Trout Fishing at Lake Petocka - March 29, 2014

Saturday was a beautiful day, but it started out below freezing.  I arrived at the lake @ 9am, and slush was forming in my rod line guides for about the first hour.

Dale G. arrived at the lake first, and had caught 2 trout on flies by the time I arrived.  Wearing fingerless gloves, his hands were very cold!  We split and hit different parts of the lake to try and find more trout.

Of course I would be on the wrong side of the lake!  Dale found some trout about the same time that my friend Jay showed up to flyfish.  We joined Dale, and caught a few fish.  It was spotty fishing, slow but fairly steady.  I left around 1:15pm or so, but returned later in the evening to try again.  I only caught one more fish, which brought my total to 13 trout for the day.  A lot of work for few fish, it seemed, but it was a great day to be outside, and it was still fun to catch some fish.  And some were decent-sized.  The DNR stocks them at @ 12", but I caught some the measured up to 14".

Here's Jay with his first flyrod trout of the day:

And here's some of the trout I caught:

I used mostly beadhead woolly buggers...flashy gold seemed to work best for me today.  I also caught a trout on a beadchain-eye fly I tied to look like a baby sunfish...the fish in the 3rd picture was caught on that, and the fish in the last 2 pictures were caught on a fly I tie that has a marabou tail, gold mylar tubing body, and a few turns of black ostrich at the head.  They like that one!

Lake Petocka - Nov. 1-4, 2012

Lake Petocka was stocked with 1500 Rainbow Trout on Thursday at Noon.  I took Thursday and Friday off work to fish it.

Thursday morning I fly fished a local public pond to waste some time before heading to Bondurant (Lake Petocka).  Using a chartreuse micro jig,  I landed 100 small fish...81 Crappies, 15 Bluegills and 4 Green Sunfish.  Not bad for two hours of fishing!

At Lake Petocka, fishing was tough after the stocking.  Most folks left fishless.  Maybe one or two caught their 5-fish limit.  I did better than most, and caught 5 trout and 1 chunky Largemouth Bass, but it took me all of 2 hours to accomplish that.  I also fished my way around nearly the entire lake.  I didn't keep any.

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On Friday, I fly fished Petocka for 6 hours.  I fished one corner of the lake for awhile.  Caught 10 Trout there, before my friend Dale G. called and said he'd been there awhile longer and had caught 18 fish where he was.  He told me to come down and fish with him, if the action slowed where I was.  It did slow.  I caught one more trout before heading over to his corner of the lake. I saw a few small pods of fish working quidkly along the top of a drop-off, and landed 2 trout from those groups.  Then the action died at that spot.  I saw some more fish further down the shoreline, so I started following where I could see fish.  I caught quite a few more fish, at least one from almost every small group that came down along the shoreline.  Dale came down and fished by me.  The action slowed.  I headed back to the corner of the pond where I had started the morning.  There were fish there...quite a few!  I was catching fish on nearly every cast for awhile, and Dale came over to see what was up.  We both caught fish here.

For the day, there were lulls in the action, but overall it was fairly steady.  I used a variety of fly patterns.  White was a very effective color this day.  I ended up catching and releasing 64 Rainbow Trout.  Some were caught by casting straight out with beadhead White Woolly Buggers.  Others were caught on Blue Thunder Streamers worked along the top of a drop-off when small groups of 3 or 4 trout would come along the bank.  And others were caught on unweighted white Woolly Buggers cast really shallow along the shoreline when small pods would come in and search for food within 4-5' of shore.  And still others were caught on a gold Springbrook Wunder microjig suspended about 10"-12"under an indicator in a small pocket of water with 2-5' depth.

This one hit an unweighted white Woolly Bugger.

This one hit a glass beadhead dubbed-body softhackle.

This one hit a Blue Thunder streamer.

Hard to see...but a number of fish had sort of rosy-pink bellies.  I assume this might be the coloration of a spawning male Rainbow Trout?...since most of the fish with such bellies were dripping milt.

This was Trout #60 of the day!

Dale G. And I fished together much of the time.  He even supplied some buffalo meat sticks to help re-energize us after noon.  They were tasty, thanks Dale!

