Burke Lake and exploration

June 26, 2010

Stopped with Sarah on the way home from picking her up from girl's camp. She wanted to float tube. Went to Burke Lake on the way home. Kicked around for an hour with no action, no rises visible, nothing. Buggers, hare's ear nymphs, small nymphs, nothing drew a strike.

Next went south of George to check out a couple "Drains" that are planted yearly with fingerling trout. First location was high and somewhat colored, and I would have thrown out a few casts except for the several hundred beehives right next to the parking area, the beehive in the ditch bank, and the bees flying all around everywhere. Saw a school of small (3" to 4"), trout-shaped fish suspended near the bank.

The next location further downstream was much larger, higher, and dirtier, winding between grassy banks. Both locations look interesting enough for a return exploratory visit before or after irrigation season (of course, that applies to just about anyplace I see with year round moving water!)

Michelle & Rob on the Yakima

Michelle and I had a "last hurrah" trip before I'm no longer her favorite boy. We floated with Joe Rotter from Red's and had a great day fishing. Started the day with some nice activity on dries, then changed to a double nymph set up and got lots with stones at first and fish changing over to small prince nymphs as the day wore on.

Had a great lunch with grilled chicken breasts on the river. Seasoned with lemon pepper and then topped with Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ sauce. Chicken pasta salad, fresh orange slices and a cookie. Not bad!

Had several fish in the 20's, lots in the teens, and a few "Chesters" mixed throughout. Fish in great shape and a nice distribution. A great day with my number one daughter.

On the way to Wenatchee and back....

June 18/19, 2010

Holding to my commitment to myself to report on all fishing trips, I'll add a couple brief notes here (sorry, no photos):

Friday, June 18 The Creek. Stopped with Sarah taking her up for girls camp. Started at the flat rock falls and worked up. We only caught a few, and the grass was heavily and freshly trampled, so we moved up to the crossing. Similar results. Although no other vehicles were present, it appeared to have been fished earlier. I probably landed a half dozen, Sarah a couple. Renegade, of course, although I tried a psycho prince nymph in the beaver dam and landed a couple.

Just up from the crossing is a big beaver dam that innundated the deep hole by the big rock/concrete you had to climb up and around. Don't step off that thing, it was six feet deep (measured with my rod, not me!). Worked our way past the beaver's den, where you could hear him chomping or something like that. Sarah wouldn't crawl in to see.

Climbing out we ran into a flyfisher coming down the road. He said he'd been fishing a beaver dam up farther and had driven in from the north. Said the road had been graveled and was in good shape.

Saturday, June 19 Upper Caliche Lake. I wanted a quick stop with my float tube, so I thought I'd see if I could find anything at this sentimental stopping point. It was a bit windy, no surface action. In 40 minutes of trolling around about half the lake, I caught a 12" fat perch, and that was all. Black sparkly wooly bugger.

Flyfishing Training

June 12, 2010 At the nearby irrigation pond....

Had an evening to spend with Melinda, so we first gave the Family Fishing Pond in Columbia Park a try. Murky water, no visible action, so we moved on to McD's for dinner, then proceeded to a little pond in the middle of a nearby neighborhood. There are bass in the pond, but the easy target is the small bluegill. Perfect training for a budding flyfishergirl. A little size 16 or 18 prince nymph, and a thingamabobber for strike indicator training, and we were good to go. Mel could drop the fly within a foot or two of shore and watch her indicator or the fly. After about a dozen bluegill in not too many minutes, she looked at me and said, "this is kind of fun!" She also learned to unhook them, and did so herself a few times.

It's a nice little pond where you can take kids to have fun catching fish. And no snakes, ticks, or anything like that - mown grass bordering backyards. Suburban fishing at its best!

Little Nunya

June 10, 2010

Dad, Tom, and Rick got up really early to give Nunya a try; however, we found it chocolate brown with zero visibility from recent rains. So we continued on to our fall back stream that I had visited twice last week.

In the morning, we fished up and found some trout, but not a lot and not much size like my morning stop on the way to the airport. Walked up a lot farther, and found a good bit of flat water with some nice holes in places. Got drenched in a downpour. The long walk back tired Dad out, so he stayed at the car while Tom and I checked out further downstream than we had tried before.

Not much action the first half mile and a lot of flat water, then it changed to quite a few riffles for the next half mile. The sun came out and so did the fish, especially when I tied on a psycho prince nymph caddis green size 18. In the little run below, I proceeded to catch them on every cast. After about two dozen, I mentioned to Tom (who was not having success below) what I was using and that he might try up where I was. He came up, and after I landed another six or so to his one strike on a small nymph, I gave him a green micromayfly to try which looked similar. We stood side by side and continued to pull fish out of this run, altogether probably 60 fish or more out of this one spot! Most were in the 7" to 12" range.





We continued to find nice fish, and felt bad that we wore Dad out in the morning. Some riffles we'd pick up a few, others a bunch. Largest size about 13", spooked a couple in the 20"+ range.

Near the end of the day, I broke my magic fly off on a fish setting the hook. While I was tying on the new dropper line, Tom proceeded to hook and land a fish. Then he says, "Hey, this guy has someone's fly in his mouth" and shortly thereafter adds "It's the fly you just broke off!" So he pulls it out of the fish and hands it back to me. I tie it on and start catching fish again. He is quite the brother!

