Jim Speaker's Blog

Lake Walker Evening

June 18, 2006: 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm

The weather this evening was really nice for fishing with temperatures around 60f, partly cloudy and almost entirely wind-free. I got on the water in my pontoon boat right at 7 p.m. noting sporadic risers here and there across the still surface. No doubt these were midging trout and with no real hatch going on I popped my intermediate camo lined spool into my reel on my 5 wt.

Rowing out beyond the structure I paused to stow my oars and began kicking with a mini-bunny leech in black with a red seedbead head at a fast mooch. A couple passes through my favorite area yielded no strikes, a very bad sign, so I knew it was time to switch up.

I tied on a synthetic mohair leech in peacock with again a red seedbead head and mooched this pattern fast again. After a couple passes through some prime feeding areas I hooked and landed a healthy little 10-inch bow. This pattern yielded no more strikes after a couple more passes through nice areas so I switched it up again.

All that speed mooching had me a bit tired so I opted to tie on my no-name damsel variation (Jim's Damsel) so I could catch a little rest micro-mooching at a couple inches per second. I didn't have a lot of success but when I sped things up to around 6 inches per second I hooked and lost a couple of fish.

Feeling rested, and with the sun now dipping behind the trees, I figure the lighting was probably right to try that mini-bunny leech again. I took to speed mooching this again and almost immediately got action hooking and losing two fish in quick succession and a couple minutes later landing another, much feistier 11 inch bow. After this I had a good ten minutes or so with no action followed by a few soft strikes and short strikes. Playing dead with the leech after the short strikes did not bring the fish back. Near 9 pm I made my final run back to the launch and had one more soft strike near shore.

Other observations: (a) In general I've concluded that Lake Walker is a much better morning and early-afternoon fishery when damsel twitching slays them. (b) The lake at this point very well may be affected by the gear fishermen reducing the population. (c) The fish were more spread out today than earlier in the season when they seemed quite consolidated in a particular area. (d) Risers stopped completely at true dusk. (e) The largest midges observed were #16, tan, with dark ribbing. (f) A couple of large ~#14 caddis were observed - not much in the way of caddis tonight.

Cheers and tight lines.
- Jim Speaker

After Work on the Cedar River

June 6, 2006

I fished a couple spots on the Cedar after work this evening from about 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. The river is still rather high for the beginning of June at about 950 cfs. The 58-year average is around 650 cfs. The conditions are quite tough with difficult if not scary wading to get to decent runs, and while the fishing isn't bad, it is clear that the fish are still adjusting to the dropping flows and not in their typical lies.

My first stop was at the pull-out along the Cedar River Trail a bit downstream of the Jones Rd. bridge. This is not by any means my favorite part of the river but given the high flows I thought it warranted a visit hoping that the access and wadability would be worth it. It was actually very difficult wading and required some bushwacking to get from run to run. I picked up a few bows and a cutthroat on nymphs on this stretch but all were small (8-10") so I moved on.

I decided to check out the hole below the old railroad bridge at the Maple Valley River Park next. Deep-nymphing this hole provided no results and the riffle at mid-river just below the hole looked completely unreachable without a boat so I moved up river a bit. The run above the bridge has been fairly good for me in the past and was looking especially tasty with the higher water - the problem of course being that getting to it looked a bit sketchy at best.

As I worked through the shallowest water I could find to fully cross the river footing was somewhat marginal with thigh-high water and strong flow. I knew that coming back was going to be really tough due to the angle I would have to take on the return wade. Both the payoff and the heartbreak would come shortly.

Fishing through the extensive run above the railroad bridge initially yielded about 6 - 8 rainbows and 1 cutt in the 6-10" range. As I worked deep nymphs into quite heavy water I hooked into what felt like a real nice fish. After turning its head a couple times what seemed a real nice fish turned out to be a serious Cedar River Hog - it got all pissed off, made a run and came clear of the water for me to see the full 20-inches or so of fish with beautiful dark coloration. My heart was really cookin' now and I worked it through a couple of great runs as it ripped line from my hand and I took it back. Alas, when seeming to have the fish fairly tired and bring it toward me the hook just popped. Damn. See you next time ya big hog.

A few casts after the heartbreaking loss of a true Cedar Hog, I hooked another fine fish. This one came ripping out of the water and while clearly not the class of fish as the last, was looking and fighting like a great fish. After an excellent fight I managed to coax a beautiful, fat and healthy 15" bow to my net and snapped a couple pics before releasing it.

On my way back down the run, sorta on my way back to my truck, I was broken off by a big fish when I hooked up and it turned its head - so I guess there's more than one big dog in that run. After this I brought about a 15" whitefish to hand. Wading back across river was treacherous as I was in that gray area of having footing and losing footing I used forward momentum to propel me to the safety of shallower water. Looking down river at that point got my adrenaline pumped as it was not a pretty place to be swept into.

I love this river, so glad it's open again and grateful it's still catch-and-release. I'm so fortunate to be able to call the Cedar my home water.

Cheers and tight lines.
- Jim Speaker