I finally left when a very rude Dad used his 3 year old son as an excuse to cast into the small area we were fishing.  Really irked me.  Don't misunderstand, I thought it was great the guy brought his son out to try for trout.  But fishing really close to other guys and then casting the son's rod (with a huge bobber on it) over in front of those other guys into the area they had clearly been fishing for some time, and then moving himself between the son's rod and the closest guy and start casting dead-center where the established angler had been casting and catching fish.  Dale was that guy first...and he left without complaining.  So then the Dad picked up his gear and moved over by me and repeated the same situation.  Each time he would cast his son's giant bobber over in front of me, I'd turn and look right at the dad.  He wouldn't make eye contact with me at all.  But it was ridiculous and obvious what he was doing, and it was outrageously and sickeningly rude.  What a horrible example he was setting for his young son!  I just reeled in and left as well, and saw the  dad then move into my position and start casting over by the guys that had come down to fish on my other side, but were not crowding me.  Unreal.  I'm still pissed.  The Dad finally hooked a trout, and handed the rod to his son to reel in.  THAT was a good move, and I admired him for that.  But with a lake full of fish and tons of vacant shoreline to choose from, to crowd out people who are catching fish is still unacceptable.

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Unexpectedly, I found myself with some time to go fishing on Sunday, Nov. 4.  I headed back to Lake Petocka.  The sky was overcast, with occasional light drizzle.

I first fished the last spot where I had caught fish on Friday. Not much going on there.  I had only made about 10 casts when I got a phone call.  Dale G. was at the lake again, and had seen my car.  There were fish where he was, so he invited me over.  Fish indeed!  The two of us were soon catching plenty of fish.  Guys next to us bottom-fishing with bait just looked on and shook their heads.

Because of the weather, I had my hoodie hood pulled up over my cap.  After awhile, I became aware that I was being watched.  I looked to my left, and there was a guy standing about 6' away, facing me and just looking on with a scowl on his face.  "Hi," I said.  He said "I'm just going to watch you."  Weird.  "OK," said I, and turned back to the business of fishing and catching.  The guy just watched me for about 20 minutes!  At one point he asked to see what I was using.  I showed him, and went back to fishing.  He finally moved about 25' down the shoreline and fished.  Turns out he was using spinning gear.  He was casting into an obvious pod of trout, but not catching any.  Over about 1.5 hours, he did land 3 or 4.  That's him in the background of this picture (of me holding a rather fat toad of a trout!):

Dale caught plenty of Rainbows as well:

Fishing eventually slowed.  Dale had to get on home.  That guy to my left who had been watching me caught one more, and decided to leave.  His pod of trout were still there, so I moved over and caught a bunch more fish from that pod before it slowly moved beyond my casting range ( plus I was casting into the wind).  I ended up catching 78 Rainbow Trout in 4 hours!  Pretty good day!

Dale pointed out later that my total trout caught over 2 days (64+78=142) amounted to nearly 10% of the fish that had been stocked!  Actually, I need to catch just 3 more trout (since I had caught 5 on Friday, so a total of 147) to make it an official 10%.  I think I can "get'er done"...if I can find time to get back over to the lake!  :)

Iowa Trout...Hat Trick Saturday, 3-10-2012

On a whim I decided to get out of bed earlier than I normally prefer on a Saturday...and go fly-fish for trout at a nearby lake.

Wind forecasts yesterday called for winds up to 15mph for today.  I can do that.  When I got up this morning, I checked the weather forecast again.  They had boosted up the wind speeds again.  But that was nothing compared to what REALLY was going on!  By the time I got back home again after fishing, I checked to verify my suspicions...sure enough, winds from 24-32 mph!!!  Cripes!  It was brutal indeed!

There were two gents fishing when I arrived at 7am.  One was fly-fishing.  After I had been fishing for a bit about 100 yards away, I saw the fly angler catch a trout.  He waved and started walking over.  It was my friend Dale Gooding, fellow member of Central Iowa Anglers!

