Stillwater Sunday

       On Sunday, Sam and i were invited to fish a private trout lake in the hills outside of town. The lake,formerly a bass/panfish fishery, was stocked with trout  last year.It is a healthy body of water with all of the components needed to sustain a trout fishery, but knowing large bass inhabit the lake made me question the lakes potential.We arrived a little before 9 and started fishing from float tubes.Water was murky with 2-3 ft visibility and a muddy tint, surface temp in the mid 50's.Fishing a new lake can always be frustrating because you never know what the fish are eating, and where they are at in the lake.Luckily there was a map showing how deep the lake was, making it easier to find feeding fish.


I started out with a clear intermediate sinking line and a size 10 black/red simi seal leech and worked the shoal area to the east of the channel that runs down the middle of the lake, side by side with jay and his wife slowly trolling our patterns. Not long into the morning we began to hook into some fish but not a ton,action was consistent.After about half an hour of bites and jay still hooking good amounts of fish, i narrowed down an area that seemed to have lots of fish.I anchored in 14ft of water to the side of the channel, and rigged up with a two fly chironomid rig, with a maroon pupa on the point, and a small red bloodworm on the dropper. Almost immediately after my patterns sunk it was bobber (indicator) down! it pretty much remained the same way on and off for the next few hours, with the bite picking up then dropping off for a bit here and there. Depth really seemed to matter, as the fish were cruising a narrow water column about  1-2ft off the bottom.I stayed in the same general area the whole trip with good success, and after lunch sam and jay both joined me for some chironomid fishing and the action continued until we had to call it quits. The day ended with several large rainbows to net for us all. What an excellent day on the water, and more to come as the lakes over eat open up soon.