Northwest Fishing Magazine April 2025 Volume 4 Issue 6 - Flipbook - Page 31
From outside the boat, it
looks like a boring way to
fish. I beg to differ. Some
methods are more suited
to small fish, while other
strategies are better suited
to big fish. But all trout, big
and small, eat chironomids.
Setting the hook is like
pulling the lever on a slot
machine. Especially on
reservoirs with submerged
streambeds like Crane
Prairie, Haystack, Prineville
Reservoir, and Timothy
Lake.
the trick is finding the
old river channels. As the
average lake temperature
warms, the fish move into
the cooler river channels
and use them as highways
to move around. The
channels average 12 to 13
feet deep and are relatively
weed-free with a sandy or
silty floor.
So what you have is a
90-degree angle coming
off your indicator. If you
move your indicator a
couple of inches. You give
it a twitch and it rises up
a couple of inches then
settles back down. Vertical
action is what you want
with chironomids. Reds and
black are the primary colors
most anglers use in Central
Oregon, but olives and
browns can also work. More
important than color is to
present at the right depth.
The fish is probably more
attracted by the silhouette
of the midge.
One of the things we tell
ourselves is we want to
find the depth where the
feeders are working. My
friend Scott Cook calls it
finding the feeders.
If a certain depth is paying
off, try to bracket all the
flies in the boat around that
part of the water column.
A depth finder can help
locate schools of feeding
fish.
