When working the shallows for cruising fish, the best results tend to come if you can drop the fly well ahead of the fish, let it sink down to slightly below the level at which the trout is moving, then start a slow retrieve right in front of the trout's nose. Even if he's never seen anything like it before (and if it's a Zug Bug, there's a good chance of that), he may well take it out of curiosity and because it's just too easy. The take can be impressively casual. Naturally, the ideal conditions required for this tactic to work (excellent visibility, fish that don't veer off at the last minute, and so on) don't always come together on a regular basis, but some variation of this tactic is usually the most consistent way to take cruising fish in shallow water. Since trout and grayling often cruise around the shallows in apparently random patterns, you'll Often find yourself having to drop the fly only a foot or so in front of them,, and this is where I prefer a smaller fly that makes less of a splash when it hits the water. At times the fish don't seem to mind a fly plopping onto the surface-sometimes they'll even be attracted by it-but it's usually fair to assume they won't like it very much, and you should try to cast as far ahead as possible. When the visibility is poor, you're reduced to using the same tactic blind. You won't know if you" re casting to a spot where there are no fish at the moment or are dropping the fly right on top of them.
A refreshing mountain lake.
|
Happily, the conditions that will most often limit visibility in shallow water-a breeze, a cloudy day, or a light spatter of rain-will tend to make the fish a bit less spooky. It sounds like it might even out but, in my book at least, it doesn't. I'll take clouds and wind over excellent visibility anytime. The speed and style of your retrieve will have as much to do with your success as any other factor, including pattern. The answer may be a slow, crawling hand twist retrieve, a fast swimming strip, or something in between. As a general rule, trout that are cruising, lazily seem to be more interested in the slow crawl, while those that are darting around chasing bugs want a faster strip. The fly should act more or less like the trout because the trout are probably acting like the real bugs. When in doubt, start off slowly and gently-you'll be less likely to spook the fish. If no fish are working the shallows, try at any stream inlet or outlet-anywhere there's a current. The inlet of a healthy stream will usually be pumping in a small but steady supply of aquatic bugs, and it's always possible there will be a full-blown hatch going on, in which case the insects will be concentrated on the area of the lake right at the inlet. If the bugs are just filtering in a few at a time, you may find only small fish working the inlet, but if there are good numbers of bugs, then the larger fish may well move in. Also, a little hatch that doesn't amount to much on the stream can really turn into something when the bugs start to collect at the lake inlet.
A good strong outlet can serve almost the same purpose, collecting the floating insects from the surface of the lake and delivering them, in a gentle current, to the waiting fish.
I got into an interesting situation like that a few years ago on a cutthroat lake. The only place fish were working was at the outlet, and only in a little twenty-by-thirty-foot piece of water where the current really started to pick up. The water was glass-smooth until the last second when it went over a little shoulder-high falls into the creek. My partner and I couldn't see a thing on the water, not even a speck, but the trout-maybe twenty fish altogether-were rising steadily. We could see the fish pretty clearly in the smooth water, and they were darting around some, not just holding in one spot. We took that to mean they were very interested in what was on the surface but there weren't a lot of bugs, whatever they were. The fact that we could see absolutely nothing on the surface from a good vantage point under almost perfect conditions meant the bugs were either flush floating (like a mayfly spinner) or very small (like midges) or both.
It was a one-man spot, so we flipped a coin and my friend took his turn. He also took a fish on the third cast with a #18 black deer hair beetle. I don't carry that pattern, so when my turn came I tried a #18 spinner and took a fish.
Between us we took a dozen fish from that spot (resting it for a few minutes now and then), and we were successful with five different patterns. I don't think that's too unusual, and I've seen it a number of times. It's rare to find a concentration of a single kind of insect at an outlet. I almost always use a small, low-floating fly in a situation like that with the smooth, clear water and all, but someday I'll get up the nerve to try a #10 Royal Humpy, just to see if it works.
If it's spawning time, the fish may be concentrated at the inlets, the outlets, or both. It's hard to resist trying to hook one or two fish at a time like this, if only to have a look at their bright, spawning colors. But for obvious reasons, it's best to leave spawning fish alone or, at the very least, to release any you may catch.
© Article copyright Pruett Publishing.
Powered by Trip.com
