Elevation 8,260 Feet

On Friday, 6/24, it sure was nice to be up at Mosquito Lakes where the temperatures were in the low 70s as compared with SacTown where the temperatures were near or above 100.

I learned from my brother "da PRO" many moons ago to swap out treble hooks for single hooks on crank bait lures.  I borrowed this same concept and swapped out trebles hooks for single hooks on trout spinners!

Will these work?!?

Of course, WizTech and I had the Miracle Squad with us, so we must setup regular fishing poles for them to catch fish while I experimented.

We left home at 7 AM, had breakfast at 8 AM in Valley Springs, and arrived at our destination at 11 AM.  Note that the breakfast time could be shorter for the next trip.

I went to our favorite spot at the Upper Mosquito Lake and tossed in four poles for the group.  Immediately, it was fish on!  Mrs. Miracles and the kids had a blast landing fish after fish.  By 11:30 AM, we had our first limit!  These were between 11 and 13 inches!

Master Fisherman displaying the first limit!

The next limit came at 11:30 AM....  Awesome!  Compared to the fish at Loon Lake from last week, the smallest fish from Mosquito was equal to the biggest from Loon!

WizTech with the second limit @ 11:30 AM.

At 1 PM, there was a big hit on one of the poles and the Monk set the hook and landed the biggest fish of the day:  a 14 incher!

Let me show you how to hold it!

Like this?

From noon to 2:30 PM, the bites slowed down tremendously and winds picked up.  We managed another three and packed up to head down the mountain.

JU's Experiment

I went between Upper and Lower Mosquito Lakes with lures to entice some trout.  At Upper I had three hookups, but only managed to land one on the Thomas Buoyant at 12:30 PM. This was consistent when using single hook: more difficult to land fish.

This 12 incher fell for the Thomas.

I proceeded to the Lower Mosquito to try out my new rigs: the spinners with single hooks.  I never had success with Panther Martin spinners in the past.  So I tried this first, the smallest of the spinners on the right hand side from the first picture.

I found a stream running into the Lake.  About 10 feet away was a big boulder sticking out 3 feet above the lake surface.  This was deep beautiful clear water.  First cast with the Panther: Fish on!!!  Tornado, what the heck swallowed the lure?  The drag from my fishing reel screamed!  My pole bent over!  I knew it was a big fish because my drag was set in such a way that only a big 3 pounder at least could have pulled it out!  On yeah, baby, the fish surfaced.  This confirmed my intuition.  I have never caught anything big like this before with a Panther.  From a distance of 15 feet, I could tell, it was not a rainbow trout, looked more like a brown trout.  I didn't think any big fish like this existed in this little Mosquito Lake!!!  Then it happened.  The fish went left toward the big boulder 10 feet away.  I tried raising my pole high and herding the fish away, but it wouldn't have it.  Behind the boulder it went.  Within seconds after that, my line broke :-(  When I got my line back, it was frayed badly by the boulder where it broke!

Trout 1, JU 0!

Unfortunately, since this was an experiment, I did not bring another Panther like the one I lost.  Thus, I tied on the second rig, the white with red dots lure in the middle of the the first picture.  Before using it, I moved it back and forth in front of me to make sure that the blade was spinning properly.  I was satisfied.

First cast with new rig, fish on again.  Not as big as the first.  No drag screaming, but hey, fish on, baby!  Within a few seconds, fish off :-(  For the next hour, I had a total 5 hook ups.  They fought for a few seconds each, then fish off.  My conclusion was that the single hook on the snap swivel somehow enabled the fish to shake off easy.  No need for me to try out the last lure because it also had a single hook on the snap swivel.

Trout 5, JU 0!

I can't wait for the next time.  I will modify the single hook to be on the double split rings like I did with the Thomas Buoyant!

Video Section

For now I will leave you the following two videos featuring Master Fisherman (Age 11) and "little j" (Age 7).

Master Fisherman had a dancing technique to catching fish.

"little j" was more serious when it comes to landing fish.

Which Way to Loon Lake?

Got a blessed opportunity to go fishing today, Friday, 6/17.  Left my home at 7 AM with 6 children, 4 of my own and two on loan.  I met up with WizTech at a McDonald's in Placerville to treat the kids to breakfast.  I decided to visit Loon Lake, which was another hour drive away.  The last time I was there was probably more than a decade ago when I did not own a Garmin and relied on hard copy of a map to get to my destination :-)

WizTech and his two friends finished breakfast first, so I said to go to the right hand side of the boat ramp at Loon Lake and I will follow after the children finished with their breakfast.  I left McDonald's around 9 AM confident that I would get to the designated location by 10 AM.  On the way to Loon Lake, as I drove past familiar territory such as Ice House Reservoir, my Garmin was excellent.  However, beyond that, it went crazy and directed to go to all sorts of roadways.  I stopped twice and got directions from strangers and finally arrived at the Loon Lake dam by 10 AM.   I knew it was not the designated meeting place, but the view was fantastic and I had not been here before, so it was a photo op place and to give the children a break from the windy road.

Pardon me, sir.  How do we get to the boat ramp?

Boys will be be boys

It is a little colder @ 6,000 feet up.

View from Loon Lake dam.

Let's go fishing now.

I got information from a camper that the boat ramp that I was looking for was only half a mile away, but in the opposite direction of my travel :-)  So back down the mountain I went.  Once again, my Garmin was no help.  I relied on my Lord the Holy Spirit to guide me.  Yes, just like that, I found myself entering the boat ramp location within 10 minutes.  It almost threw me off that the entrance fee for day use was $8.00 per vehicle per day.  I know there was no fee a decade ago.  However, the camp host was kind enough to let me check to make sure my party was already by the boat ramp before I committed.  Yes, by then it was 11:30 AM, Wiztech and friends just limited out!!!  What a blessing!

We set up rods for the children and for the next couple of hours, they had a blast goofing around and landing fish left and right.

An extraordinary thing happened while I was there.  I threw my first cast out using the Z and it was fish on!  No, that's not the amazing thing because I was spoiled with the success of the Z.  As I turned to my left I ran into familiar faces: my fishing buddy the Pacman and another friend from my previous work!  What joy to run into friends at this leisure site.  So much to catch up on, I talked more than I fished....  And, it was all worth it.  Hope to see you again 'round the mountain in the near future.

If I am blessed, we will meet again.

As I mentioned, I had two children on loan with me: the Fishing Wonder, which already went fishing with me before and now introducing the Fishing Ninja, the fish never saw him coming.  I got Fishing Ninja to catch his first fish and brought a limit home to share with his family.  How awesome was that?!?

First Fish!

Hey, is that the Z?

Fishing Wonder

The fish tried to swim away with the stringer.

???  Right in front of the fishing zone ???

:-)

What a feeling!  I'm done with High School!

What a blessed day!

So I left the house at 7 AM and didn't get to fish until 11:30 AM and by 2 PM still managed to get the kids to land some fish, which reminded me of a saying from Kayaks with Beavers: "Results matter!"

I leave you now with a video clip of the Fishing Ninja and his first fish: it didn't see him coming.