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!

Lunchtime Limit, 3-1-2012

I’m so EXCITED!!!!  I just fly-fished Lake Petocka from shore during my lunch hour today.  It was so fun!

I caught (and released) my limit (5) of trout, which I felt was impressive for a number of reasons:
- I had no idea what to expect...ice only recently melted off the lake, and we had 50 mph winds just yesterday!

-I couldn’t see any fish, so I was really just blind casting.

-I didn’t fish the area I had planned to, but instead just fished a  fairly random location that wasn’t ideal (for casting) based on the wind direction.

-When driving time was figured in (and yes, I probably stayed longer than I technically should have), I had only about 35 minutes to fish.

-Most of my time was spent re-tying a line (because the first or second trout demolished my No-Knot Fas-Snap) and taking pictures of each fish.

-My line was getting tangled in rocks at my feet and in sticks, trees and brush behind me.  I was a mess!

-Trout were last stocked in this lake at least 35 days ago ( on January 25th, 2012).  They generally get tougher to find/catch the longer they've been in the lake.

-Judging by the fin clips...some of these fish were from at least 2 stockings ago (October 14, 2011)!

So...as it worked out, Probably every 3rd or 4th cast resulted in a trout on the line.  I even missed one good hit!  If only I'd had more time...  I was retrieving in quick, short jerks (no indicator), and the fish hit and fought very well.

All the fish were caught on a #10 olive-n-black beadhead woolly bugger.

And the fish:

Trout No. 1

Trout No. 2

Trout No. 3

Trout No. 4

Trout No. 5

Fly-Fishing Lessons Learned in 2011

I try to do this after each year, in hopes that I will remember SOME of what I thought I learned from each year's fishing adventures.

Here's some of the things I learned:

-Stream Trout.  I had never fly-fished for stream trout before.  I discovered that I really enjoy it.  Too bad the nearest trout streams are a 3-4 hour drive away, and there is so many other good places to catch fish that are much much closer.  Anyway, I learned at least one way to catch these fish.  I used a large nymph pattern and an indicator.  I fished pools, deeper slicks, and bank hides.  I look forward to doing this again in the future, and start exploring more streams.

-Carp Riddle Solved.  One behavior of local river carp that had perplexed a handful of local fly-anglers is when carp will line up along the shoreline or current break just beneath the surface.  They often appear to be snacking on nothing, or maybe the foam that is floating on the surface.  A variety of techniques were unsuccessfully tried on these fish.  I decided to try fishing a nymph extremely shallow beneath an indicator to these fish.  The belief was that the indicator would scare the fish away.  Carp are pretty smart and wily, after all.  Turns out it worked just fine.  I'd fish the nymph just 8" to 18" beneath the indicator.  I tried a variety of wet fly patterns, and all worked.  I used a Thingamabobber, which is translucent like the foam on the water.  After losing several fish to lines that broke at the Thingamabobber, I've decided to try a different style of indicator.  I'm certain it will still work.

-Channel Catfish/Bread  Connection.  While attempting to improve my success with flyfishing for Grass Carp, I discovered that chumming with bread in the local ponds during the summer can be effective in bringing the catfish to you.  Once they are nearby and feeding, you can often (but not always) be successful in enticing the catfish to hit artificial "bread flies" or white streamers.

-Channel Catfish and Streamers.  I discovered that the "Jumpin' Catfish Nymph" works for catfish.  I also learned that white streamers are very effective for Channel Catfish.  I used white hair streamers in two situations...the "bread" situation in ponds that I discussed above...and when the catfish are chasing shad in a large local reservoir.  I can't say it was the MOST effective method of catching these fish, but it DID catch some, and it was F-U-N!!!

-Walleye on Flies.  Catching a walleye on flies was a goal of mine this year.  I figured my best chance was during our fishing trip to Canada in the late Spring.  Before I could get there, I "lucked" into one in Iowa while fishing a lake for sunfish from my kayak.  I did end up catching something like 5 or 6 on flies while in Canada, both nymphs and streamers.  And then I caught another one in a local river here in Iowa in the late Fall.  How cool!

-Smallmouth on Poppers.  I FINALLY tried fly-fishing a central Iowa stream for smallmouth bass.  I'd caught smallies on fly gear before on a stream in Illinois, but hadn't really tried it since moving back to Iowa.  So I went, during the middle of the afternoon of the hottest week of the summer, and the river level was about as low as it gets.  I tried Clousers, nymphs and streamers.  I worked at it pretty hard and landed a couple of fish, but it was TOUGH.  I decided to try a popper.  First cast had barely hit the water before I had a fish hooked.  It worked really well, and I caught several more fish on it. And of course watching fish crush topwaters is always exciting!

-Stocker Trout.  Weeks after the trout had been stocked in a local lake, typically the trout get hard to catch.  I took a day off work and tried to see what I could get to bite.  I had solicited suggestions on my favorite fly-fishing website.  One suggestion was to try the "Blue Thunder" streamer.  I tried a few other patterns first with less than satisfactory results, then tried this streamer.  It worked GREAT!  I've used it a few times since, and it can be hit-or-miss...but it is certainly worth trying, and plus its a fairly easy and good-looking streamer to tie.

I also caught my first stocker Brook Trout, and learned that I REALLY like these fish!  Its not that they are much different than catching a rainbow trout...but they are a Char, rather than a trout, historically native to Iowa, and such a colorful fish.