Secret Brown Trout Lake High Sierra 7/31
Here we go for another hike up to our secret High Sierra brown trout lake in search of The Monster I saw 21 years ago. Last July, as you recall, I hooked and reeled in a five-pounder only to lose it at gaff when the screwed-on shark hook popped off my old broomstick. The fish swam off with hardware stuck in its ass.
Tuesday July 24 I stopped by the Eastern Sierra InterAgency Visitor Center south of Lone Pine at the intersection of 395 and 136 to pick up the wilderness permit I ordered online this past January. Just hand them your confirmation printout and you are in and out faster than the burger joint of the same name.
I passed through Bishop and purchased a few supplies from Wilson’s Eastside Sports. I found it amazing I could not locate quality hiking boot laces at the usual Sport Chalet or Sports Authority type places in and around Riverside and Orange Counties. Wilson’s has an extensive collection.
Earlier in the year I made reservations for a site at your basic roadside campground, where I spent the rest of the afternoon stuffing my backpack with fishing gear, clothing and kitchen hardware for the seven-night adventure.
Wednesday I awoke early, packed up the truck and motored over to Mammoth Lakes to carb up at Breakfast Club. I had the beef machaca burrito and extra large cinnamon roll washed down with coffee to fuel me until I reach base camp.
At a picnic area near the trailhead I used one of the bench tables for the final staging of the pack, paper list in hand, checking off each component one by one. If you hike way back in and forget one thing it could wreck you whole day. New items this year include Leki Makalu ultralight titanium trek poles ($35 used on eBay), white motocross gloves and a Cummins boat net with the extendible handle. No more homemade gaff or small trout net for me, I’m bringing my standard issue breakwall opaleye and calico net.
I trained for this day rigorously throughout the past 11 months but still after a hundred steps my left gluteus started barkin’ at me. At ten o’clock I thought, dam, I have five hours to go, is it going to hurt all day? I put my heel atop the next fallen log to stretch it out hurdler style and just like that I was back to normal.
And of fallen logs, did you guys hear last November there was a super wind storm around these parts? Especially hard hit was Red’s Meadow Valley, where a 120+ MPH blow knocked over a hundred thousand trees. On my trail thankfully I witnessed none of this as I saw only what looked like two new trees down since last year the whole five miles I travelled.
The bad news is the bark beetle devastation. When Breakwall Shane and I were up here five years ago we saw the usual one or two dead trees here or there. Now, as you will notice by clicking through this trip’s photo album, whole swaths of forest are dead as if our generation will see a major transformation of habitat as speedy as the clicking on of a switch.
The way it works is, bark beetles are part of the system. Nature has them programmed to kill weak trees so that they fall and in turn supply their nutrients back to the soil to nourish healthy trees, which produce sap to kill the insects. Nowadays we have hotter and drier winters and without the normal snowpack/snowmelt the past two decades, the trees on the ridges cannot produce enough sap to kill their beetles so the beetles kill them. You will see in the photos the stands of trees next to the main water sources (lakes and creeks) are doing just fine.
The second thing I noticed was the lack of mosquitoes. Last year as soon as you exited your vehicle there was a cloud of them following you all day 24/12. You get a break at night. This year all of the snowmelt ponds are bone dry so the only place I saw one was near any of the barely trickling springs.
At four-and-a-half hours I was at the main junction, left to the high country, right to big brown trout. This is the spot one finds a cold spring next to the trail where I usually fill my water jugs before hoofing on. This time I kept moving for two reasons: I now use a 100-ounce Camelbak Antidote reservoir with the insulated flex hose, which is 30 ounces larger than the one I brought last year and I am aiming for a different side of the lake that is of less distance.
I am now moving along the section of trail I call the longest mile. I had just climbed from 9900 feet, over a 10,400-foot ridge then descended back down to 9800 in five steady hours. Already beat, I was concentrating so hard on keeping pace that once I reached the meadow on my right I realized I missed my turnoff to the left by a quarter mile. The area received a downpour three days ago, making it somewhat difficult to detect some of the side trails that hadn’t been walked on since. The runoff caused the whole forest floor to look like dry rivulets with pine needles bunched up on the sides. Backtracking, I ambled over a small trail through another meadow to hook back up to the side trail I missed. I took a big suck off my Camelbak hose and nothing. I was out of water.