Dale had caught 2 trout so far, including the one I witnessed.  He told me the shoreline I was working hadn't been producing, and invited me to join him.  He showed me the pattern he was catching fish with, which was similar to what I was using.  I'd been wanting to give him some flies I'd caught trout with at this lake in the past, so I brought out my fly box and picked out a trio for him to add to his fly box.  I decided to work a bit more of the shoreline near me, which I did unsuccessfully, and then walked down to fish near his spot.  I slowly worked down the shoreline away from him, making a half-dozen casts, then moving on.  I missed a strike.  Then had a big heavy take that quickly broke my line as I strip-set the hook.  Darn!

I caught a couple fish on the olive & black beadhead woolly bugger I'd been using.

Dale caught another fish or two.  He gave me a fly he'd tied that was working for him.  Looked good, so I accepted it and put it on my line.  Soon I was catching a few more trout.  I ended up catching 7 trout on that fly, before it started falling apart.  Not bad!  That kind of abuse on a fly gives it that ragged "Badge of Honor"!  Definitely a good fish-catching fly pattern!

Dale had caught & released 6 trout total, and decided to call it a day.  Casting into that wind was a lot of work!

I was one trout shy of a double-limit (5 trout is considered a limit, but of course I was not keeping any), so I decided to stay a while longer.

I switched to an orange-n-black beadhead bugger. I found a good spot or two, and caught some nice trout.

This was the biggest trout of the day for me...very chunky!

I caught 5 before the new fly I had tied on (one that I had tied) started falling apart.  I really need to reinforce the hackle with counterwraps of wire!  I switched back to an olive-n-black beadhead woolly bugger, and caught 2 more trout before I decided to call it a day at 11am.  I was BEAT!  It had been tough fishing conditions, and the trout were willing to hit, but hard to locate.  Plus our casting distance was extremely limited due to the strong winds.  I ended up catching & releasing 16 rainbow trout (that's a limit hat-trick plus one!), plus had long-distance releases on about 4 others, plus one broken line, and a bunch of missed strikes.  All in all...a pretty fair day of fishing.  I was happy with the results.

Thanks for the tips and the fly, Dale!

Lake Petocka Fly-Fishing Report, 11-7-2011

I took the day off yesterday (Monday) and did some fly-fishing for the trout at Lake Petocka. When I requested the day off work, the forecast was for 10 degrees warmer than what it turned out to be, and low temps almost 20 degrees warmer than it turned out to be.


Still, it was a nice, sunny morning and early afternoon, with reasonably low winds.

Fishing was S-L-O-W. Very few "rings" from surfacing fish within casting distance of shore. No big groups of fish. In talking with some folks, there was some great fishing a week ago, and reports are that folks were keeping a lot more than their legal limits. I even talked to a couple guys out there who said they had caught their limits (a week ago Saturday), took them home, then came back. They left it to my imagination as to whether they kept any on their 2nd trips of the day. But anyway, all the harvesting (both legal and illegal) seems to have cut the trout population down considerably over the past 3.5 weeks. That's good from the DNR's point of view that the fish get "used" and enjoyed. It just makes fishing a lot more challenging.

Most folks I saw out there yesterday who were using lures or live bait didn't catch ANYTHING. The best I saw was one guy using minnows...he took home 4 trout.

Comparitively, I did well and caught 9 trout on flies....8 Rainbows and 1 Brookie. I stayed about an hour-and-a-half extra trying to catch "1 more fish to make it an even 10"....but it was dead, and it didn't happen.

I tried surface patterns as well as nymphs under an indicator, but didn't catch fish on them. I did best with streamers like beadhead woolly buggers and simple patterns using gold mylar tubing bodies with a marabou tail. Although fish were very rarely visible from shore, I caught almost all of my fish within 15' of shore.

NE Iowa "Driftless Region" Trout Fishing, 5-1-2011

5-1-2011

Swiss Valley
Fly-Fishing
Time Fished: 8am-11am
Weather: Sunny, @46 degrees F
Wind: I'm guessing it was a GOOD 20+mph wind and gusting!
Fish sought: Salmo trutta, and his buddies
Fish caught: 7 Rainbow Trout, 2 Brown Trout

I was excited to finally get to try fly-fishing for some stream trout in NE Iowa. I was pleased with the results!