Numbers for the day - Dad had fifteen or so in the morning, I had a couple dozen, not sure about Tom. In the afternoon, I had to be well over 75, and Tom wouldn't have been that far behind. Fly of choice - pyscho prince nymph caddis green, size 18, fished on a dropper below a size 16 prince nymph tungsten bead. Green micro mayfly did almost as well.

Heather's Catch 22 for Age 22

Heather and Daddy went fishing today to celebrate her 22nd birthday. She wanted to catch 22 fish to match her years and she was successful. We went to The Creek and despite downed trees (active beaver built a couple more dams), overhanging grass, and other obstacles she managed to find the fish.

She learned a new technique for releasing the fly when caught in a tree eight feet overhead, learned how to shortline dip a fly in tight quarters, how to underhand flip cast to get beneath brush or branches that are all the way across the river. She also discovered that if after having broken off and retied a couple of flies she can plead with her dad to "please tie this one on for me", take his fly rod and proceed to land two fish in the time it takes to tie on a new renegade.

No surprise, renegade was the fly de-jour as usual. I tried to get her to keep the grasshopper on her line that was there from her last time fishing so I could fish alone with the renegade, but she didn't take the bait and asked me for a renegade which she promptly tied on.

We had a nice lunch after spending the morning fishing--rotiserie chicken, Fuji apples, and sourdough bread washed down with ice-water from the Nalgene bottles. What a great way to spend the morning!

On the Way From the Airport....

June 4, 2010 On the Way From the Airport....

Well, I came back from Michigan and paid another visit to one of my favorite creeks on the way home. Despite all the rain in the morning, the water was crystal clear, but there was a truck at the pull out. I figured they had gone up to fish the water I found last time, so I decided to just fish around the bridge. About an hour and a half later with one pheasant tail chewed to the bare hook, I still hadn't made it to the bridge. I couldn't stop catching them in the water below the bridge. All small, 5" to 10" bows. Then two guys come walking up from down river. I talked to them a bit, and after they left high-tailed it up to where I ended fishing last time.

I didn't find the monster I saw last time, but found bigger fish up there (a lot in the 10" to 13" range). Oh, and did I say a lot of them? Think "The Creek", but with more water, no overhanging branches, and a little bigger fish. There were several riffles where I wanted to move up to the next hole that I could see upstream, but I just kept catching fish! (what a sad situation to be in). The stream eventually narrowed to winding between grass banks with some deeper shots. This could be fun in hopper season.

I wore another pheasant tail to the bare hook, and had to tie on a third. Fish were actively feeding on a small white mayfly, but that is a lot harder to hook them on, so I stuck with the nymph under a foam hopper. All in all, a conservative estimate of 80 to 100 fish to hand in 4 hours on the water. I love flying out of Spokane!

Bows & Browns

Went to the FRC with Dad and Matt Jeffery today. Rained like crazy on the drive there but stopped just when we arrived. Winds were surprisingly/miraculously/graciously calm. We actually had about 10 minutes of sunshine and glass calm water.

Matt got us off to a rapid start with a fish landed before we even finished the first turn down at the far end of the lake. Takes were very light and Dad had lots of them before he finally got the "Ed Dersham leave it in the rod holder until it starts pulling out line" technique down. Really difficult when the "rod holder" is his hands.

Best fish of the day was a 20" bow which Dad got in. I caught one at 19" and Matt caught a nice German Brown Trout. (see photo). Dad had the prize for the biggest and smallest trout, but near the end I managed to catch the smallest fish of the day--a bluegill that probably measured about 2.25". (no photo)

As we were driving out at noon it started to rain again and pounded us pretty well until we reached Vantage. A great morning at the pond!

On the Way to the Airport...

June 1, 2010

Had to fly to Michigan for a couple days, so I scheduled my flight out of Spokane so I could do a little fishing on the way there and back. Stopped at a favorite place along the way (kind of), and since I only had a couple hours, I decided to fish the stretch near the road where we often catch a lot of little ones rather than explore some new stretches. Well, there were a few little guys, but not as many as normal. So I found myself moving on. Caught one at the corner where Tom found a couple dozen last year. Kept walking. A lot of flat water where I spooked some good sized cruisers just by walking on the high bank (in the range of 14" to 18"). Found a bit of moving water, and a few more little guys. Tramped along the trail some more and then took a peek at the water - hmmmm, that looks nice! Meandering with riffles below a high bank, again spooked a nice one just looking down. I had about 20 minutes until I had to go. Quickly fished through a couple holes, with nothing. Came to the third little hole about the time my watch alarm went off. I'm checked in, I have a little more time. Toss my black beadhead bugger with a trailing pheasant tail. Hook and lose a nice fish in the 12" to 14" range. A few more casts and about ten feet in front of me a huge back arches out of the water, showing the pink side of a large trout as it tries to swallow my white thingamabobber (strike indicator). Whoa!!! That thing was a very, very fat 20+" bow! I still have a minute or two. Tie on a foam hopper, toss it out. The fly hesitates at the edge of an eddy on the foam line. A huge swirl that you could hear clearly it was so big. But the fly was rejected. No time to try new flies, just to dream about stopping on Friday on the way home......