Spring time is here, most of our lakes have thawed out and the fish are very hungry. Its always a great time to fish stillwaters since the fish are close to the shoreline edges of the lakes that have had ice on them for months. These fish are now looking to start putting on the feed bags and fatten up as much as they can. Midges, which in most stillwaters are around 85% of a trouts diet in the spring, are the main food source until other food items start to appear later on in the season. This is a great time for anglers now to sharpen up on your chrionomid fishing skills and have some fun in the process.

LOOKING FORWARD TO SEEING OLD FREINDS AND MAKING NEW FRIENDS IN THE MONTH OF APRIL. I HAVE THE HONOR TO SPEAK TO THREE FLY FISHING CLUBS AND ALSO SPENDING SOME TIME AT A VERY NICE FLY FISHING SHOP IN GRASS VALLEY NAMED THE "REEL ANGLERS FLY SHOP" APRIL 5TH I WILL BE DOING A MEET AND GREET WITH OWNER TOM PAGE FROM 2PM TO 4:30PM. I WILL BE TYING UP SOME OF MY CROWLEY LAKE MIDGE SPECIALS AND LEADER SYSTEMS. LOOKING FORWARD TO SPENDING SOME TIME IN THIS GREAT FLY SHOP MAKING SOME NEW FRIENDS, TALKING ABOUT CROWLEY AND PYRAMID LAKE! 

HAD THE CHANCE A FEW WEEKS BACK AT THE PLEASANTON FLY FISHING SHOW TO WORK IN THE HARDY BOOTH. WOW, ARE THESE RODS THAT HARDY MAKE SOMETHING SPECIAL. THE ZEPHRUS BY FAR IS MY FAVORITE ROD AND IT ALMOST CASTS ITSELF. ITS NOT REALLY FAIR BUT SO GLAD TO BE ABLE TO HAVE THESE RODS, ZEPHRUS, WRAITH AND THE FENWICK RODS, WORLD CLASS, AETOS AND THE NEW HARDY GLASS IN MY ARSENAL NOW AND MOVING FORWARD INTO THE FUTURE.

Fantastic Stillwater Fly Fishing

At a new fishery known as Lago Fig

Earlier this month I had the opportunity to fish a small lake located 45 miles North of Santa Barbara. The fishery is fairly new, in only the second year of existence, and is located in the rolling hills above a little town in California’s wine country called Los Olivos. What the lake itself lacks in size is made up for very quickly by the size of the rainbow trout it holds. On this trip the fish caught averaged about 17", with many fish in the 20" inch range. My first fish to the net while fishing intermediate sinking line and a black and red leech pattern was a whooping 22" and well into the 5 pound range.

This adventure started on a Saturday morning in a parking lot at a country store in Los Olivos. I was there to meet Ken Lindsay, the owner of the fly fishing store called "The Fisherman's Spot" located in Van Nuys. This is one of the best fly fishing stores I have seen and you should take advantage and visit this store in the near future. Ken and I were to meet one of his store’s customers and brain child of Lago Fig’s existence, Lake Manager, and local ranch owner Rick Paaske. From there we were escorted only five minutes away to his beautiful ranch nestled in the foothills outside of town where I was pleasantly surprised at my first glance at this beautiful little Stillwater fishery settled in a small steep canyon surrounded by green grass, beautiful oak trees.

As we all parked - there were 6 anglers in our group - I popped out of my truck and unloaded my gear very quickly. Ken said, “Slow down Ernie”, to which I replied “You know me better than that and how passionate I am about my Stillwater fly fishing”. I was quickly in the water with four rods in hand on board of my super fat cat pontoon , one intermediate line, one sinking line type 4, one floating line for indicator fishing and on other indicator rod for deep water indicator fishing with a sliding indicator for water over 15 feet deep. As I kicked away I could hear the anglers ask, “Wow, who is this guy?”, a question I would hear a few more times throughout the day as the fishing became better and better using midges under an indicator. As I kicked away stripping line off of my intermediate line rod I was surprised to see just 30 feet or so off the shore line the water was well over 15 feet and dropping fast into the 20 to 25 foot depths. Wow, I said to myself, I will have to let this intermediate sink for a while to get down closer to the bottom so I slowed my kicking down to a crawl and casted out 60 feet of line. No more than 2 minutes later my rod loaded up and I was on a nice fish and as quickly as the fish loaded the rod the fish disappeared back into the depths. I was not disappointed, not by a long shot. Success so soon was more than I could have asked for.

Pyramid Lake is located 35 miles North of Reno, Nevada on the Piute Indian reservation. This ancient lake, along with the Piute Indians, has been around since the beginning of time. This beautiful sea has only one inflow, the Truckee River, which is being cut in half by the derby dam completed in the early 1900’s to divert water into the Carson City basin. The lake has been hanging on by its finger tips over the years and a much needed 2011 winter has risen this lake over 4 feet due to one of best winters the Sierra’s has had in its history. Still with all of the trials and tribulations this ancient lake and its people have gone thru, it remains in my opinion one of the best stillwater destinations in all of the United States. In no other stillwater lake can I think of at any one given moment, on any given cast, you have a chance to hook a 10, 15 or 20 pound cutthroat trout on a fly rod. Here is the story of my trip of the year, Pyramid Lake, NV.

My trip was to be a 7 day expedition to Pyramid; however with unforeseen adjustments with my fishing partner, we decided to make it a four day trip with three days of fishing. This is a very long drive for me, more than 540 miles one way but it was going to be Pyramid Lake or bust. I started my journey from my home in Riverside, CA at 9am in the morning, next stop, Mammoth Lakes, CA to pick up my fishing buddy, Joe Contaldi of Performance Anglers Guide Service. This would be an opportunity for my first trip with Joe to Pyramid Lake and hopefully many, many more in the years to come. All reports since the beginning of the season were dismal to say the least. Anglers were averaging 1 to 3 fish per day. This year’s fishing reports from Pyramid had been the worst reports in over 20 years. The fish were not moving into the shallows to spawn, water temperatures had held them back and with a very warm weather front moving in we decided to take a chance and make the trip anyways. With a lot of hope and a few prayers, a chance at a monster Lahanton cutthroat on any given cast was on our mind. Nine and a half hours later, which seemed like an eternity to the both of us, we arrived at the ancient shores and unpacked the truck. Along with our entire fly fishing gear and camping equipment, we also unpacked our ladders, yes ladders. This is one of the tools that you need to fish Pyramid and be successful, however this year we didn’t need our ladders, we used them sparingly with very minimal success. We fished mostly deep drop-offs that can be found on many of the different beaches found along the 25 mile long western side shoreline of the lake, mostly standing and wading in ankle deep water along the edge of the shoreline. Our favorite and most productive beach turned out to be a beach named “Sand Hole” located on the southern end of the lake close to where the Truckee River feeds into the lake.