Early Patterns For Trout Lakes

Thermoclines tend to measure about 10 feet, top to bottom, and represent a rapid change in temperature and density that divides upper and lower layers of a lake until Fall Turnover, or until a big storm mixes things up. They can be located with temperature gauges on downriggers or with depth-finders. With the gain turned up, thermoclines become a visual band on the screen, somewhere near the upper middle of the water column. Depending on the lake, they can develop at depths ranging from 18 to 35 feet or deeper. In the Great Lakes, it’s not uncommon to find them deeper than 50 feet. Thermoclines are not static, bulging downward on windward shores, while bending upward on the lee side of the lake.

Just as thermoclines develop, those places where they intersect bottom on good structure can be prime for trout. The same kind of bottom rig and baits described in Stage One can be deployed, though a lively crawler becomes hard to beat. Hover a boat, drift slowly, or anchor just inside the intersection of the bottom and the thermocline on humps, points, or sunken islands. When the intersection is deeper than 20 feet, fishing vertically with tubes or backtrolling slowly along the intersection using jigs tipped with action-tail grubs can be highly effective, especially on windy days.

But the primary tactic for Stage Three quickly becomes trolling. Trout enter a suspending stage within a week or so of the development of thermoclines. “At that point, get the depth-finder out and look at the deeper sections of the lake,” Smiley says. “A depth-finder helps a lot, because you locate the trout at 20 feet some days and 40 feet the next. In summer, they might be using the top or the bottom of the thermocline, but they’re generally somewhere near it.

“Most of the year when I’m trolling, I put 60 feet of 6- to 8-pound line behind the boat and pull a floating Rapala,” he adds. “I might use a split shot or two to take it a little deeper, and in-line trolling boards can be very effective for dragging the lures out away from the boat path. But in summer you need downriggers or diver-planers to get the lures down there. Minnowbaits and smaller banana baits, like the Luhr Jensen Kwikfish, are my favorites. Get them running at the depths where you’re marking fish and it shouldn’t take too long.

“Summer isn’t the best time to fish trout, because they’re stressed and forced deep. Most fish,” he notes, “even stream trout, are the opposite—stressed in winter and building weight all summer. But trout in lakes can be turned off for long periods in summer. Keep playing with color, style, and size until something encourages a reaction.”

Following this three-stage process could be the ultimate test of maturity. A 13-year-old gets a tent, a flyrod, a spinning rod, and a duck boat and won’t be allowed to return home until he or she has caught trout on bait, flies, and lures. (That’ll teach ’em.)