I got there fairly early, there were only 3 other cars in the parking lot, and one of the guys was just taking pictures of the stream. I saw a couple other guys baitfishing, and a couple walking their dog.

There were no visible hatches at all, and no visible fish or surface activity of any kind. So, I tied on one of my largest nymph patterns. It is, very generally speaking, a "Rubberlegs". Its mainly designed to imitate good-sized stonefly nymphs. It has an underbody of non-lead wire for weight, and the legs have all sorts of great movement in the water.

As I walked my way (on shore...I left the waders at home since my whole family was along on this trip...although I fished alone) upstream, I hit a couple of ok-looking water. I could see the bottom in most places, and no fish were visible. This wasn't encouraging.

I eventually emerged from the woods into an area that was much more open along the creek bank, and found a constructed "bank hide", and drifted the nymph along that, with a small split shot above it for weight, and a strike indicator to help me deal with the combination of water depth, current speed, and strong winds I was dealing with.

Got a Rainbow Trout!! WOO HOO! I was ECSTATIC that I wasn't going to be "skunked" on this trip!

I caught another one from there:

Then I found this interesting fishy-looking pool:

After at least a half-dozen drifts through there, I got a strike, and landed my first Iowa Brown Trout!

That was pretty cool! But, that was the only fish I could coax from that pool, so I moved on.

I found another interesting deep pool, and caught a colorful Rainbow Trout:

I found another bank hide, and caught a couple more rainbows before moving on.

I found another long deep pool above some rapids, and fished there. I missed a handful of hits before landing this colorful Brown Trout...he was very strong and very colorful (LOVE the red spots! Click any photos to enlarge), but was only around 14" long. He was one of the bigger fish, as all the trout seemed to be in the 10"-14.5" range.

I had just a few more minutes to fish at this pool before walking back to the car, I caught one more decent Rainbow:

When I got back to my car, the parking lot was full, with other people out walking with families and dogs, and people baitfishing or using spinning gear. There was one fellow in the parking lot getting ready to fly-fish. He came over to ask if I'd done any good. He fishes there often, and was surprised I'd caught 2 Browns. He said 4 years ago, the DNR and a local fly-fishing club had built some bank hides up on one of the smaller tributaries to this stream. They had stocked some fingerling Brown Trout then, but had not stocked any since. So, the Brown Trout in the creek were basically wild, and there seemed to be some natural reproduction occurring.

I had been looking at the fins of each fish I had caught, and none had those rubbed-down "hatchery fins". So, I'm assuming all the trout I caught were carry-overs from at least the previous year. They were nice and healthy fish!

"Warmwater" Trout Fishing?

Our fishing club, Central Iowa Anglers, had our monthly meeting last night. We held it at a small public lake, and had a fish fry....the food was excellent! Afterwards, many of us fished.


This lake is an old borrow pit. It has a shallow shelf around it, then a drop-off to deeper water beyond. No significant structure to speak of. The water is relatively clear, compared to other lakes in central Iowa.

I spotted some bluegill beds in the shallows, and there were some good-sized bluegills on them. I had a number of hits, but the fish were quickly spitting the fly back out. I only caught one bluegill, but it was a good 8"-8.5".

This lake was stocked with trout for the first time this past fall & winter. It was a "put-and-take" fishery. They weren't expected to survive the summer water temps. One of our club members spotted a small group of trout near shore, where a field tile was draining cool water into the lake. I started off with a small nymph, similar to a Prince Nymph, but with some modifications. I caught one or two trout on that, but it was slow. I tried some other things with no success. I tied on a small wet fly tied using grizzly marabou for a tail, and small gold mylar braided tubing for a body. The trout LIKED this! I ended up landing 8 trout total. I'd caught trout on flies before, but used spinning gear at the time. Most of my trout are caught while ice-fishing. So, these were the first trout I'd caught on fly gear! Hooray!

Normally when I go trout fishing locally, it is on "stocking day", when the catching is sometimes fairly easy. But these fish have been in the lake now for probably at least 6 months, so are more saavy than freshly stocked fish.
Here's some trout pics from last night: