Kern River Region Trout

The source of the Kern River of California is in a great mountain amphitheater about 12 miles in diameter, lying mostly above timberline at an elevation of more than 11,000 ft. above the sea. In this amphitheater are scores of lakes in depressions scooped out by long-vanished glaciers. From these lakes emerge numerous streams which either flow into the headwaters of the Kern, or fall over the lofty rim of its great canyon.

Most of the lakes and streams have been stocked with various species of trout. The golden trout, indigenous to the area, is the most abundant. Next comes the Kern River rainbow, also native to those parts. Less plentiful is the Eastern brook trout. These trout are occasionally found in waters at even greater elevation than 12,000 ft. The golden trout especially does well at high altitudes.

The trout of the streams all average about pan size, with occasional larger specimens. Commonly the golden trout of the higher elevations give way rather abruptly to the rainbow, sometimes at 10,000 ft., though 8,000 ft. elevation usually is the dividing line in the southern Sierra Nevada Mountains. In some streams, notably: Tyndall Creek and tributaries, the Eastern brook trout is found in association with the goldens.

The trout average much larger size in the lakes. Golden trout 16 in. long are often caught in them. There are occasional 18-inchers and sometimes a specimen of 20 in. or more. The largest that I know of was caught some years ago in Wales Lake, at an altitude of 11,712 ft. It weighed 8 lb. The goldens in that lake have gone down into its outlet to spawn, and since waterfalls prevent their return, Wales is now thought to be barren of trout. The like has happened a number of times in Sierra lakes. Screening outlets appears to be the only remedy.

Golden trout do well in a number of lakes of this immediate region, notably Lake South America, on the headwaters of the Kern, at an elevation of 12,000 ft. They also have been planted in Lake Tulainyo, occupying a depression on the very crest of the Sierra, 12,865 ft. above sea level. It is known that they survived there for several years at least. Whether they still are there does not seem to be known.

Rainbows in the lakes of the region run up to at least 18 in. Some of these lakes are small, and lie at high altitudes in the bleakest of surroundings. One of these, a mere tarn, is a stone's throw from Shepherd Pass. A great snow bank is there throughout the summer. This little lake has numerous rainbows, some of which go up to 18 in. or more. The Eastern brook trout does well in some of the lakes at the headwaters of Tyndall Creek.

Since both lakes and streams at the headwaters of the Kern either are above timberline, or are bordered by very open stands of pine and shrubbery, or by an occasional willow thicket, they are a delight to the fly caster. The angler can do well on them using the fly only. The possible exception would be in the case of the largest trout in the high lakes, where a spinner or similar lure may prove the more taking. Many of the larger trout, however, take the fly if it is presented properly.

The goldens of the higher lakes are reputed to be temperamental. However, it is seldom that they won't take the fly at some time during the day, most frequently in morning and evening. Fly fishing for rainbows in these high lakes is sometimes exceptionally fine. The Eastern brook trout in some of the streams gives fascinating fly fishing.

The high passes by which only, except from the south, the Kern River amphitheater may be reached, usually can't be traveled by riding and pack horses before the first of July. These passes also may be blocked by snow in the latter part of September. Thus fishing in these high lakes and streams is confined to summer and early autumn. Some of the higher lakes are not free of ice until well into July.

Due to its undulating and open character, the terrain up there is very easily traversed by sportsmen traveling either afoot or on horseback. During the summer months it makes a delightful camping area. While back-packers sometimes enter this region, it is best to lead pack animals, if you walk, or else have both riding and pack stock.

http://www.kernriverflyfishing.com/trips.htm

Mackerel on Light Gear

Whether I'm fishing for tarpon or tomcod, I seldom pay any attention to the antics of bathers, picnickers, or shell collectors. My wife tells friends that the nibbles of an eel would make me ignore an exploding grenade.

But a few years ago, while black-fishing from a bluff on a stretch of rocky Rhode Island shore, I was distracted by a lady who appeared below me carrying two items which didn't seem to belong together: an artist's easel and a large wooden bucket.

