Manzanita

“Big headshakes!”, I yelled to my brother Phil.  I had just hooked into what felt like a big fish… and in this lake there was one species of trout that reigned supreme… it had to be a brown.  I was only fishing four pound test so I had to be careful.  I let him take drag and he started heading out to deeper water.  We had fished Manzanita Lake quite a few times now and had a few patterns dialed.  This fish had crushed a countdown Rapala fished deep and very slow.

He was dogging now and I couldn’t move him with my ultra-light loomis.  “He has got to be decent”, I told my brother, who had kicked over in his tube to help me try to land the fish, as was our practice when one of us hooked a better fish.  One of the main reasons we loved this lake was the fact that it is a non-powered lake and that set up perfectly for our style of stealth fishing at the time.

I was working him slowly but surely back to the tube and we both squinted through our polarized lenses to see if we could get a glimpse of deep color as he came up.  We both let out a gasp as he saw him turn down deep with a big flash of gold.  He was huge for this little lake and now I wanted him very badly.  We had landed a bunch of nice Manzanita browns over the years to around 25” but always knew there were a few fish lurking that were bigger.  This was one of the bigger models and suddenly my four pound test felt like gossamer.  Just as that thought crossed my mind he made several large headshakes and was gone… just like that.

I sat staring at the sky for a few moments before I tied on a new lure and kicked back over to our area of interest for that trip.  We caught a few more decent fish but didn’t hook any other quality fish for the rest of the day.

Manzanita is special.  It is probably my favorite lake in the world.  Why?  You tell me where you can find wild browns and rainbows in a gin clear lake sitting at the base of a snow-capped, majestic mountain peak.  You tell me where you can site fish for marauding browns while wading in knee deep water and watch as they refuse fly after fly.  You combine all of this and much more and you will know why I love this lake.  If you haven’t been to the lake, do me a favor and swing by sometime.  Even if you don’t get a chance to fish it much, you should at least see it.

The trout are bug eaters in this lake so flies like damsels, small dark nymphs and chironomids work well.  But as you all know, once a brown trout gets to a certain size he will take a minnow imitation if presented properly.  The ocasional big rainbow in Manzanita will also hit a minnow plug.

All of the trout in the lake are wild and spawn naturally in small tributaries the flow into the lake.  These inlets are closed to fishing so make sure you pay attention to the regulations if you fish the lake.  The lake fishes best from a float tube or pontoon boat in my opinion.  This is a small lake (under 100 acres) and there are no powered boats allowed.

I hope you will put this lake on your short list.  Don’t expect to land giants but the scenery and overall experience will more than make up for it.

Mark Knoch