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View Full Version : 3-19-06 Modesto Reservoir Report



Hairstacker
03-19-2006, 10:02 PM
Fished Modesto Reservoir for about 2 hours from 10am - 12noon today out of the inflatable kayak for smallies. Beautiful, sunny day, pretty calm until noontime, when the wind kicked up and convinced me it was time to pack it in. Landed one 13"er, LDR'd another about 12", and missed a hit or two. Got 'em on a size 6 black strymph variant while fishing rocky island points. Wished I'd had a digital camera with me, these fish are kind of a washed out pastel light olive color with very distinctive red eyes. (I'm expecting a camera any day now!) Spoke to the guy at the gate for a bit, who said locals have been doing well lately. I say now is the time to get out on valley lakes for smallies if that's something you've been looking forward to, like I have. 8)

David Lee
03-19-2006, 11:12 PM
Nice job Mike !!

Pale color morph likely due to murky water - how clear was it ??

Were you stripping , or fishing the fly on the drop ?? How much weight on the bug and leader length ...???

David :D

Hairstacker
03-19-2006, 11:50 PM
Thanks David! The water was kind of murky, although it wasn't muddy, if that makes any sense. Definitely wasn't clear, that's for sure. One fish (the one I actually landed) took it on the drop, whille the one I LDR'd took it on a strip (actually thought I had snagged on a rock until it started moving :oops: ). I should have landed the LDR, but I knew he wasn't anything special, so I wanted to have fun with him by getting him on the reel, by which time he got off. Probably would have landed him if I'd just stripped him in instead of allowing slack. No big deal and didn't really care, was happy just to have a fish take my fly and let me know I was on track.

I was casting the fly on a standard 9' long leader with a 4X fluoro tippet, letting it drop, then stripping it in with 6" or so strips, although I tended to mix it up. Tried not to strip too fast, as I was using a floating line and wanted to keep the fly down as much as possible. I was pretty much fishing in water less than 10' deep, usually more shallow than that. I think a type III sinking line probably would have been a better choice.

The strymphs I use are pretty heavily weighted -- I wrap 'em with .030 lead along 3/4 of their 3XL length. I had tied 'em for creek bassin' (!!!) but figured they should work well in the lake shallows with all that weight (nice alternative to a Clouser). One thing I REALLY like about those strymphs is the ostrich herl tail -- stuff has fantastic motion and action in the water, much more so than you would think examining a package of the stuff in a fly shop. 8) In fact, I think I like it better than marabou. :shock: 20 strands or so tied as a tail on a fly makes it seem positively alive. 8)