Oster Lake #3, ID

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Outing Information

Date: Sunday, April 13th, 2008
Start/End Time: 2:00pm to 8:30pm
Best Fishing Time: -
Rating: Good

Classification: Public
Water Temp: -
Water Clarity: Clear - 5'+ visibility
Water Level: -
User: Jason Hansen

Fish Caught

Rainbow Trout

Caught	Avg Size	Pattern	Optional Fields
1	12"	#12 Olive-Brown California Leech	Time Caught: 2pm
3	12"	#16 Maroon Chironocone	Time Caught: 2pm-4pm
3	12"	#16 Rust Zebra Midge	Time Caught: 2pm-4pm
5	12"	#16 Olive Chironocone	Time Caught: 4pm-6pm
6	12"	#16 Black Chironocone	Time Caught: 6pm-8pm
18	12"

Gold Trout

Caught	Avg Size	Pattern	Optional Fields
3	16"	#16 Maroon Chironocone	Time Caught: 2pm-4pm
3	16"	#16 Rust Zebra Midge	Time Caught: 2pm-4pm
3	16"	#16 Black Chironocone	Time Caught: 6pm-8pm
9	16"

Total: 27 fish Top Patterns: Chironocone (20) Zebra Midge (6) California Leech (1)

Weather

Skies	Afternoon	Evening
Sunny	X
Mostly Sunny		X
Precipitation
None	X	X
Wind
Very Light - <5 knots	X
Light - 5 to 10 knots	X	X
Medium - 10 to 15 knots		X

Air Temp High/Low: 77.0°F / 65.0°F
Wind Direction: -
Weather Front: -
Barometer: -
Moon Phase: 47% Full (First quarter)

Other Patterns Tried

#16 Black Zebra Midge

Hatches

#20-#24 Midge Diptera

Insect Seining

No seining information for this outing.

Fishing Partners

Karl Sloth

Waypoints

No waypoints were saved with this outing.

Tides

No tide information was saved with this outing.

Notes

A second consecutive nice-weather day. It was incredible how many people were fishing Oster Lake #1 when I pulled in in the afternoon. Wow. Lots of people were also fishing #2. Luckily, not too many people were at #3.

Karl arrived a little bit before I did, and had landed 5 by the time I was putting my float tube in the water. I started with a California Leech that was still tied on from yesterday. I caught one pretty quickly and had a couple other hits, then it went dead. As I was paddling around I saw one #16 bloodworm (red/maroon chironomid larva), so I switched to a hang and bob with a chironocone as the bottom fly and a rust zebra midge about 1 1/2' up from it. I had a pinch-on float another 1 1/2' to 2 1/2' feet up the leader, so the chironocone varied in depth from 3' to 4' most of the day.

The fishing was very fast for the first couple hours, then it slowed down substantially. In the late afternoon Karl and I walked back to another lake and fished that for maybe an hour with some success. The lake was ridiculously weedy, though, so we headed back to #3.

Our fish numbers were pretty close going into the evening/final stretch, but like a veteran, I knew when it was time to pick up the pace. I did very well again in the evening on a black chironocone.

I landed 27 today, had probably another dozen+ that I fought and brought close to the tube and didn't count, and had another 30+ hits where I missed the fish on the hookset. Lots of action for most of the day. The fish were recent stockers and not all were in great shape, but it was still quite fun.

Midges hatched sporadically throughout the afternoon, but fish weren't up on them. Didn't see any mayflies.

Note that I tie zebra midges on a TMC 2487 hook which is 2X short, and I tie the chironocone on a TMC 2302 hook, which is 2X long. My #16 zebra midges are quite a bit shorter than my #16 chironocones.