Not to worry, I was within earshot of the main creek between Second Lake and Secret Brown Trout lake. Once there I unstrapped my pack, set it down, pulled out my MSR ceramic water filter pump and Nalgene bottle and filled ‘er up. First thing I notice is the water is warm. Of all the years I have hiked The Sierra since I can remember, I never experienced the sensation of warm water when I dipped my hand. As I pumped I contemplated. Winter 2011 brought us record snowpack, something like 220% of normal. This year our winter was a record no snowpack, ice-out occurred in early March and the air temps have been relatively warm ever since. Apparently all six main upper lakes in July have stratified, meaning the top thirty-or-so feet of warm, less dense water sits above the cooler, deeper water. Since the warm water is at the top of the lakes, it is flowing out into the creek between each on its way down to the valley floor. Trip out!
This fact validated even more my decision to make camp near the fish-rich cool deepest part of the lake instead of the usual shallow to mid-depth side where I usually stay. Last year I found my beautiful beach campsite choked with dead trees that crashed down in an avalanche two winters ago so there is really no reason to park over there other than that’s where I’ve hooked all my big browns throughout the years. Still, there shouldn’t be any reason why monsters would not linger around the shoals nearer the deep end in the evening.
I set up camp then walked to the creek below the falls where I pumped all my jugs full of freezing cold water, as this stream emerges from underground instead of a warm lake. Once I rehydrated a meal and ate I started casting a Rapala J-13 in brown trout pattern with an outfit spooled with twelve pound Trylene XL. On this side of the lake there are no perfect casting rocks so I stood and cast until my back was in such pain that I had to lie down in the dirt for ten minutes. This went on from six to nine PM before my body had enough activity for one day. I did however catch something, a smallish rainbow that was tossed back. It was a good sign the lure was eliciting some kind of strike.
Thursday morning I crawled out of the tent around 11 feeling energized, ate breakfast then went walking around to re-familiarize myself with some of the side trails so that next time I will not bypass the one I wish to use. Also, I can’t find the top half of my flyrod. The last time I used it was here. I checked out my old camp but I figured it would be a slim chance to find it lying around anywhere. While I visited this side of the lake I checked on my perfect casting rock. Now that the inflows to the lake are about a quarter of last year, the rock is accessible and I already miss it. It is long , level and smooth, making it perfect for lying comfortably on your back and casting just as far as you could while standing. Last year so much water was coming in, the lake was almost three feet deeper, covering most of the platform.
Back to camp by two, I ate lunch and took a big nap at three.
At 5:30 I ate and returned to casting the J-13 at six, just as the sun was behind a peak and off the water. It was the same boring scenario as last night. Stand and cast until my back hurt, lie down for ten minutes, cast another hour… and so on until midnight.
Friday was another perfect cloudless, windless morning to do just about nothing. It’s too early in the week to hook and kill a bunch of fish; I always wait until the last two days before hike out for that fun time. Today I did a little landscape maintenance. I picked the best spot to cast from, so that the prevailing breeze would place my lure right over the breakline between shallow and deep. I topped off a rock pile I built with another rock that was contoured to fit my butt perfectly so that I can have a nice chair to cast from later tonight. Also I pruned back several bush branches to the sides and behind me so they would not interfere with my fishing line.
After the usual lunch, nap and dinner, I was back casting the J-13 until midnight. Each night as the moon waxes fuller, there is more prime time to fish, as the browns will hunt at night using the extra light to help them see my wiggling plug. Unfortunately it was without a hit that I retired from business at midnight.
Saturday was just a repeat of Friday only I did less. Another group of campers showed up on the other side of the lake. Kids were diving into the water and swimming out to the island, an activity that before this year was prohibitive, as once you hit the water you would contract hypothermia immediately.
