BIG VIRGINIA TROPHY—Jennifer Hamman is all smiles after landing this 23-inch, 4.4-pound beauty at Big Virginias Lake while tossing Mice Tails from a float tube.
BY ERNIE COWAN
MAMMOTH LAKES—The summer doldrums have arrived as high temperatures sizzle the Eastern Sierra and put a damper on the trout bite.
Trout are kind of like you and me. We get lazy in the heat and our appetite slows down.
We avoid the hottest time of the day and look for cool places, and trout do the same thing.
But the trout are still there, lots of them in fact, thanks to aggressive local stocking efforts and renewed allotments of state hatchery fish. Also, the must eat.
The secret is to find out when, where and what trout are eating when the doldrums show up.
The problem is, we are creatures of habit, a curable disease known as Bttwwadi.
To avoid complicated medical terms, let’s just refer to this as, “Because That’s the Way We’ve Always Done It.” It’s pronounced bu-twa-de.
I learned it the hard way. I’ve always been an opening weekend, late spring and fall Sierra angler.
When I showed up mid-summer, the fish had lockjaw. The doldrums had arrived.
My usual midday effort resulted in nothing. No bites, to hits, all errors.
By shear accident I tossed a baited hook into Deadman’s Creek midday and didn’t pay much attention as it bumped along entering a culvert running under the road.
I was hit with a strong bite and reeled in a nice rainbow. In the next hour I pulled my limit from the shade of the culvert and when I got back to Mammoth, the clerk at The Troutfitter looked at me with that expression that says, “how did you not know that?”
I see a lot of summer anglers who don’t know that, so that’s why I am passing along a few tips to improve your success during the peak of summer heat.
If you are going to fish midday, work the shady places or cutbanks where trout will be lurking to escape the hot sun.
Get away from shore.
That means the deeper water and pockets created by cooler, undergrounds springs bubbling into the lake. If you do plan to fish from shore, find he drop-offs and cast into that deeper water.
Fish early and late.
Things cool off overnight and towards evening. Try to avoid midday.
Seek higher elevation waters.
We’ve said it before, but as temperatures rise, so should your elevation where temperatures are cooler and that means trout water is cooler.
For a full in-depth breakdown of all the Eastern Sierra regions, see page 2-3 in the July 19th, 2024 issue of Western Outdoor News. Subscribe here: https://wonews.com/subscriptions/