Terry Thomas
11-23-2009, 10:25 AM
Fished three days on Eagle last week with three friends. We rented a house in Spaulding and fished with Bryan Roccucci (www.bigdaddyfishing.com). Bryan spends most of his time guiding conventional gear anglers, however, he knows the lake and has a 23ft. Boulton with a heated cabin...very nice for us "age challenged" fly guys. We fish the rock piles, islands, and points on the lake. From our experience, I would say we had an average trip. The first day we spent the whole day in the north part of the lake. Fished Buck's, big and little Troxell, and some rock piles. The fish were scattered and the water temp. was around 47F. We landed @4-6 fish each for the day. For some reason, the fish seemed to be a little on the thin side. We had pretty heavy wind out of the north on Tuesday. The launch ramp at Spaulding is open with a day use fee of $8.00 per car (up from $5.00 last year). There were only two other boats launched on Tuesday. We had wind out of the south on Wednesday and a little snow on the ground from the night before. Fished the north end again with water temps dropping a few degrees from the day before. The fish were again scattered. The lake glassed over in the afternoon and the grab stopped. We finished up a Pelican with a couple of fish. On Thursday morning, the lake was like a mirror. We found a large concentration of fish off a point and had an amazing grab until the sun hit the water. I believe we landed @20 fish in an hour! With the lake perfectly calm, we couldn't buy a grab. Headed to the south end of the lake to try and find some deeper water. Shrimp held a couple of willing fish, but with a calm lake, not much was happening. Headed back north @2 and found the wind to be blowing out of the north at the Pelican divide. Pretty weird! Fished the points and found a few willing takers. Most all of the fish were in the 18-22 in. range, pretty typical for Eagle. The fish the second two days seemed to be their normal robust size. On a side note, on the last day, the temp. on the north end was @37F. in the morning. When we fished Shrimp at noon, the temp. was @47F. The lake level seems to be down again over a foot. If we don't get some rain this season, the dredged launch at Spaulding will not be available. They dredged it down to the rock bottom so it can't be dredged any further!