Cycling Trout

Karen and I always keep an eye out for trout that have a "beat" on our local waters. They often feed along the edges. Today we encountered several "cycling" trout that worked up and down a stretch of water, aka "their beat!" We both love to get our presentation right along their feeding path and often we get a hook up. If you look at the shoreline in the picture above, there is a break in the weeds. That is a spot we love to cast into and wait! I am always amazed that trout will eat your fly just 18 inches to 2 feet below you strike indicator along a weed line. While out fly fishing the other day, I saw a fellow in a boat sitting right along the weeds. The trout were cruising right where he was sitting in his boat. It may have been better to set up so he could work the weed line he was parked along! I love to "set a trap" and catch a trout working the edges!

 

Chironomid Hatch on Sylvan Lake

It isn't very often that we motor into perfect fly fishing conditions at Sylvan Lake, but today; Karen and I had just that. The water temperature was 55F, there was a light west wind, both chironomids and mayflies were hatching and the lake whitefish were quite active. You could see them on the sounder chasing emerging bugs. We set up in 10 feet of water and fished 8 to 9 feet below our strike indicators. The hits today were hard. We could see chironomid shucks everywhere on the surface of the lake. We used a zucchini chironomid size 12 and 14. The lake whites were all over it today! It is not always like that but today was nothing short of incredible. Boat traffic on the lake for the most part was thankfully respectful. My late friend Bernie loved to fly fish at Sylvan Lake. I paused several times to think about my friend!

Red Butt Zucchini Chironomid

Zucchini Chironomid

Body material for a Zucchini

Lake whitefish chasing mayfly larva and chironomids.

 

Windy Day on the Prairies

The wind was rocking yesterday. Karen and I knew that we could shore fly fish if we had to. When we arrived at our destination, we had to laugh because the wind was roaring. When we rigged up, we talked about how to modify our set up so we don't spend the entire day dealing with tangles. The first thing we did was cut off our dropper. We then shortened our leader. We fished with a 7 foot leader to a single fly. It looked kind of odd to fly fish with such a short leader but it definitely helped both of us a lot. We wanted to cover the water along the edges. Yep, we tied on a Tokaryk Special and pretty much stuck with it all day. We did not have to change to a different pattern. There were times that we had to wait for the wind gusts to settle before we could cast. We did find some deflections that had a bit less wind so our Tokaryks didn't slide down the lake at mach speed. 

We were amazed at our success. We caught lots of trout and even a bunch of pike.

At one point during the day, I saw a deflection that created a wind lane. I fly fished the wind lane where food for the trout can often accumulate. I had a lot of success fly fishing 4 feet down in the wind lane. When we walked the shore, Karen and I had to give a wide birth to bird nests on shore. The coots had several nests and they were full of eggs.

We caught a lot of rainbows, mainly stockers; a few tiger trout and several browns. Yes there were also pike present, mostly tiny pike but Karen did land a better one.

Our throat samples consistently had daphnia in them. Many of the takes were hard. We figured the trout were straining the daphnia. The trout swim with their mouth open and just scoop up the daphnia. 

We had to dodge several thunderstorms but our day was amazing. 

Daphnia in the throat samples

Yep a wind lane

Coot nests were all along the shore

I love tiger trout!

A nice surprise at the end of the day!