Horseshoe Lake, Paradise Lake

Paradise Lake & Horseshoe Lake, The Hate and Love

Lil Paradise Gill

One of the great aspects of fly fishing is the concept of learning how to be successful. To me, taking the time to learn a body of water and figuring out the puzzle of what works and what doesn’t is far more rewarding than catching a few here and there. There is one lake I tell people I “hate” because it is by far one of the most difficult still-waters I’ve fished so far.I hate Paradise Lake. 
When I use to fish with a spinning rod it was pretty easy and on most days I ended up catching more than a few bass, but once I picked up my fly rod the entire game changed. This Sunday I fished Paradise Lake to see if I could finally figure it all out.

Paradise Lake
On Sunday the weather was still a bit cold. The cold front had finally begun to taper to an end but the clouds and winds were still around. I found the water to be relatively warm and there was a lot of nice tall grass growth on the banks; ideal holding spots for bass and other fish. The lake had been stocked with trout a few weeks ago and the majority of anglers were targeting the planters. However, I had different intentions.

Paradise Lake is known for its quality largemouth bass population however, the conditions that they live in make them wary and smart. The clear blue waters with a visibility of 5ft or more makes these bass difficult to target, especially if fishing from the bank. They’ll see you before you see them and tricking them into eating a fly is futile if they saw you throw it.

I tried different sink-tips, patterns both big and small, and various retrieves but nothing proved successful. The only fish that were willing to bite were the tiny bluegills. I did manage to hook into an 18”+ bass but on its first jump it threw the hook. Pretty awesome to see it all happen though.

I definitely need to take the time to learn how be successful on Paradise Lake. The next time I get out there I’ll try fishing bluegill
patterns, maybe that will motivate the bass enough to get them to take. I hate Paradise Lake because its challenging, but love it because that’s what makes it fun.

Horseshoe Lake
Horseshoe Lake is my still-water success story. This small “lake” is the complete opposite of Paradise Lake. The clear blue waters are muddy and turbid and foothill forest is a tall grassy meadow. Countless trips of trial and error is how I learned to be successful on this particular body of water.

Another Bobber Cat

I spent an evening during the week to fish the lake and caught a dink catfish. My standard rig wasn’t working so I switched and quickly found success. I also snagged myself another bobber fish but it was a dink that was somehow able able to break itself off. At least I was able to release this one.

I’m tired of catching dinks. This Memorial Day weekend will be a great fishing weekend and I’m ready to catch some trophies.

Tied me a Trophy catching fly
Deer Creek, Horseshoe Lake, Sacramento River

Busy at Work, Busy on the Water

Scenic Deer Creek

This week has been one of the longest and oddest weeks I’ve had in a while. The kiddos at school were acting up, I was sick Wednesday morning, there was a flash thunderstorm Thursday, and the fishing was pretty off.
Although the fishing was sort of difficult, I spent some time at Horseshoe Lake, Sacramento River, and Deer Creek catching a few here and there.



Horseshoe Lake
I’ve been wetting my line at Horseshoe a couple time this week in hopes of finding carp. I caught a cat one day and got skunk the next two trips. Monday I fished with Patrick, a friend from the fly shop, and he had all the luck that evening. Patrick says he’s never caught anything on a fly at Horseshoe but that evening he landed a good 4# bass and a nice cat while I caught the skunk. It was nice to see someone else catch some fish on a fly out there besides me for once. I fished the lake a few more times to be skunked again. It must be those darn east winds. The fish were scattered all over the lake and were very off this week.

Splish Splash

Sacramento River
I want to catch a shad. Its still a bit early for them to be in Chico in numbers but it never hurts to try. Although no shad were caught I did manage to catch a small hatchery steelie on the swing with a soft hackle. Its weird that there are trout out there because the water is pretty warm.

Washout Trout

Deer Creek
One of my favorite things about Deer Creek is that when I’m fishing, the majority of the time I’m fishing alone in the tranquility of nature. No one is ever on the water when I’m there. I made plans and opted out on going Saturday opening day because it was a bit too cool around 60 degrees. On Sunday the temperature range jumped up to a nice 70-75 degrees just as predicted. It was time to head up to Deer Creek for the first time this year. While I was there I saw hatches of midges, march browns, and a few caddis; bugs were pretty much everywhere.

Fish of the Day

My day started below Red Bridge where I fished my usual holes. I must have caught about 30+ fish on dries this trip. It feels good to get some action back on the 2wt. Although most of the fish were around 5-7” no nymphing was needed. Usually I start catching the 10”+ bigger fish as summer rolls in.

Salmon Smolt
 

After fishing the catch-and-release section, I fished above the Upper falls to catch some dinner and ended up with 3 pan-sized fish while releasing a ton of smaller ones. Overall a great productive day.

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