Placing the easel on a boulder, the lady lugged the bucket to the edge of the water and ladled out half a dozen scoops of thick liquid into the sea. Returning to her easel, she painted for some minutes and then paused to dipper out some more of the liquid. It looked as though she were chumming, but if so, why wasn't she carrying fishing tackle? After about half an hour of this dippering-painting routine, I felt that I must get to the bottom of the mystery. I reeled in and made my way over to where she was.

"Yes, I'm chumming," the lady told me. "But for my husband, not for myself. He's fishing the cove around the bend below us. When tides and winds are right, as they are today, currents sweep the chum into that cove and mackerel often follow it in. I don't care for fishing myself, but I don't mind helping my husband while I'm dabbling with seascapes."

"I'll walk down to the cove and see how he's making out," I said.

Climbing down the steep, winding path which led to the cove, I found a most happy man. He had a good fish on the end of his whippy bait-casting rod, and judging from the boils near the end of the reef, there were plenty more where that one had come from. Obviously, the unique chumming operation was paying off.

He played his fish carefully, allowing the fish to run without too much rein until its strength had been exhausted. Then, reeling steadily, he worked his prize closer in, and finally, with a long reaching net, scooped in a 3-lb. mackerel.

"Say, that's a beauty," I exclaimed. "Yes, they're running good size this fall," he replied.

He looked at my tackle and noticed that I was carrying a bait-casting outfit not much heavier than his.

"Why don't you replace that bottom rig with a spinner and join me?" he invited.

"There's plenty of room on this reef and I'd be glad to loan you one of my spinners."

"Thanks, I'd like to, but I have a little box of lures in my bag. I always carry them this time of year in case a school of mackerel suddenly shows up."

It took me just a moment to snip off my light black-fishing rig and attach a yard of nylon leader and a bead-chain snap swivel. Instead of a twin-bladed spinner such as my new-found friend was using, I decided to try a shiny, 1oz. wobbling spoon.

By the time I was ready to cast, some of the mackerel had moved in closer. A silvery horde of small baitfish had also moved into the chum slicks making the area doubly attractive to the mackerel. Some of the little fellows brushing over the surface like hard flung pebbles, had retreated almost to the inner edge of the cove where they were comparatively safe. Only on rare occasions have I seen the deep-running mackerel enter depths less than 4 ft.

I brought back my rod, took aim, and cast out beyond the edge of the cove. Letting the lure settle about 2 ft., I gave it a hard twitch for extra flash, and then, holding the rod at a side angle of about 45˚, I reeled in fast.

A few moments later, I had a swift, slashing strike that made my line come taut as a fiddle string. The mackerel shook his head, flipped his tail, and then began racing toward open water.

It was a heavy-throttle run of more than 100 ft. When it ended, the fish dropped a little deeper, bolted to the side, and threw his weight recklessly against the line as he launched into a number of shorter runs. I could predict each time he was ready to turn by the way he flung himself against the line. One reason mackerel are such fast moving fish, is that they are among the few fish which lack air bladders to keep them buoyant.

When the mackerel finally began to show signs of tiring, I kept him off balance by dropping and raising the point of my rod from a side angle. In easy stages I began putting on greater pressure until, after about 10 minutes, I had the blue-and-silver warrior close enough for netting. He was about the same size as the one I'd seen my companion land, possibly an ounce or two heavier.

The school hovered around for almost an hour, and by the time it moved out, I had four more on my stringer-a nice haul of fish that taste as good as they fight.

It's not surprising that the Atlantic mackerel is such a little package of dynamite at the end of a light rod. He can claim relationship with some of the finest gamefish that swim: tuna, wahoo, bonito, albacore, cobia, and even swordfish and marlin. Of more direct kinship are the Spanish and king mackerel of warmer Atlantic waters, and the hard hitting Pacific mackerel.

How to Catch Panfish

Of all the fresh-water fishes, yellow perch and bluegills are probably accountable for more pleasurable hours of fishing than any others. Of course those deriving this pleasure are not the rabid trout and bass fishermen, but the large numbers of anglers who fish mostly for relaxation and for food, and who are satisfied to associate with the lesser lights of fishing society.

Generally speaking, perch and bluegills are easy to catch, except when it comes to getting big ones. Because of this, people who fish for them are often looked upon by trout and bass anglers as lowbrow fishermen.