Casting from Six until midnight was again fruitless. Instead of like the past three nights, I used a J-13 in rainbow trout pattern instead of brown trout. The coloration of this lure perfectly matches the small rainbows you see swimming by. It looks and swims great. By the way, the Rapalas don’t include split rings and when you tie your line directly onto the lure’s loop, the action is somewhat stifled. The line tied to a split ring around the loop allows a freer wiggle.
Sunday I had recovered enough to be up at 7am so I could explore the back country past third lake. Many years ago I made it to a tarn that contained goldens, where I landed one that weighed a pound, pretty big for that specie. I passed Second Lake, Third Lake then hiked off-trail up the Fifth Lake outlet, through which I have never trekked, and will never again because once you are up in there the boulders are too large to safely climb over while strapped to a pack full of fishing gear.
Once at Fifth Lake I said hey to a group of anglers then motored on to the next stop Seventh Lake where the goldmine is. As I gracefully ambled along the shoreline in order to not spook the fish, I could see several target species rendezvousing nearby in the shallows. I backed up a little so my temporary camp and I would be obscured from their view by a large boulder, then set up my four-pound outfit with an eighth-ounce egg sinker, small swivel and four feet of two-pound leader tipped with a #18 treble hook. I molded on a teeny wad of Berkley Gulp trout bait in chunky cheese color and tossed ever so gently to the middle of the deepest part of the lake, which is maybe 20 feet.
I placed my rod into a spike holder, then pulled out my stove and pot to prepare lunch. Mere seconds later my fish pole bell rang out and I was on. The fish was a fighter, like all goldens are, and just like that I was holding a real beauty, not large but tasty nonetheless.
I cast out again with the same set-up and had another… and another and another before I could even unfold the feet of my stove. I just went ahead and filled my chain with the daily limit of five before I re-nourished with a pouch of Mountain House spaghetti and meatballs. And, oh by the way, I released another five that were lipped hooked in the hour and five minutes I fished.
As I stretched back in the sand to doze off I looked up at a low point in the Sierra Crest contemplating the next time I come up I will explore Eighth Lake, which lies behind the gap to the left. To the right is Ninth Lake, but I already went there many years ago when all the boulders on the way up were covered with thick snowpack. This year there are only two small patches of white and without the pavement to walk on, the boulder hop to the lake is too stressful to be worthwhile. After all it took over four hours this morning just to make it here, and another at least three to get back to brown trout camp. Spending any amount of time all up in this area requires quite the planned effort.
On the way back, instead of taking the scenic route through Fifth Lake Gap, I hiked the official trail down to Third. From the top of the ridge you can get a wide glimpse of the beetle devastation of the pines that used to live on the dry slope. It’s very heartbreaking to see.
I made it back to brown trout lake just in time to fix dinner and start fishing by 6:30. There was no time for the usual preparatory nap to ready my weary body for the many hours of casting. Five days into the adventure, even after seven hours of hiking, I felt great and cast my lure all night until the midnight cutoff. Now that I have a chair, I can sit on that rock until my ass hurts, then stand and cast until my back pains me, then sit back down for another while, and so on and so on.
Monday was the first day I should be thinking of collecting fat rainbows to harvest. Already I have five goldens in a zip bag, inside a trash bag, wrapped up in a gunnysack keeping cold in a shady riffle in the falls creek. We need five more to fill the limit. On a normal year it would take me two days to catch another fifteen fish to sift through until I have my largest take-homes but this year seems different.
I don’t know if the warmer water is the cause – probably is – but this year fishing is crazy good. I walked to a rock near camp, sat down and flung an eighth-ounce prism blue Kastmaster into the deepest part of the lake, let it sink to the bottom counting to 45 seconds, then jerked it in slowly using my J-13 rig spooled with eight-pound Trylene XL Armor Coated. Holy trout Batman, I was reelin’em in at a pace of ten per hour!! The first thirty minutes resulted in casting for the cycle, that is, I caught one of each of the three species that inhabit the lake, a brown, a rainbow and a brook trout. At one point I cut off the blue Kastmaster and went with the quarter-ounce hot pink rainbow pattern. It worked even better.
