Winter lake fishing

[Nol]

I was thinking of doing a little lake fishing this winter but don't have much experience. Does anyone have any advice in terms of techniques and finding fish this time of year? I was planning to go to places such as Pass lake or Cady lake.

[dominic7471]

use a boat and sinking line and troll wooley buggers... unless theres a chironomid hatch coming off and see if the trout are keying in....

[Steven Green]

Slim chance you will catch anything without good sinking line. White wooly buggers are one of the go to winter lake flies for west side lakes. fish deep deep deep on the shoals right where the lake drops off to deeper water. make sure to do a slow retrieve. other than that i agree with dominic, look for hatches or anything else the trout are keying in.

[dominic7471]

i don't like to fish lakes in winter personally...

[uncledave]

A properly presented bloodworm pattern can keep your rod hot many times on cold, windy winter days. See you on Pass!

[hikepat]

Do not be afaid to check the shallows out on the rare warmer days in the middle of winter. I have often seen and have caught some large fish in water as shallow as 1-3 foot of water along the lake edges on many of our year round lakes in Dec, Jan and Feb.
If cold and cloudy or in the rain then deep is the only way to go.

[sharpshooter223]

whats the definition of cold?

[chadk]

whats the definition of cold?

http://www.washingtonflyfishing.com/gallery/data/522/Feb_07_180_Large_.JPG (http://www.washingtonflyfishing.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=18681)

:clown:

[sharpshooter223]

what about temp wise?

[barbless]

what about temp wise?

It depends on what temp your antifreeze is rated for - and how much of it you drink. I have frozen my ass off when ambient temp is around 45 degrees, and been comfortable when it's below freezing. I always feel warmer when the fish are cooperating.

[Jim Wallace]

I'm about ready to do some winter lake fishing as I break in my new 4-stroke. I was hoping for some balmier weather, but it looks like I'm gonna freeze my okole off. I don't tank up on anti-freeze when i'm boating, because its warmth only works when its going down the hatch, anyway. Alcohol in your system does not fight hypothermia...just the opposite, in fact.
Big thermos of hot coffee!:cool:

[CovingtonFly]

[QUOTE=Big thermos of hot coffee!:cool:[/QUOTE]


Then you risk freezing your wang off becuase you have to pull it out every 5 minutes to urinate. :beer1::beer2:ptyd
fishing with out a fly isn't fly fishing and fishing with out beer isn't fishing:ray1:

[Wayne Jordan]

http://i106.photobucket.com/albums/m280/wj35/Fishing%20Pics/Ice%20Fishing/IceBass.jpg
http://i106.photobucket.com/albums/m280/wj35/Fishing%20Pics/Ice%20Fishing/Bradslaker.jpg
http://i106.photobucket.com/albums/m280/wj35/Fishing%20Pics/Ice%20Fishing/Pike.jpg
:thumb:

A few winter fishing pics for ya!

[uncledave]

Thought this was a flyfishing forum?

[Wayne Jordan]

I like to throw pictures like this in every now and then to get responses like the one you just gave...:rofl:

[Old Man]

http://www.washingtonflyfishing.com/gallery/data/522/Feb_07_180_Large_.JPG (http://www.washingtonflyfishing.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=18681)

:clown:

This is what winter fishing in Montana looks like. Except they have heated shanties out on the lakes along with all the cars and SUV's.

Ice stays on the lakes and res's pretty long here.

Jim

[Jim Wallace]

Then you risk freezing your wang off becuase you have to pull it out every 5 minutes to urinate. :beer1::beer2:ptyd
fishing with out a fly isn't fly fishing and fishing with out beer isn't fishing:ray1:

I'm talking winter... cold days. A cold beer on a frigid day doesn't do it for me, and I never take hard liquor with me fishing anymore, let alone boating. Spring summer, and fall, if i'm going to be on a lake in my squanoe for the good part of the day, I'll usually have a couple of beers along.
Besides, my wang has its own central heating!:cool:

[sharpshooter223]

ok, what temp would be about the line where the fish go deeper

[BFK]

This may not apply to your lakes, but when I used to fish Lake Roosevelt during the winter, the trout were mostly up in the water column. I would be fishing in the upper 10 feet or so, and it wasn't unusual to see dimples or swirls where the trout were hitting or taking daphnia.

