Green Lake - are you too proud?

[alessis]

I live in Seattle and can't always take the time to travel a few hours to good fishing (lots of fish and in the wild somewhere). I keep hearing rumors about green lake though... Does anyone flyfish green lake on a regular basis? If so I'd love to hear from you.

I am not interested in keeping anything, but wouldn't mind more time on the water. FYI WSFW stocked 5,000 fish in early March.

I assume you need a boat or float tube for good access.

Any info appreciated.


updated a few hours later:

I have found one report from some unknown source about green lake which states:

"Date:: 3/24/02

Yes finally the fishing is really starting to pick up. On Monday of this week I saw a great sight. Lots and lots of rainbow in the shallows over by the boat rental dock area on the north side of the lake. Say about 8 browns that had to be about 20 to 24 inches and 10 to 13 pounds wailing away on the rainbows which are about 10 to 12 inches. No muskie this time which was good. I am heading out on the 3rd of April after school. So anyways in the past week I have caught at least 40 fish all small except for 5 which were browns that ranged from 15 inches to 20 inches all on large single hooked rooster tails and flies - use emerging midges and large adams to get the trout to take. See yeah around..."

I don't know if this is fishy or not.

The washington lakes report says Green Lake is open to fishing year-around, and is typically stocked several times between mid-March and mid-June with a seasonal total of approximately 13,000 catchable-size rainbow trout.

[chironocast]

Look, I want to go fishing so bad right now
I'm about ready to take the top off our aquarium
and catch this little amazonian crappie we have in there!
Dang work anyway...I have the fever bad!
Proud? I'll tell ya what; I can picture myself right now...
up against those cattails on green lk in my float tube
not even paying attention to the fact I'm in the middle
of bohemian blunder. I can only hope however, that I
just might sneak over to dry falls or rocky ford wednesday or thursday.
Ya know, there used to be some brown trout in green lake.
dont know if there still is. What the heck. go out there
and let us know how ya did. I just don't know if I could relax out there is all. I'd be worried some of my business associates would see me over
their fishnchips is all. If ya can't relax it could be bad mojo

[steve s]

you know, i've been wondering the same thing about green lake for the past couple weeks, and i did see the stock report, i think that number is for catchable size fish, i also saw another one saying that they just stocked/or are planning on stocking later this spring, a whole bunch of brown trout. i've been waiting for a day with terrible weather to fish the shore because the stocked fish will probably be hanging around in the shallows, and most of the time there are so many people there, i would be afraid to catch a jogger on my backcast. i do have a float tube but haven't used it in a couple of years, i think that i would just try to stalk the shoreline at first. let me know if you plan to go soon and i might join you, my weekdays are usually all full with a full-time job and being a full-time student at night, but i may be able to get free during an afternoon. or at least post a report if you go.
good luck

steve s

[o mykiss]

I live near Green Lake and have tried fishing from the shore a couple of times. Caught one small rainbow. I couldn't resist trying because I've been running around there many times in the early morning during the late spring through early fall where there are sometimes incredible rises going on. There are not all that many places you can fish from shore without worrying about hooking a jogger on a backcast or getting caught up in trees or other brush, especially because the docks (the most obvious place to cast without either of such obstructions) that dot the lake are usually well staked out by the bait chuckers. I have thought about trying it with a pontoon boat and probably will one of these days, because the rise action always seems to be happening way beyond casting distance. I've occasionally seen a fly fisher in a boat on the lake. Creekside Angling sometimes writes about Green Lake in its bi-monthly reports during the summer/fall season. I think they're trying to manage Green Lake to become a respectable trout fishery - who knows, one day it might be. On a separate note, I had the misfortune of hitting the lake during carp spawning season a couple of mornings last year - hundreds of the big ugly buggers in the shallows doing the big nasty. It was a most disturbing sight.

[BoatBBQ_Rs]

Over the last couple years I have seen many big fish jump while running around the lake and also seen the shadows of many others in the shallows(maybe carp). I almost gaurentee if you put in your time you will find nice fish; also seen some pretty good hatches of Chironomids and caddis(later in the year)so there is a decent food base to grow fish. I've thought about fishing it but its just not for me, plus with no ties I can fish around the state every weekend if I want.

[Rob Blomquist]

The heck with trout in GL, there are Tiger Muskies and I hear that they are in the 20-24" range right now, and some are being caught by folks fighting other fish.

Bring your 7-8 wt, a bunch of saltwater flies, and some heavy nylon on steel tippet for their teeth....

