from deep to shallower water. As one strips in the line it naturally becomes shallower IMHO. Also bugs, e.g. dragon/damsel nymphs, crawl toward shallower water to emerge or climb up shoreline vegetation.
 
Have you considered using a fly that 'floats up' a bit (aka slightly positive buoyancy) when not being retrieved? That way you may avoid some of the snags by having the line hit the bottom and snags and fly will be above them. Plus it will add more action to the fly...
 
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RCF said:
Have you considered using a fly that 'floats up' a bit (aka slightly positive buoyancy) when not being retrieved? That way you may avoid some of the snags by having the line hit the bottom and snags and fly will be above them. Plus it will add more action to the fly...
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I have used a foam dragon with occasional success. My thought about anchoring outside and casting in is ; the fly will settle to the depth there (15ft) and really not get deeper as it approaches the boat, hence missing the bottom on the majority of the cast. If I stay inside and cast out and let it sink (30+ ft.) it will scrape bottom all the way back in. Just a thought and probably an overthought one at that..
 
I like to fish damsels from deep to shallow, retrieving in to shore. Sometimes backcast room is tough. I like to fish buggers and leeches from shallow to deeper. I'll go parallel trolling/moving and searching. Sometimes parallel is better to keep the proper depth.
 



Had a good outing with this pattern in my little, local suburban lake this morning. The best set up was out about 70ft from the weed line. I'd cast to the weed edge, countdown 40 sec. and retrieve back slow. I always wondered if there wasn't some bigger fish in here, as it's deep , 70ft deep. Well there is. I've usually caught cookie cutter trout here but today I got a beauty. Could not get my hand around it's body. So I'm happy..
 
These are tough lakes to anchor in. I tend to find the zone they are in, drop a channel marker and then try my best to anchor where I can then cast to that zone with an indicator set up. It helps if the W is on your side.
 
Wetswinger said:



Had a good outing with this pattern in my little, local suburban lake this morning. The best set up was out about 70ft from the weed line. I'd cast to the weed edge, countdown 40 sec. and retrieve back slow. I always wondered if there wasn't some bigger fish in here, as it's deep , 70ft deep. Well there is. I've usually caught cookie cutter trout here but today I got a beauty. Could not get my hand around it's body. So I'm happy..
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Great looking fly! And it works. Not just pretty to fisher people's eye...

I am actually surprised fish are that deep. I too live on a small WW lake. It is 55' deep. My wife and I were the lake custodians for King County for several years. We monitored the lake at various depths and took water quality/visibility samples. There were two distinct thermoclines --> one at 20' - 25' with a temp about 50 degrees and one at 40' with a temp 43 degrees. Based on my fish finder, when the surface temps got hot (above 65 degrees), the fish would go down to the first thermocline. Never saw any below that.
 
RCF said:
Great looking fly! And it works. Not just pretty to fisher people's eye...

I am actually surprised fish are that deep. I too live on a small WW lake. It is 55' deep. My wife and I were the lake custodians for King County for several years. We monitored the lake at various depths and took water quality/visibility samples. There were two distinct thermoclines --> one at 20' - 25' with a temp about 50 degrees and one at 40' with a temp 43 degrees. Based on my fish finder, when the surface temps got hot (above 65 degrees), the fish would go down to the first thermocline. Never saw any below that.
Click to expand...

Ya, I was shooting for 20ft depth with my countdown. Plus the area I targeted was in the shade..
 
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I used this fly for part of the day yesterday and again got a nice one. This time it was a LM Bass. Side catch from trout fishing. It only brought me two fish. Caught a couple fish each, on several different flys, though none of them were lights out. Practiced my strip set on the numerous Bluegill using a chromie wet hackle thing I tyed up..
 
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