The odd thing about this is that many of the anglers who don't do so well with trout and bass are the ones who are most likely to act superior toward the pan-fisherman. And while they may themselves have an urge to catch some of these common fish, they don't give it a try because they're afraid of being scorned by the elite, the stars of the trout and bass world.

In my opinion fishing should not be competitive or comparative. Rather, it should be contemplative - a sport to build up your soul and refresh your mind. So that after a day or more on a lake or stream you can go back to the job of making a living with renewed vigor and new ideas.

For this purpose panfish serve just as well as the more popular gamefishes. If you get skillful enough to locate and fool large perch or bluegill, you can feel just as proud as the angler who catches a two-pound trout in water where a pound fish is considered big.

Yellow perch were once restricted to southern Canada, New England, and the northern Midwest states. Now, as the result of stocking, they're found in all states. Since they're wolfish killers of other fish - to the limit of their size and physical powers - these perch are seldom protected by closed seasons and bag limits.

While yellow perch prefer a diet of minnows or other small fish, they also feed on, insects and crustaceans. With an adequate food supply they may run to a good size and sometimes be rather difficult to catch. However, it's rare to find them running better than about half a pound. Under ideal conditions they can grow to a weight of four pounds or more, but if you ever catch a two-pounder or better, you're entitled to a little bragging.

As a rule, yellow perch are found in large quiet streams and in ponds and lakes. Their tendency is to seek deep water, even to 30 feet or more, although the smaller ones usually stay in the shallows near vegetation. However, I've caught large ones while trolling in shallow water for bass and pickerel.

Good spots to try are areas off weed beds where the water breaks abruptly to greater depth and to a bottom of gravel, rock, or sand. It also pays to investigate water of good depth near pilings, docks, bridges, etc. Large perch will usually be in the vicinity of forage fish, or where they can grab the unprotected fry of bass and other gamefishes.

Perch schools usually number from one to three dozen fish. In each group the size of the individual fish will be fairly uniform, any difference of more than two inches in length between the largest and the smallest being uncommon. Perch are spring spawners; sometimes spent females are observed before winter ice has disappeared.
One time while fishing a smallmouth bass lake with chub minnows, my companion and I consistently took as many perch as bass, with the perch running heavier. Sometime later, fishing with 5/8-oz. plugs in the same water we took only one large perch to each eight smallmouths. However, we had many misses which I suspected were yellow perch.

I felt sure that the missed strikes were mostly from perch that couldn't handle our bass-size lures. Later on I went back to test this theory. Using smaller minnows and small spinners on a fly rod, I brought my yellow-perch score up to four for each smallmouth. In subsequent experiences with yellow perch, I always did better when using small bait.

Another time a couple of us were fishing for pike in a northeastern lake. Ordinarily pike are ready strikers, but on this occasion we couldn't seem to find them. We searched the depths (some 30 feet of water) and experienced many “bunts,” or a feeling of something tugging at our lures, but we couldn't connect.

Experience told me to try a smaller lure, so I weighted a very small one to get the proper depth. The bunts then became hooked fish - yellow perch averaging about a pound each, with an occasional larger specimen adding an extra thrill.

I've had many pleasant hours of fishing for bluegills with wet flies and nymphs. These fish seem to prefer dull patterns, as a rule, such as March Brown, Blue Dun or Blue Quill, Cahill, Ginger Quill, Alder, and Gold-Rib Hare's Ear. As for hook size, No. 10 has served me best.

Among the fancy flies I have found Alexandra, McGinty or Bee, and Royal Coachman all excellent. Any dull nymph will do. As a rule, fishing the fly slowly with slight jerks is good practice. So is fishing them at different depths. Start by working the fly just beneath the surface, and then gradually let it go deeper before retrieving. Often a split shot above the fly will be needed to get the proper depth.

Among natural baits on a spinning rod, worms top the list, but grubs, beetles, and any other small bait that may be impaled on a hook will do the job. Remember that although these fish are good little scrappers, they have small mouths, so that unless you use small baits and suitable hooks - not larger than No.8 - you'll miss lots of takes.

