Time: 10:30AM – 4:00PM

Location: South side of lake mostly

Pine Lake 06/04/2021 Photo Album

OK, so I fished for stocked rainbow trout. Catching trout from a lake of any kind is an ongoing challenge for this novice stillwater fisherman. How did I do this time? Read on.

A week ago Jane and I made the trip from Denver to Pine Valley Ranch Park after some serious pickleball in the morning. On June 4, 2021 I decided to make the trip solo in order to log additional time on the lake. Also by foregoing pickleball I intended to get an earlier start.

Both objectives were achieved. I arrived at the lower parking lot at Pine Valley Ranch Park by 10:15AM, and this enabled me to be on the water fishing by 10:30AM. I hoped to revisit the upper end of the lake, where I achieved a small degree of success on 05/28/2021, but a youth with a small spinning rod, who was accompanied presumably by his grandmother preceded me. As I approached, however, the pair abandoned their spot, and the woman announced that “there were lots of trout, but they were not hungry”. Another young male angler was positioned toward the west end of the channel, but I decided to try the eastern end that was recently vacated.

End of the Lake

I knotted a peacock hippie stomper to my 5X tippet and then added a size 18 olive-brown deer hair caddis on a short six inch dropper, and I began to flip casts to visible fish. Unfortunately the trout were preoccupied with invisible food items, and they ignored my large offerings. A few brave finned residents inspected the hippie stomper, but they eventually shunned the imitations. Not wishing to invade the space of the young angler, I hooked my flies to the rod guide and took a walk around the western end of the lake, until I found a nice open space on the southwest side of Pine Lake. I began spraying twenty to thirty yard casts to the deeper part of the lake, but without rising or sighted fish, my prospects seemed rather slim. I spent fifteen minutes pursuing this futile strategy, when I observed the occupant of the channel area walking along the north side of the lake, and I quickly reversed my path and claimed the channel section that produced six rainbows in two hours on May 28.

Nice for Stocker

For the remainder of the morning I sight fished to the shallow water inhabitants, and I landed five trout before I broke for lunch at 12:30PM. All these fish were clearly stocked, and surprisingly four crushed the hippie stomper, while one fell victim to the size 18 caddis. I also tested a size 24 griffith’s gnat, but it was ineffective unlike the previous Friday, when the tiny peacock speck was a favorite. After lunch on the bank next to the canal-like waterway, I resumed fishing and swapped the griffiths gnat for a size 20 parachute Adams. The small Adams repaid my confidence, as it produced one of the larger rainbow trout of the day.

Although you might expect this fishing to be rather easy, it was not. I executed numerous casts to sighted fish, and more often than not they simply swam by my imitations. Occasionally they slowly moved below the hippie stomper and nudged it, but failed to eat the medium sized foam attractor. Inexplicably on rare occasions one of the targeted fish darted a foot or more to gobble the hippie stomper. Why the stomper produced random aggressive assaults was beyond my comprehension, but I was pleased with the variance in behavior. This area of the lake contained significant gobs of green algae or moss, and it was a nuisance to pick the slime off both flies after four or five casts. Another element of difficulty was the need to make fairly long backhand casts because of my position on the north side of the slough and the presence of dense willows along much of the section.

Beaver House I Walked Over

By one o’clock the fish count rested on six, and the random rises in the area ceased, and I grew bored with backhand casts and picking slime, so I stripped in my line and waded across the channel in order to explore the western shoreline of the lake. I waded along some mucky reeds and crossed over the top of a beaver house, and then I paused to scan the water for rises of visible fish. None of these appeared, but a long mammal came into view, and just as I recognized it as a beaver, it raised its tail and smacked it down on the water to create a loud whacking sound. Beavers do this to warn their mates. I watched the beaver circle around the western bay three or four times, while I recorded several videos, and then I moved toward the southwest shoreline. A man and young girl arrived on the north shore, and they, likewise, spotted the beaver, and the girl began to chant “go away beaver”. Perhaps in response to the chant the beaver executed one more tail thwack, and then it dove beneath the surface. I moved on and disregarded any additional beaver activity.

Same Fish, Better View

I was next perched on a gradual beach in the extreme southwest corner of the lake, and I began casting the hippie stomper and parachute Adams to the deeper area. Two fly fishing anglers occupied spots roughly thirty yards to the east, but I gradually worked my way toward them with no success. When I reached a long narrow deadfall that extended into the lake for twenty feet, I fired a cast to the deep area beyond the tip of the fallen tree, and a small rainbow rose and crushed the hippie stomper. Imagine my surprise, when I netted number seven from the large lake. This was my first landed fish from Pine Lake that did not originate from the shallow channel, where I began the day.

I continued to fire casts to the area surrounding the angled tree without success, and then the pair of anglers to the east decided to call it a day. This opened up the entire south shore, and I began to gradually move in an easterly direction. I duped a few more fish with the hippie stomper, but quite a few refusals crept into the equation as well. The gap between surface action was fairly long, and I was frustrated with my inability to determine what caused the random attacks on my hippie stomper.

West End

After a lengthy lull with a few refusals and some splashy rises, I contemplated another change. This time I decided to swap the trailing dry fly for a beadhead nymph, and I selected a size 16 salvation nymph. I cannot explain the choice other than the thought, that I wanted flash, and I harbor exceptional confidence in the salvation. Can you guess how this change played out? It was a stroke of genius. I fired forty foot casts to random areas and allowed the hippie stomper to rest for thirty seconds. In the absence of a response from lake residents, I began to strip the flies with short strokes, and quite often the hippie stomper disappeared, and I was connected to a rainbow trout chowing down on the flashy salvation nymph. In some cases, the trout attacked the hippie stomper, but more frequently the salvation was the object of desire of the stocked trout.

Silvery Sheen

The fish count mounted from seven to seventeen, once I uncovered the winning technique. I could have continued tormenting Pine Lake trout, but by 4PM I was tired, and I broke off the salvation as a result of an abraded knot. Rather than replacing the salvation with another fresh version, I decided to call it quits. What a fun day! Sure, most of the landed trout were stocker rainbows, but I was mentally stimulated with the challenge of unlocking the code for success. Once I settled on the nymph dropper, the trout responded. I love the feeling of confidence, when I find the secret key. I discovered that an abundant quantity of fish remain in Pine Lake, and I will likely pay it another visit or two before run off winds down.

Fish Landed: 17