Lake Davis fishing

[Eric F]

I am going camping up at Lake Davis this weekend with some friends and family and am toying with the idea of sneaking away for some fishing. Does anyone know of any good small stream fishing in the area? Or have any advice on how to FF on Lake Davis?

Thanks,
Eric

[Rick J]

The Little Truckee and the Feather are close but I don't know much about them.

Regarding Davis Lake check the posts in the stillwater section. Davis is as good as it gets right now for damsels at least for the opportunity to cast to big fish (no gurantees an the number of hookups!!). Your best bet if you don't have a tube is to get on the lake early and drive down onto either Jenkins or Cow Creek point and check out those areas or walk aorund the perimeter from thsoe sites to get away from the crowds checking out the points and look for working fish. You will do good if you are on the lake no later than 7 and find a likely looking point, otherwise you might get hole hopped by boat guys who come in and take over a point.

Fish will be working from very early with the major damsel migration starting around 9:30 or 10 and going until 1 or 2 with fish continuing to work sporadically after that time

you do not need waders as the water is warm but it is muddy wading - I use sandals to get where I am going but once at teh site I just wade barefoot - just hope you don't mind a thousand damsels crawling up your legs and body trying to hatch!!! :)

Good luck

[Eric F]

I have to admit that lake fishing has never been my strong suit, I have spent most of my life fishing small streams. How do you fish with damsels? Any pointers? Sounds like I need to run into the shop to pick up some flies. :)

[Rick J]

Eric,
All you need is a floating line and 9' leader tapering to 4x or 5x. Cast out and slow retrieve in - I would vary the retrieve to see if you can get a strike but damsels don't mover really fast but they have lots if wiggle so I prefer patterns with long marabou tails that give plenty of motion. You will have plenty of naturals to observe their swimming behavior!

My favorite retrieve is the hand twist but I do it pretty violently with a finger snap to give a little burst of movement followed by a pause. However, I have also used small quick strips.

Rick

[jayclarkflyfishing]

I fished Davis on Sunday and it was slow.Talk to several people and all had the same thing to say.Water temps were 70 degrees at 930 am.I would recommend hitting the MF Feather in Graegle or downstream around Camp Layman.

[Rick J]

Eric,
One other thing if you fish Davis - perhaps your best opportunity at hooking up is if you find a fish that is not moving fast - sometimes they hang in one area gobbling bugs - if you see a fish eating more than one time you can get a feel for which direction he is moving and how fast - get a cast close and they will often grab.

Little Truckee - don't know where you were on Davis but it was the most prolific damsel migration I have seen for a long time with fish working from 7:30 to 3. That is not to say that the catching was hot but the fishing was red hot - with constant opportunities to cast to working fish. As Bill posted in the Stillwater Section a comment from Don - guys with tubes and pontoon boats that cannot access some of the lake and are limited to a couple of areas may not find the fish but if you find a point where the damsels are migrating - good chance the fish will follow

[Eric F]

Rick,
Thanks for the all the feedback and advice. Hopefully I will be out there on Friday morning. I'll let you know how I did next week. :)

-Eric