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Just another great day on this lake!! Started first thing in the morning, put in at Bridgeport State Park and motored up to the first set of net pens, fishing there was tough and the wind was just howling in that stretch of river. We decided to go farther up to see if we could find some other area that was sheltered from the wind.

Wound up at the upper net pens. The fish were everywhere! The wind was non-existent there and the water calm and smooth, allowing us to see the trout swimming below the boat, .....and all around the boat! It was amazing, at any one time we could see up to a hundred trout skulking below us, it was like we motored the boat into the pen of a hatchery!! And, no, we were not fishing in the net pens but out in open public waters.

Based on our last trip here, I tied up some weighted flies that imitated the fish food pellets that they use for feed at the pens. To say that they worked great would be a gross understatement !!!

We caught over a hundred fish between the two of us this day. The largest we caught was a nice and fat nine pound-er, we saw many more that were larger, but couldn't get them to bite because the "smaller" ones were getting to the flies first.

We were using mainly two flies, one, a floating fly that resembles a floating fish pellet and another that looks like the darker, sinking pellet. The fish didn't seem to have any particular preference as to which one they liked better. We did try other flies with no success, mosquito pattern, wooly buggers in several different colors, the old stand by, royal coachman, midges and spinners, (a pattern that imitates a small dead insect with wings, floating on the top of the water).

Its now Tuesday and my fingers are just starting to recuperate from getting line burns from fighting these heavy fish while trying to "get them on the reel" when they first got hooked. These beautiful large fish love to take long hard runs when they feel that little hook in their lip. I have caught many large fish from fly fishing lakes, nice big rainbows from Rocky Ford Creek, but never had such a problem controlling these large feisty fish. My arms were actually sore from having so many large fish on!! A problem I am looking forward to having next weekend!!

I tied the flies using hairs ear and tied it tight. After a fly was wearing out, and had pieces of hair coming off of them we had to clip them clean or put on a new fly otherwise the fish wouldn't take them. For the floating fly imitation we used cloth balls made originally to imitate a salmon egg but we dyed them light brown to imitate floating fish food. Both of these patterns worked way beyond great.

In my last entry from a few weeks ago I stated that the trout were finicky as to what they wanted.....they certainly had no reservations to taking these new flies.

For all of you fly fishing purist out there, would you carry a hand-tied imitation of a fish pellet in your fly box?? I am simply, matching the hatch, so to speak!! I have to go now, my fly vise is waiting and I need to tie up some more fish pellet flies for next weekend.

snake7676

9/2/2008 5:50:00 PM

good lord those are some sweet fish : )

Anonymous

9/2/2008 6:56:00 PM

WOW!!!! those are some big trout.....cool report and nice pic......

fishing collector

9/2/2008 11:38:00 PM

Well........Are you going to post a pic of these super "flies" ? Please :-)

kevinb

9/2/2008 11:42:00 PM

Dang!!! Great report and amazing fish.

HammerinHonkers

9/3/2008 5:55:00 PM

gotta love rufus. great report and fish

outdoor chris

9/4/2008 10:59:00 AM

I will try to remember to take a few pics of the flies so you can have an idea of what they look like, basically, the floater is about the size of a pea, light brown and the sinking is a darker brown, cylindrical in shape, tied on a size 12 barbless hook

Larrinator

9/9/2008 6:40:00 AM

Wow! Those are awesome fish! It is unbelievable that you can catch, fight, and land a fish of that size with a dinky little size 12 hook. And barbless to boot! Kudos to you Chris!

Yes, please, post some pics of these wonder flies! Matching the hatch... >:)

cenels2

9/9/2008 9:28:00 AM

Which pens do you consider the upper pens. Where you at the second or third set from Bridgeport? How fast were you trolling? I'm heading up for my birthday on the 16th. It will be my first trip to Rufus since March. My last trip they were still hitting pretty hard at Bridgeport on black wooly buggers but it sounds like you found the hot spot.

cenels2

9/9/2008 9:31:00 AM

Which pens do you consider the upper pens. Where you at the second or third set from Bridgeport? How fast were you trolling? I'm heading up for my birthday on the 16th. It will be my first trip to Rufus since March. My last trip they were still hitting pretty hard at Bridgeport on black wooly buggers but it sounds like you found the hot spot.

outdoor chris

9/9/2008 10:37:00 AM

outdoor chris

9/9/2008 11:29:00 AM

if you haven't been to Rufus since March, the technique changes from season to season, depending on the water temperature. I NEVER troll at Rufus, its just not that productive and I don't like to have all the extra tackle on my line...and to be honest, its just a little too boring for me. In march, we knock em dead using black jigs, bounced off of or near the bottom along the shoreline. One trip to the closest net pens from Bridgeport we caught over a hundred fish in around 4 hours using jigs and or flies. To get the flies down to where the fish are, we Texas rig them.....slip sinker then the fly about 4' below that. Look for big submerged rocks away from shore using your depthfinder to find spots that hold more fish.

This time of year we are simply fishing around the boat at anchor or floating down the shoreline using a bow-mount motor for control of the boat. The fish are mostly suspended in 5' - 25' of water around the pens. Try drifting down the shoreline below the pens, especially looking for eddies that hold more fish. When the water is smooth you can easily see the fish swimming in front of the boat, its very exciting!! ...the hard part is watching a trout open his big mouth, and sucking the fly in and then not to set the hook too early before you feel the fish on....I loose more fish this way than any other, pulling the fly out too fast before the fish can close his mouth on it!!! I swear at myself for doing it and then go and do it again!! I just never get over the excitement of seeing a huge fish hitting on my fly. But then, thats why we all go fishing!!

Always fish below the pens or around them, not upstream of them...the fish are there to eat the free food and it never works its way upstream.

HammerinHonkers

9/9/2008 12:29:00 PM

you go this past weekend?

HammerinHonkers

9/9/2008 1:24:00 PM

you go this past weekend?

cenels2

9/9/2008 1:48:00 PM

Thank you.

cenels2

9/9/2008 1:50:00 PM

I'll be launching at Ceton Grove. Do you recommend the 1st, 2nd or 3rd set of pens. Or should I just start at the first set and work my way down?

outdoor chris

9/10/2008 9:13:00 AM

we went this past weekend, haven't had time to write a report yet though, using a slightly modified fly using a chenille yarn to tie it with instead of hares ear hair, we caught 228 trout. They were a bit smaller, the two largest were an ounce under 8 lbs. After a while, we had to cheat though and tied the flies to spinning gear using 4lb test line, arms and fingers were getting sore from fighting so many fish with fly poles!!

A note on the flies, I tie them with a small amount of lead on the shaft of the hook first so they are slightly weighted, this helps to get the flies down deeper to the bigger fish.

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