Fishing Forum

[cool]This last weekend was both our 24th wedding anniversary and Father's Day on the 15'th. We decided we needed to run away to get out of the Phoenix heat, so we arranged for someone to look after my mother and we headed for the cool White Mountains of northeaster Arizona. Our destination was Show Low, above the Mogollon Rim, where daytime temperatures had been about 20 degrees cooler than Phoenix.

There is a city water reservoir, coincidentally known as Show Low Lake, that produces some large fish of several species...trout, walleyes, largemouth, sunfish and catfish. At least it has in the past. On this trip, we arrived on Friday the 13'th...the night of the full moon. Double whammy.

We should have known what to expect when we went down to the lake in the evening to locate a good launch site for an early morning excursion. We stopped by the single small launch ramp and found everybody launching, and nobody coming in. The locals advised us that during a full moon "You fish for trout until 8, then walleye until midnight and then catfish until daybreak." They shook their heads ly and knowingly when we told them we intended to try for some walleyes in the morning.



We found a secluded spot to launch, up in the inlet area. This was Friday evening, before all the intelligent locals hit it for the night's action.



It was already light when we launched. We started seeing fish on the sonar as soon as we moved away from the bank. But, the only bite TubeBabe had all day was a large crawdad that latched on to her baitbug while she let it sit on the bottom while fooling with tackle. It got away.



About the only fishermen on the lake were a handful of tourists in their "cabin cruisers"...trolling various flashers and bait combos for the little newly-planted hatchery pet rainbows. There were also a few bank "tanglers" soaking assorted "bottle baits" for trout with minimal success. We saw two trout about 16" taken by one of the old retirees who lives on the lake and fishes it every morning. Other than that, we saw one 8" hatchery pet.

I ran through my whole arsenal of potential walleye enticements, and fished from shallow to deep and back again. I metered quite a few concentrations of fish over humps and rocky points, but from what I could see on the sonar, they all had sun shades on their eyes and zippers on their mouths. I had several bumps while retrieving small RoadRunners and other lures at middepth. I suspect they were only the tiny tyke rainbows that were also taking newly hatched cicadas from the surface on occasion.

It was a beautiful morning, and a non-stop wildlife parade. In our float tubes we often have all kinds of critters come right down to the water's edge to drink...remaining undisturbed by our silent passage. The first such treat was a pair of little grey foxes. They were too far away to get a good pic, but they were pretty little things.



I kicked under a large dead pine tree that had a couple of cormorants drying their wings in the morning sun, after a hearty breakfast of hatchery trout.



I also made friends with a rock squirrel foraging along the bank, by flipping him a small piece of my peanut butter and honey "fuel" sandwich.



We are wildflower enthusiasts and love to add new pics to our collection. We put on slide shows of Arizona flora and fauna for the winter visitors (snowbirds) and are always on the lookout for flowers. This is a type of penstemon...related to snapdragons.



The pretty but formidable "prickle poppies" look like a cross between thistles and daisies. Their sharp spines will penetrate leather gloves.



On our way back to Phoenix, on Sunday, we were treated to the bloom cycle of several showy members of the agave family...also called "century plants".

TubeDude
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Happy belated Fathers day and congrats to your 25th Ani. Looks like beautiful lake. So you are takin' pics of flowers now eh? How are the both of you? I finally took some time out to fish on a cattle boat ( this time it was truly bovine in a boxcar). You have people hurlin' chum fromthe second deck... missed the water completely! you have people droppin line before the boat could settle... Fortunately for me I knew something about fishin' (just a little) and came home with my limit.. with the largest being about 2.5 3 lbs sand bass. Fished malibu pier with small swim baits for short halibuts.. that was the extent of the weekend... Oh ya... won a Rhino rod and an abasor 6000 reel. Did not catch anything on that set up.
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[cool]Thanks for the kind words and good wishes, my friend.

Glad to hear you were able to "harvest" a few fish, even with all of the "help" from the chummers. It's great that people have a means of getting out, but it makes it less enjoyable for the serious anglers to have to contend with a lot of "amateurs". Still, it sounds like you got some fillets.

We are doing well, and hope you are too.

TubeDude
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Hey TubeDude,

Nice bunch of pictures and nice story. And to think TubeBabe lost the battle of the day to a clever little dad.... Oh.. Crawdad.. See, it was Fathers Day after all! ha ha ha

JapanRon
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HAPPY ANNIVERSARY MY PAL , AND A BELATED FATHERS DAY AS WELL .

YOUR PAL AL .
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[cool]Thankee kindly, my far off friend. Hope you had a good dad's day too.

Did you get your waders fixed okay?

TubeDude
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PATCHED , BUT DEFINATLEY TO BE REPLACED . TRIED THE FILL EM' WITH WATER APPROACH AND FOUND WAY TO MANY PINHOLES . , GOOD FOR THE SUMMER MONTHS BUT NOT FOR THE FALL AND WINTER ( LOVE THOES WINTER STEELHEAD ) .

THEY WILL MAKE FOR A GOOD CLONE , UH , I MEAN SCARECROW !
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hahahaha!

Aaron
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Great pics tube,

my uncle and i plan on hitting showlow and a few other lakes up there when we come down again. really want to hit the east clear creek when we are there. i dont know how october still sounds for ya but we are tentatively planning on that. been down to patagonia lately? i need a big crappie from there next time i come down.
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[cool]Been too busy to get back down to Patagonia. I hear they are still catching a few crappies, but the best fishing of the year is from late October through about mid December. The big crappies move back in near shore and over sunken trees. That's when I have taken several up to 19".

Just give me some advance notice (two hours is about right) and I can be ready to go.

Showlow Lake is also prime in the fall. The Arizona state record walleye (16 pounds) was taken during the first week of November last year...and they get some five to ten pound trout during that time too.

We will keep a water watch going. If we don't get some summer monsoon rains, you will have to cross any of the high country streams off your list this year. Although, that will be a good time to try for a big Apache trout from Hawley or Christmas Tree lakes. That would be a good new species for you. They love big jigs and wooly buggers. Also some big brookies in Sunrise Lake...not too far from Show Low. And fall is when they come in close for spawning. Some of those big males hurt your eyes they are so pretty.

Stay in touch.

TubeDude
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i once had a dream of catching a gila and apache till i realized I had no idea where to start and what i was doing for them haha. I sure would like that. Its all about plannin down there so much to do not enough time and so big of a state.
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