Lake Fishing Amber Lake

Eastern Washington is loaded with lakes. Not so many rivers. That is what Idaho is for. Well the Idaho Rivers have the run-off going right now so they are almost all un-fishable. That leaves me Washington lakes and I don't know how to fly fish lakes. I went to the local fly shop, Silver Bow, and got the low down on what I needed to do to catch fish here. They showed me some fly patterns that I tied up and sent me on my way. The first trip to this lake produced nothing. The other anglers reported it as a slow day too so I didn't feel so bad. Here is my second trip to the lake. Success. My first trout from a lake using chironomids I tied. I caught a few and actually enjoyed myself. I learned a new skill that will benefit me when river fishing is impossible.

The big guy. All cutthroat. Thick as can be. Caught on an olive Anato-May.

My first trout in a lake caught on a size 22 olive chironimid.

Love catching these bad boys.

Learning a New Skill

I am the worst at tying flies. But I have been stuck inside unable to go fishing because the run off so I needed to do something fly fishing related. Ben has now got me hooked on tying. I have been tying up still water patterns to get ready for some lake fishing. Here are some of my new creations.

Panfish Charlie

Chironomids

Streamers

Fly Tying

I am the worst at tying flies. Lets start with that. The other day Ben helped me via text to tie this egg sucking leech. This is the easiest fly to tie ever, but it still took me 30 minutes to tie the first one. This is the quality fly I have ever tied. Now this is not something to brag about. Like I said, easiest fly to tie ever. I am still proud and will post it on here just in case there is anyone else out there struggling to tie flies and needs to know that there is hope for those of us who's hands seem to botch every fly they attempt.


Put orange hot bead on size 6 streamer hook.


Lay thread base down and then wrap hook shank with desired amount of lead wire for additional weight.


Tie on black rabbit hair zonker, tail the length of the shank. You can also add some flash to the tail at this point. I did on 4 of my half dozen I tied up.


Advance your thread to the bead head then wrap the zonker around the hook shank while pulling back the hair so you don't wrap hair fibers under.When you reach the bead head with the rabbit fur give the hair 8-10 wraps to hold it down then whip finish and done.


I know these are nothing to brag about but I am very excited that I did well. I tied half a dozen and it got me so stoked to try something new since I finally succeeded.


Here are some example of my previous flies just so you get an I idea of how bad I really am. Check out the yellow body wrapping on this baby.


Here is the Daniel Special. "Head crowding the eye so much it takes a wire tippet to poke through the eye."


Here are my warm water flies and streamer boxes. Not a lot of stuff but working on tying up many more.