Misty Mountain Lake of Trouts – Part 1: Lake Trout of Trout Lake
2017 season didn't start as planned having shoulder problem, but it gave me a great opportunity to concentrate on fly fishing in lake where both underhand casting and light weight tackle can make the best performance . Also, having to go to the same lake extensively.
1. Lake Chuzenji
Lake Chuzenji is the only place in Japan where you can fish for lake trout brought in from North America in the 60's. No additional stocking was done since that time, but the fact they are the most active predator in the coldest water temperature allowed them adopt to the environment of this lake as the apex predator above other fish such as cherry salmon, rainbow trout, and even brown trout.
I only fished one day in 2016 on Lake Chuzenji taking free ride with my friend who told me about flourishing population of trout after the 2011 Fukushima fall out that continues to build radio active contamination in predacious fish. I didn't even bring my own lake tackle, but then the fishing from boat turned out to be very productive. Went back to the boathouse looking at the record size fish in display, I thought of coming back here for that monster one day.
Also, I saw anglers were wading in beautiful emerald green shallow of the lake using two-hand rods gracefully. That is something equivalent to saltwater fly fishing on single-hand 8wt in coral shallow, so that was my plan. I brought two-hand outfit with varieties of Scandinavian shooting heads and streamers not knowing what I was about to endure in the next 2 months.
2. Kokanee Salmon & Lake Trout from the Western Bank
I set out from the early morning into the western bank of the lake kept quiet in wilderness. On my project of "catch 100 species on fly rod", this should make ideal location for kokanee salmon to come ashore while catching lake trout. First challenge for this plan was the lack of most abundant baitfish: smelt. In the shallow or near the cape forming drop off, there were only very small schools. Most predacious fishes in the lake, lake trout and brown trout, had become very territorial over their feeding ground. Just in one small cove, I saw rogue predator making noisy splash here and there. OK, this should be easy. I changed my first priority to kokanee salmons.
For some reason, a school of kokanee salmon coming ashore feeding on top water drifters didn't seem to move out of the cove back into the deep. Thought this was a perfect chance to target them and I managed to hook kokanee salmons twice on skullpin streamer. However both fishes ran like there was no tomorrow ripping their own lips in a zig zag surprising me what the hell was going on inside water that morning.
They were behaving similar to saltwater fish freeing sharks after being hooked. Then when it became brighter, I saw a couple of huge lake trouts feeding on them like small baitfish!
3. Monster Lake Trout...
Never seen any trout with that big mouth making vicious move. I tried to win their attention with the largest streamer I had in my fly box, but absolutely no chance. Smelt, skullpin, even clouser deep minnow... No chance.
Later when I came back to my car for lunch, Kuge-san, an angler with spin tackle who was fishing on the other side of the cove showed me his catch. It was the fish I saw earlier...and it was 94cm, season's record fish.
This confused my priorities big time... Who wouldn't dare dream about crazy big fish?
Also I got very rusty after not fishing lake for years, kept missing strike
4. Pike Rooster - No Longer "Proto Type"
After I returned to Tokyo, I searched the dusty basement storage for my proto type streamer "Pike Rooster" I used against pikes in England. I gave up on that design after learning fish only nibbles its tail. But now with my latest fly tying knowledge for steel head pattern, I had trailer hook materials.
And it is important to add swivel to avoid twisting leader. Whole rig is set up on G.Loomis Beach Rod 10wt/425grain and I thew it in my car just in case.
5. Quiet Reality
When I returned to Lake Chuzenji, the condition has changed greatly and I no longer saw a school of kokanee salmon ashore or huge lake trout munching on them. Lake has gone back to its normal quiet state.
At least I had a wonderful dream...C'est la vie, my fish. Back to normal fly fishing business with two-hand scandi tackle.
Being quiet can tell you many things and I noticed that fish attacking puny school of smelts are not coming straight from the drop off, but going into a bridge-like slope into the shallow then cruise along the bank to attack smelts on head on collision course. This is very clever, because smelts have only two choices: turn back into the shallow or run into the deep where lake trouts can out swim those poor little thing.
Using 12' long rod didn't give me enough control using #6 smelt imitation, so instead, I laid small streamer across the bridge-like slope with an angle to make lake trout see one fly long enough in less cautious depth. This worked spot on! But then I ended up finding out those boiling predators in the shallow were smaller than I thought.
Not all fish are taking risks going into shallow for smelts and what's the point of carrying two-hand rod when fish is within the range of single-hand?
Instead, I aimed for quietly rising fish 60-80ft away. Smaller, but they will be worth the underhand cast in nice wide open space.
With this beautiful misty mountain view, patiently waiting for fish rising in distance scandi cast away is a joy... regardless of the size of my fly: #18 soft hackle.
So I missed my chance for big fish, but saving that for next season.
Meeting Friends
Sometimes, fishing is not about fish, but meeting great personality who share the same passion. Making friends with Tezuka-san and reuniting with Ikeda-san parking next to mine were the bright part of this series.
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