And as baseball stats go, not only did I, Mike Trout, cast for the cycle, for the trip I hit a grand slam if you add in the fourth specie, golden trout. And wait!! This means for the year I scored the Sierra slam because I caught that cutthroat trout back in May, the first time ever I nailed all five game species of trout of the Eastern Sierra in a season. Whoa!!
I lost count of how many fish I caught on the chrome for the day. I kept the one largest Kamloops rainbow of fourteen inches, as with the small head and fat body, their salmon-colored meat tastes the best.
After dinner I cast the J-13 until midnight, with the only hits being two small brown trout landed and released. I was using the brook trout pattern tonight, the same one I used to hook the big one last year.
Tuesday I went nuts and hiked past the falls creek inlet to the other side of the lake from camp, where we find the deepest water. I got to thinking, all these years we have been fishing sierra trout similar to the way I did Sunday for the goldens by using ultra light gear and a small wad of bait. Since the bite is so good, why not think big for larger fish. Onto my four-pound outfit I slid on a one-ounce egg sinker, a swivel then instead of the two-pound leader I went with four. To that I tied on an Owner Stinger treble in size 20, pinned onto all 3 hook a nightcrawler, then molded to that a big wad of Gulp bait. I inflated the worm with an insulin syringe and cast out as far as the ounce would take it. Hits were immediate. Don’t let the small sounding size 20 fool you. For whatever reason the Stinger treble in 20 is just like a regular Mustad in size 12. I reeled in three twelve inchers before hooking one that felt twice as big. With the four-pound-test it was give and take for five minutes then the hook came out. DAM!! For this kind of baiting I will need to bring larger treble hooks. I retied and cast again with the same bait combo. The fish wouldn’t leave it alone. I caught three more then again another lunker hit. This time I let it take more line before I set the hook. That did the trick as up from the depths arose a beautiful fifteen-inch Coleman rainbow netted without incident.
In the afternoon the first real clouds of the week were building over the White Mountains, far enough away to not bother us here in the Sierra. For an hour I didn’t have a hit on the bait but the action never waned as with my other rod I was reeling in the three species while spoonplugging the Kastmaster at the same pace as yesterday. I tried different depths with the lure, the best results again coming from the deeper water.
I pretty much now have the ten fish I will bring home. I cut off the action at 4:30 to make it back to camp to ready everything for the final night of casting the J-13. I again had no hookups while using the big lure as the cumulus east over Nevada provided a most scenic sunset to the trip.
Wednesday morning, fueled by one pouch of scrambled eggs and ham and three Quaker Chewy Granola bars I powered myself with the trek poles back to the trailhead in three hours fifty minutes. About half way I came upon an angler and three teenagers, who looked at the large net strapped to my pack and said, hey, there’s a guy going for them big browns back in here. We exchanged tips, all of his I already know. He said last year he saw a ten pounder cruising the back of Second Lake. I told him my sad story about how 21 years ago I saw an eighteen-pounder follow up a rainbow I was reeling in. He concluded with, you been coming up ever since, right? Yup. It’s an addiction.
Brown trout planted in Lake Gregory to control smallish crappie
*****
Photo Gallery -- Went 4x4 / hiking Owens River Headwaters Wilderness 7/5
PhotoGallery -- Went 4x4 to McGee Mountain and also hiking the new Owens River Headwaters Wilderness 6/29.
Breakwall Robert loaded the boat with lings and buts photo.
Wook fished the delta and nailed a lunker largemouth photo.
*****
Fish News:
Retired vacationers haul in giant BC sturgeon
White shark spared from angler at Mahattan Beach Pier
Fly fisherman benefit from low water levels
Classroom raised seabass released to ocean
A million trees down in Red's Meadow Valley
Trails around Mammoth Lakes a mess due to Nov. 30 windstorm
Redondo Beach to get waterfront and pier makeover
Mt. Whitney fish hatchery might go to Sierra Nevada Conservancy