As far as temps go, we occasionally fished in water that was forming slush ice, which is right about 31 degrees, or at least that's what the temp gauge was saying. I recall that it's 34 degrees where water becomes heaviest and sinks, and the lakes become homogenous as far as temps go. I certainly caught a lot of trout on both sides of that temperature near the surface.

But if I were to take a guess, I'd say that 34 degrees and lower is where you'll find the fish at all depths, living in the warmest water. Then as the lakes cool even more, the surface ices over and the temperature stabilizes. Doing the ice fishing thing for trout, I found that fish would be moving by at all depths at any given time--anywhere from the surface to the bottom.

[uncledave]

I believe the magic temp is more like 41 degrees

[Gary Thompson]

It's all about water temp not air temp.
Find the right water temp and fish on.

[Stefan Elliott]

Trout like the cold and prowl the shallows in the winter

[Keith Hixson]

Is jigging through the ice with a weighted wooley bugger and using a fly rod, FLY FISHING? :hmmm:

Keith

[Dustin Bise]

can anyone give me some tips on taking water temps. i was thinking just tieing a thermometer onto a a line that changes color every ten feet, adding a weight, and hanging that off the side of my tube.

what im curious about is what thermometer to use and how long to keep it down to be accurate. thanks

[sharpshooter223]

they sell aquarium thermometers at pet stores, might work. i was thinking of just tying a knot or making a mark every 5 feet.

[Islander]

I have one left over from my bass fishing days. It's a probe on a cord that is marked every 5'. You hold the readout in your hand and lower the probe into the water. They probably still sell them at Bass Pro Shop or Cabelas.

[Jim Wallace]

Is jigging through the ice with a weighted wooley bugger and using a fly rod, FLY FISHING? :hmmm:

Keith


Yes, but only if you stand back from the hole and cast your weighted bugger into it.:p:rofl::clown::beer2:

[Keith Hixson]

This is true story and no exaggeration, however no one believes us, but it is the truth. When I was living in Newport, WA my buddy Nick and I decided to go fish a little lake on private property up in the Selkirks. The owner of the land was a friend of ours. When we got to the lake we found it still covered with Ice. However the ice was sloppy and very, very thin. Nick looked in his fishing tackle and found a crappy jig, tied it on and tossed it high in the air and it went right through the ice. Immediately he had a fish on. I tied on a jig but it was slightly smaller and black and it didn't have enough weight to punch through the water. I started dragging it back over the the ice and a fat little 10 or 12 inch brookie broke throught the ice ate it. Fish on. We switched to some size 10 wooley buggers and and started dragging them across the soft slushy ice. Almost ever cast we had a fish on. A day ealier the ice would have been too thick for the fish to punch through, a day later most of the ice would have been gone.

Now the question is: Were we fly fishing? We certainly were casting and retrieving a fly.

Keith

Yes, but only if you stand back from the hole and cast your weighted bugger into it.:p:rofl::clown::beer2:

[mstrofsinanju]

they sell aquarium thermometers at pet stores, might work. i was thinking of just tying a knot or making a mark every 5 feet.

Cabela's sells a depth computer that goes on the end of a line. You drop it to the bottom slowly and as it drops it records temp@depth info. It is kind of spendy for a gadget, i think it was about $40.00? it was a while ago that I bought it.

good luck!

[tkww]

Water is most dense at 39 F/4 C. If there's actually slush in the water, it's probably a lot closer to 32 than it is to 39.

That depth computer sound nice, bu spendy.

[dryflylarry]

whats the definition of cold?

Definition=

[ceviche]

Trout like the cold and prowl the shallows in the winter

That has been my experience, too. Also, fish days when the wind is blowing gently from the southwest to west. Wind from that direction will warm things a bit while the barometer is slowly rising. And do scope out the shallows, like Stefan says. Just focus on habitat that looks both fishy and buggy. We're talking about a food chain that you want to be on top of and at the top of.