Pyramid Lake and Truckee River Report

Matt Gilligan Koles Reports on 11.12.2015

Pyramid Lake:

It finally feels like the old Pyramid Lake I remember in November, you know, freezing your ass off and catching big cutts. It is winter now in the high desert.

This weeks storm left a good coating of the white stuff on all the peaks in and around the lake. We had a good chop, (wind) and pretty raw/ gnarly conditions to fly fish in this week. Since the week before, the surface lake temp has lowered about 5 degrees. This is huge for the shore fly fisherman. You can now get those big Cutthroat of Pyramid Lake right of the beach wading, or fishing on your ladder. Retrieving the old standbys like the midnight cowboys, popcorn beetles, copper johns, all the old good stuff is working. Tui Chub patterns are sill effective flies too. Of course, I have some flies that have been out fishing the old standbys by a long shot, but when the fish are in close and cruising by in good numbers, they aren’t terribly  selective. A lot of times the retrieves you are using is the most important thing.

This month should be very good out at the lake until the water gets cold then it will slow down. Right now the morning and evening grab will be best unless you have a good wind and cloudy stormy low pressure type whether pattern. Good news for us is this looks to be the case as Lake Tahoe and Western Nevada are in for a cold and active weather pattern this month.

Truckee-Little Truckee River:

Definitely cold this week, a good warm up during the last couple days, but more cold weather is on the way. Kinda feels like a mid-winter type weather pattern and it’s only early November.

The Truckee River did come up since last weeks storm. We almost got to 200 cfs in the Hirsch, and 500 cfs down by Vista NV. The river is back down to 80 cfs here, and just over 100 cfs down toward stateline. The Glenshire stretch and all that stuff above Boca is still very low. 100 cfs ain’t to bad considering we have no water anywhere in Tahoe. Hopefully we can continue to get some storms. I think we will see the river pumping once El Nino kicks in. We have moved into a more winter type fishing pattern on the river with the lower water temps. The small stuff becomes important this time of year and most importantly the type of water you fish.

The Little Truckee River has been hovering around 45-55 cfs. That is actually pretty good this time of year regardless if we have water in Stampede or not. Not to much dry fly fishing to speak of lately unless it’s overcast. Lot’s of lakers moving into the system to spawn from Boca. Be very careful of where you wade if you are fishing the upper lot.

Doug O and I have one clinic left this fall at the Pyramid Lake on November 14th. This will be a good one, fish will be in close and we will share with you everything we know about the lake.  Lines, flies, retrieves, switch rods, you name it. Doug will even show you the “German Girl.” We have just a couple spots left.