I fished the opener as has been my habit for several years. The outcome was atypical, though, with very little action. I tried a variety of offerings, including trolling flies behind a dodger which normally pays great dividends, God's Tooth spoons, spinners, and bait. Over three days I think I landed about four fish.

I went out again this evening, resolved to target fish in two ways. I rigged one rod with God's Tooth spoons tipped with worms and went deeper, trying to get down to where I've previously had good luck connecting with the holdover trout and steelhead in the 16-18" class.

For the second rod, I broke out an old 3-weight fly rod with an unidentifiable sinking line. I replaced the leader, and tied on a black leech with some purple flash.

The Bible says in Luke that if the people remain silent, the rocks will cry out. In my case, when they see me break out a fly rod and start casting, the rocks start snickering and outright guffawing. I think the trees got in some chuckles, too. I think I saw an otter do a face-palm.
So rather than casting, I trolled it about 50' behind the boat.

Final results:
Deep rod with spoons: 0/0.
Fly rod: 12/16.

The best part of the day wasn't catching the larger number of fish, though. It was the experience. I'd forgotten how sweet the simplicity of a fly rod is. It's just you and the fish, and on a 3-weight, every fish feels like a fighter. There weren't many people on the lake, and by the end of the evening I had it to myself. I stowed the gear rod and spent about 90 minutes just pulling the fly around. Great fun! It was so quiet and serene that I put on some music and whistled and sang as I trolled around. (The rocks snickered at my singing, too, and a small pack of coyotes stopped by to see who was doing all that howling.)

It was so nice not to have to worry about bait, depth, boat speed, watching a sonar, etc. Just chuck it back about 50' and relax. I'll definitely be doing that some more.

BentRod

5/3/2019 9:20:48 AM

Great report and great read! Thank you and congrats on the success.

TMBob

5/4/2019 4:45:13 PM

Reading your report I was killing it with spinning gear in all the local lakes last year till I went to Langlois for the first time ever. Luckily I did bring my fly rod also and did by far better with Intermediate line and an Olive Willy. Going to hit this lake for the first time this year next week and I’ll make sure to bring 2 fly rods with me as I have added a type 6 to my arsenal. One other tip I have is that the lake has quite the population of LMB...at least dink size ones. I have had a few fun days working the shorelines with a Bobber jig. Had a few nicer ones on but never got those in. Thanks for the report and maybe I’ll get my first ever tag Trout there this year.

MoonValley

5/14/2019 10:13:00 PM

TMBOB -- I caught a tagged trout on Langlois this evening. It will be interesting to see what it's worth. This is my third tagged fish from the lake. I threw the first one back before I knew what it was. I thought it might be part of a study or something.

MoonValley

5/16/2019 2:34:48 PM

Caught a tagged fish on Tuesday night. Just called, and found out that it's worth $50 at my local Ace Hardware, where I buy all my licenses and bait anyway. Nice surprise! That's my third tag from that fishery over the last couple of years.

I went about 8 for 14 on the lake that night. Last night was slower, ending up with 5 of about 12. The flies I normally use weren't producing, so I switched to a white & bubble gum mouse tail. It definitely earned more bites, but I ended up taking fish home that I would have normally released because they vacuumed the hook so far down their throats.

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