While you may take bluegills with a rod and reel that you use for bass, the lighter the tackle, the more fun you'll have. I prefer very light fly or spinning tackle. One of my pet bluegill rods is an eight-foot split bamboo weighing two ounces. It's extremely limber, but what fun it gives me when I catch a fish.

Don't overlook perch and bluegills.

Both can provide you with good sport and good eating.

Fishing…How it has Become Our Greatest Sport Part 1

Americans who went fishing in early Colonial times were confirmed believers in the old Indian adage, "The best way to catch fish is to catch fish." Needing fish for food, they didn't care how they got them. Scoop net, seine, jack light, fish trap, hook and line - they used whatever method was most likely to produce the biggest catch in the least time.

But some of them, now and then, would wander off to the nearest stream, cut and trim a sapling, tie a fish-line to its tip, bait the hook with a worm or a maggot, and fish more for the fun of it than for what they caught. They were our first sport fishermen.

Their number increased rapidly as the settlements grew and the stark struggle for survival let up a bit; and long before Paul Revere took his midnight ride - fishing had become the most widely popular of American outdoor pastimes.
It's still the favorite, by the way.

Spectator sports (ball games, racing, and so on) draw huge crowds, but most of the onlookers are repeaters who are counted over and again in the attendance records. In contrast, add to the nearly 91 million fresh-water license holders the millions who don't need licenses to wet a line – children under 18, women in many states and senior citizen generally - and you have an estimated 100 million participants, who spend around 10 billion dollars a year on their sport. Only hunting can ever approach that record!

But to get back to the early days:

Trout were the fresh-water favorites although south of the Potomac the fish called by that name usually were black bass, which weren't given scientific recognition-as a distinct species until 1802. North of the Potomac, or in the mountains south of it, "trout" meant the native brookie. From Nova Scotia southward to Georgia, fast-running streams -cool, crystal-clear, untainted by man's pollution-teemed with these succulent, beautiful game fish.

In addition, the rivers from the St. Lawrence to the Connecticut had big annual runs of Atlantic salmon, and most of them from the St. John in New Brunswick to the St. Johns in Florida had runs of shad-netted in such quantities that sometimes they were sold by the wagonload for fertilizer. Myriads of black bass leaped in the streams and bayous of the South. Immense schools of bluefish, striped bass, weakfish, and other salt-water game fish thronged the bays, and only the inept came home empty-handed.

We can't help envying those old-timers the fishing they could enjoy almost at their doorsteps, but no present day angler would be tempted to break the Tenth Commandment by coveting the tackle they had to use. Its purpose was to yank the fish out of the water, not to give the fisherman a chance to use his skill. The first step in that direction came when the peeled sapling was displaced by a tapered natural cane or reed pole, with the line tied to its tip and wound around it when not in use - a rig we still use today in the South.

Then came the crude rod with wire line guides and a small wooden "wheel," with a frame and handle devised by the local tinsmith, lashed to the butt. More often than not this reel was a thread spool the angler snitched from his wife's workbasket - which is why some Kentuckians still call a reel a "spool."

Long before the colonies got a powder-and-shot divorce from England's King George III thousands of Americans in every walk of life had become sport fishermen, and a small tackle industry had grown up. About halfway through the 1100's, fly fishing for salmon and trout became popular among British landowners, and a few wealthy Americans who visited England brought fly tackle home with them. The rods were long and heavy, but they were a big improvement over ours. American tackle makers copied them, and also adapted them to live-bait fishing and trolling.

The sportiest copies - shaped out of a single piece of red cedar - were whippy and comparatively light, but so weak that only an expert could play a decent size trout without serious risk of breakage. The better lines were of twisted horsehair or silk; the cheaper ones of hemp, flax, or cotton. Silkworm gut was used for leaders, and flies either were imported or copied from English patterns.

President George Washington set his fellow citizens of the new U.S.A. a good example by going fishing. He wasn't a fly caster, but catching striped bass rockfish to him - from a punt anchored on the Potomac River off his home at Mount Vernon was one of his favorite diversions. (More than half of our Presidents, by the way, have been fishermen, and at least three - Cleveland, Hoover, and F. D. Roosevelt - rate as experts.)