Spring can be a cruel season for fly anglers. Rivers are either closed to fishing or running high and murky.
This year's snowpack is ranging above normal, so it's likely many rivers will be tough to fish even when they reopen Memorial Day weekend. (In Washington, many rivers reopen to trout fishing on June 4.)
Many fly anglers head to reservoirs in the spring, but others sit on the sidelines because lakes and reservoirs require a different set of skills, tactics and gear.
But if you learn a few basic lake techniques, you will be surprised how effective you can be at catching fish.
Spring is usually the best time of year to fish stillwater because fish are waking up from the long winter and are hungry and aggressive.
Water temperatures and conditions are prime for trout. The ones that live in lakes tend to be of larger average size than those in rivers, and you can catch some real monsters.
Lloyd Rogers of Boise has been flyfishing for trout in stillwater for more than 40 years.
The 73-year-old spends about 100 days a year fishing lakes and reservoirs in several states. He often sees fly anglers making the common mistake of fishing the middle of a lake with a floating line and dragging a fly behind them in hopes of getting a strike.
Some people are overwhelmed by the size of a lake and don't know where to fish.
Rogers says an easy way to narrow it down is fish areas that are 10 feet deep or shallower.
He fishes from a float tube or pontoon boat and casts toward the shore and strips his fly back.
Trout often feed in as little as a foot of water, and, unlike river fish that are often keying in on one insect, lake fish tend to be opportunists that will eat whatever is in front of them.
Rogers focuses on two key areas: the shallows along a shoreline and the weed beds in 4 to 6 feet of water.
He looks for trout feeding on bait fish in the shallows and on insects in or near the weed beds.
Mike Smith of Eagle, Idaho, is another angler who exclusively fishes stillwater, and he targets big trout.
"If you want to catch a better quality of fish, you've got to fish the lakes," he said.
Smith likes minnow patterns, and in spring he often uses a tandem rig with a larger fly up front like a minnow or leech pattern trailed by a smaller fly that imitates an aquatic insect.
He fishes sinking lines with about 10 feet of fluorocarbon leader and frequently fishes a 2X or 3X tippet (about a 6- to 8-pound test).
He ties his flies to his leader with a loop knot, such as a Rapala knot, which gives the flies better action than a clinch knot or similar knot that tightens against the eye of the hook.
Smith warns that while a double-fly rig can be effective, it can also be risky because it leaves a hook dangling when you're fighting a fish, which can snag on weeds, rocks, a log or other structure.
Both anglers use depth finders and pause and count after a cast so they know to what depth their fly has sunk before they start stripping it back (to learn how, read about sinking lines in the basic stillwater gear section later).
They also alternate the stripping speed depending on water conditions and the fish's mood. In early spring when water temperatures are below 45 degrees, fish tend to be lethargic and less likely to chase a fly that's quickly retrieved.
When temperatures reach the high-40s and low-50s, trout are more aggressive, and you can use a faster strip.
Another key to stillwater trout fishing is detecting strikes, which can be more subtle than many anglers realize. Keep your rod tip in the water or within inches of the surface and maintain constant contact with your fly.
If you feel any resistance when stripping, set the hook. If you learn to strip strike, which is setting the hook by pulling the line rather than lifting the rod, you can keep your fly at about the same depth if you miss a strike.
Both men said fish are likely to cruise the shallows during early morning and evening, then move into deeper water during the day.
Neither Rogers nor Smith spends much time fishing deeper than 10 feet. They say fish will rest in deeper water, but do most of their feeding in shallower water.
To find fish, Rogers said he will typically start at the downwind end of a lake or reservoir because that's where the food usually accumulates.
Smith said if he's on an unfamiliar lake, he will do a quick pass and watch his fish finder for schools of fish before he starts casting.
Both spend lots of time on the water because they never know when fish will go on the bite.
"You've got to give it all day," Smith said.
It's common to have the best fishing of the day during a span of an hour or two, and it's not always during those prime morning and evening periods.
Smith said his best fishing tends to be on cloudy or overcast days. Storms can put fish off the bite momentarily, but they usually resume feeding shortly after it passes.
Both men use flies that imitate a fairly small variety of a trout's diet, including bait fish, leeches and aquatic insects like chironomids, damselflies and mayflies.
• Float tube or pontoon boat. They're easily portable and inexpensive. They not only get you where the fish are, but put you in the right casting position to catch them.
• Sinking lines. Learning all the different sinking lines can be complex and almost worthy of a separate article, but here are the basics. Sinking fly lines differ in how many inches they sink per second, which is rated 1 though 6 and often written in Roman numerals. The number equates to how quickly the line sinks, so a Type 5 or (Type V), would sink about 5 inches per second.
Each line also has a certain depth that is its sweet spot. Water gets denser at depths, so the line tends to stall at certain depths. The stall depth for a Type 1 line is 2 to 4 feet, and a Type 7 will stall at 15 to 25 feet.
You will usually see a Type 1 line referred to as "intermediate," which can be confusing because it has a sink rate of about an inch per second.
Intermediate lines are effective for fishing the shallows, or when fish are cruising near the surface.
Light and heavy lines have their pros and cons. A light line sinks very slowly, so it takes a long time to reach fish holding in deeper water. A heavier line will keep sinking even as you strip it, so it's hard to keep your fly in shallow water and more prone to sinking to the bottom and snagging.
Type 3 is a popular all-around line because it sinks reasonably fast and stays in water from 5 to 10 feet deep, which is usually a good range for fly anglers in most lakes.
• Floating line. This is what you want for dry fly fishing, which is still an option on stillwater. You can also fish a weighted fly with floating line and get it down to a reasonable depth, but weighting a fly changes its action when it's retrieved. As a rule of thumb, a sinking line is more effective because the fly and line stay at about the same depth when you retrieve them, but with a weighted fly under a floating line, the fly rises through the water column as it's stripped.
• Depth finder. Most serious stillwater anglers use a depth finder. You can buy one for less than $100, and there are models designed for float tubes or pontoon boats. They let you know the depth, where fish are located and whether the bottom is muddy, rocky or weedy.
• Flies. Here's an open secret about stillwater fishing -- you don't need a big selection for lakes and reservoirs. About a half dozen patterns will do in most situations.
Here Mike Smith's favorite stillwater flies: chub minnow imitation, pheasant tail, Rickard's stillwater nymph, black and brown seal buggers, burgundy stillwater bugger, and a damsel nymph.
• Five-weight rods are the most popular for river fishing, but most lake anglers prefer a 6- or 7-weight rod.
They cast the heavier sinking lines better, handle wind better, and can pull heavy fish out of the weeds, or keep them from going into them.
Serious lake anglers usually carry more than one rod with each rigged with a different line.
Guerlain Ombre Eclat Duo Liner
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