Rob :THUMBSUP

[Chris Bailey]

I have also been wanting to head out to Green Lake. It seems like the perfect place to try out my new pontoon boat. I've always heard of huge brown trout in there, like in the 10 pound range. I wouldn't be any more embarrassed to fish for stocked trout in Green Lake than I would be fishing for stocked trout in eastern washington spring creeks or seep lakes created as a result of dams.

I checked out the state's planting schedule, http://www.wa.gov/wdfw/fish/plants/2002stocking.pdf
and it states that they are planning to plant 1150 triploid rainbows in april in addition to the standard rainbow plants. They also planted triploids last year. I rarely have seen anyone fish from a boat at the lake and I can't imagine the dock fishers having a huge impact on the fish population. Besides, you would have to be pretty hungry to eat a fish caught out of what is essentially an urban stormwater retention pond. Maybe I'll take friday afternoon off and give it a shot.

[Native]

What Bailey said is correct. The lake gets no moving water other than oil-poluted storm runnoff. I don't imagine that there exists a lot of natural food for the little rainbows that they plant. So, anything that doesn't smell like food to them I don't think will elicit a strike.

Unless you know how to tie a size 10 brown pellet imitation...

[o mykiss]

Relative to a non-urban lake, there may not be a lot of natural food, but I can tell you I've seen swarms of bugs on Green Lake many times and lots of rises going after something in the water. No one's out there throwing pellets, so the rises must be to bugs of some kind. It is a fly fishable lake. May not be Dry Falls, Pass Lake or any of the more renowned lakes we all prefer to fish, but it is fly fishable. Here from the 8/30/01 Creekside Angling report:

"Green Lake: Yes, Lac Verde (a la Dan Lemaich, Horse Farmer), that puddle in the middle of north Seattle fishes well this time of year. The evenings are especially explosive. Chironomid hatches of black to tan in sizes #12-#16's are downright prolific. The trout and bass absolutely go nuts from about eight o'clock to dark, and continue to feed by the street lights once natural light dissapears. These fish are easily caught from shore on dry flies. It's not glamorous and you'll have to answer a lot of questions that have really obvious answers, but that's just all part of the fun of catching large metrpolitan rainbows. If you have a float tube, and you don't mind kicking around in the green ooze, put on a big black woolly bugger and troll around - that's how to get the big ones I tell you."

[Rob Blomquist]

Well since I work for the head honcho of limnology for King County, I thought I would let you in on what GL's water quality is all about.

First off, GL recieves no runoff from any industrial source, and much of the adjacent Route 99 runoff is directed away from the lake. The only inputs are from the neighborhoods around the lake. Pollutants are localized around the storm drains, and the water quality is considered very good for an urban lake.

There are bugs to eat, and decent water to swim in, basically the only problem with eating the fish is the taste, as the lake is so shallow and gets so warm in the summer the flesh is pretty low quality.

Lets not pan GL too quickly, it's doing just fine.

[Randy Knapp]

Just to let you know. I drove over to the lake today to walk it with my flyrod in hand and perhaps make a few casts. There were sporadic mayflies and midges and several fish in the 1/2 lb range were caught by those using power bait. I stopped to talk to a heavily accented carp fisherman who said there were trout out in front of us. I moved down 20 yds and started casting. I had to dodge the crowds on the back cast so timing was somewhat critical. The result: My first brown ghost. That's right, the old guy got his long handled net out and helped me land about an 8 to 10lb carp. The fly of the day? A size 4 olive woolly bugger tied clouser style with red painted dumbbell eyes on top. I gave the guy the fish and he was very pleased and said they were excellent to eat.
Randy

[o mykiss]

So did the carp live up to it's trademark - the poor man's bone fish?

[Randy Knapp]

Never have caught a bone fish but this carp made no spectacular runs. It did fight to the end however so I would say it fought more like a nice dolly or salmon. I would like to catch another as it took awhile to get it in and I do like a nice tug but it was no rainbow.
Randy

[Preston]

I believe Green Lake also receives water (though a pipe) from Licton Springs which is up at about 90th and the only one of several springs which used to feed the lake that still has any flow to speak of. The insect life in Green Lake seems to be pretty healthy, there are large numbers of gray midges out now, about size twelves. A little later there's an even larger yellowish-tan midge and, of course, Callibaetis. There are also swarms of what appear to be very small black caddis through the summer.

[0012]

Hook Sz. 10-14 Dry Fly
Thread. Strong
Body: Bleached Dreer Hair Cliped like a caddis wing
This is killer in the lakes up here


Tight Lines From Alaska
0012 :COOK :COOK