Novice needs advice for lake fishing...

[Adrienne]

Hi,

I'll be trying out some kayak fishing at Lake Camanche this week, and I'd like to use my 5 wt rod and floating line (because I don't have anything else). How should I set up the fly line to do a bit of fly fishing on the lake from a kayak? I'll be at the North Shore.

Thanks in advance!

[Fly Guy Dave]

I would suggest a heavily weighted streamer and let it sink a while before you start stripping in line. Or perhaps a couple of nymphs under an indicator, which is high up on your leader. These are two general suggestions, a lot varies on conditions, but I think being below the surface is the ticket this time of year.

--F.G. Dave

[Scott V]

I normally use an intermediate line for fishing lakes, so with your floater you could use a really long leader that will help get you down and a weighted fly. Maybe a beadheaded bugger or something like that. When you cast out let the fly sink for a good amount of time, at least 15 or so seconds, but be ready, you will probably get bite on the sink. Cat then bring in enough line to keep your line tight to the fly and just be ready. Count down each cast, that way when you get a bite you know how long you let the fly sink before. Vary your striping, some time fast, sometimes slow, sometimes twitch twitch pause then twitch twitch twitch. Keep chaining up your ret rieve until you find what they are looking for. But when you can, get an intermediate line, that is what I use 99% of the time for trout in a lake, no matter the time of the year.

[Tony Buzolich]

Unless you have fish rising to the surface feeding you'd be much better off with a sinking line and slow trolling a marabou leech pattern as deep as you can.

With a kayak you'd have the right speed while paddling to troll your fly slowly enough for it to sink. As you paused to rest your fly would sink back down again deeper and you'd be covering a much larger portion of the water column. Then resume paddling and the fly would rise again. Repeat, pause, repeat again. Vary your speed and find which speed works best for you.

As for line and leader, I use either a 150gr. on my 4 wt. or a 200gr. on my 6 wt. and these work perfectly for the size rod and fish. A short leader of 6' -9' is just right as well. I like fluorocarbon to aide in sinking and abrasion resistance though the water there will not be crystal clear any good leader material will work.

As for flies, don't waste time using anything but marabou leech patterns. I like a rusty orange / orange pattern the best and this seems to work better than anything else in every lake I've fished. I tie my flies on a #4 long shank hook with a full wrap of lead the entire length of the shank.

The tail is approx. 1.5 long starting at the bend with a couple of strands of Krystal Flash in a gold/orange color. I then wrap the body with 3 or 4 turns of crystal chenille, stop and add another clump of marabou, stop and add more chenille, and repeat again till you reach the eye of the hook. Tie off with another couple of strands of Krystal flash and you're done. Keep all of the clumps of marabou stacked on the top of the shank. Simple and it works.

When that marabou gets wet in the water and is slowly trolled it moves and undulates like a live leech or animal of some type. And it works.

Yesterday, I took an old friend out to Collins Lake and this is exactly what we did. Collins is like any of the numerous foothill lakes around our valley including Comanche. The air temp. at 7:00AM was 38 degrees and the water temp. was 56. In the low light the fish were on or near the surface and were feeding actively. As the sun came up, the fish went down and the bite slowed. By 9:30 it was just about done as the fish dropped deeper.

My old friend Don never had such a good day and couldn't thank me enough for taking him out. Here's Don and one of the beautiful rainbows he caught yesterday.
Tony

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b320/buzolich/003_zps2bda06e5.jpg (http://s22.photobucket.com/user/buzolich/media/003_zps2bda06e5.jpg.html)