Windy Sunday at Fish and Game (West Lake)

What a windy Sunday! Wind gusts up to 60 kph! Well Karen, Hal, Adam and I headed to the Fish and Game lake called West Lake. Sadly the lake is quite low but the rainbows are still doing great. The 6 or 7 aerators are doing a great job keeping the lake well oxygenated.  The water was 50F. After launching, Karen and I headed to a spot with less wind. Karen fished with a Tokaryk Special and she landed an excellent rainbow. A throat sample included several large leeches, some tiny boatmen and scuds.I  was stripping Blue Flash Damsels and caught a few but quickly changed to a basic black leech after seeing the rainbows were eating leeches, scuds and the occasional damsel fly nymph! It didn't take long to connect with a dandy rainbow on my black leech streamer. Karen tagged another rainbow on a Vampire Leech. Hal was doing great with Tokaryk Specials and Adam started landing rainbows after he switched to cast and retrieve! The leeches as you can see were large. I was stripping a 4 inch black leech and the larger rainbows showed a lot of interest in them. Looks like the wind is hanging around for a few days. I hope you were able to get out this weekend.

That is a lot of calories in this throat sample.

Hal was on fire!

A bald eagle looking for an easy meal!

 

Excellent Start to the Central Alberta Fly Fishing Season

Karen, Doug and I along with a host of other members of our club have been able to get the fly fishing season started here in Central Alberta. Several of our gang have enjoyed fly fishing some reservoirs east of Red Deer the last two days. The fly fishing has been excellent. Throat samples have been very typical of early season fly fishing. Daphnia, scuds, tiny chironomids and water boatmen have been on the menu of the trout! I see that the fish stocking is well underway in Alberta. As usual you can follow fish stocking in Alberta RIGHT HERE!

So what flies have we been using? Tokaryk Special 2.0, Pumpkin Heads, Black Balanced Leeches, Glen's Leech, RL Boatmen, and Blue Flash Damsels. Karen and I had a great day yesterday stripping Blue Flash Damsels on an intermediate line. The trout were aggressive and that made for connecting with a lot! Many decent ones too! At the moment, the feeding fish are not deep!

Karen, Doug and I have started to use a slightly different lake floating line. The Phil Rowley Ambassador Series lines are excellent. They include a split ring that allows you to easily make and connect your own leaders. I like how the line turns over and loads. Today I was casting RL Boatmen flies with it with it! I loved the way the line was casting.

Well the weekend is almost here! Get your kit ready to go. Choose a lake and have a blast!

Blue Flash Damsel

I have been very happy with this line!

Daphnia and small shrimp!

Tiny chironomids and Daphnia

A sizeable tiger trout caught on a Blue Flash Damsel

I love brown trout!

 

First Fly Fishing Trip of the Year-Cutthroat!

Karen and I needed to escape for a few days. So we did. It was an opportunity to enjoy fly fishing while taking our minds off of some tough times! We headed south of the border. We had no problems at all in that regard. We did discover that gas was expensive just like home and so are food costs. No matter!

Both Karen and I love cutthroat trout. We headed to a place we have visited many times before. It was warm. As a matter of fact, it was 27C when we arrived. We headed right to the lake and had an excellent afternoon chasing cutthroat! We decided to fly fish from shore and that was an excellent decision. We tied on baby damsels and caught our share of cutties, many in the 18-22 inch category! The second day at the lake was amazing. The cutties were willing and hungry. Karen tried using an orange beaded baby damsel and the trout were all over it! I then tied on a Pumpkin Head with a head turner orange bead! The cutties again loved it. Hmm could the orange bead be a beacon for the cutts? Well I tied on a CBO, Canadian Brown and Orange, and yes the cutties loved that too! The tried and true Tokaryk Special also got the attention of the cutties.

Well day three started off slow after a heavy thunderstorm the night before. The wind was a bit cooler even though I still wore shorts. Things that day didn't really get going until lunch time and beyond. The mercury still climbed to 20C.

I started taking throat samples. The cutts were eating tiny chironomids. We just carried on with our baby damsels, Pumpkin Heads, Tokaryks and Blue Flash Damsels. They were enough!

Our final day, we decided to go exploring and try some different strategies. We found several new areas to fly fish. I also switched up to streamer fly fishing with a Blue Flash Damsel on an intermediate line. The cutts chased my offering as soon as they saw it! That was a lot of fun!

Well we had to get back home. Obligations called. We didn't like the weather forecast but we had to get back. Luckily the roads were fine until we hit the Ring Road in Calgary! We ran into snow squalls but the roads were just wet and not icy!

Our first road trip was a lot of fun and an excellent distraction for a few days. We needed the break.

It looks like there is open water in Central Alberta. Once the weather warms a bit I will get an update out there. I know many of you have already been on the water. I'd love to hear about your adventures. Send some pictures.

I didn't even fall in!

Spring south of the border!

Karen has a great sense of humour!

Pumpkin Heads got the attention of cutthroat!

Blue Flash Damsels-2 versions

Tiny size 22-24 chironomids were in the throat samples.