I just moved out of King County, and into Snohomish. I am missing my old winter favorite lake, Lake Alice in Preston.

Not for any particular reason: it had a good population of hold over trout, they weren't big, it wasn't crowded, and it was pretty with small houses and few lawns.

Are there any recommendations for lakes that might meet my needs up in Sno County?

Ron,

I sure am glad you got a haircut. How old is that picture?

What about Ballinger? Isn't it a year round lake?

That shot is my first fly caught steelhead, August 1976. The picture can be dated by the waders I am wearing.

Ballenger is basically right across I-5 from me. Its a bit urban for my tastes. Does it acutally fish well in the winter? And does it have a boat ramp?

I am thinking of something more rural.

Rob

Rob,

It's supposed to have coastal cutts that find access to the lake. That's why I mentioned it.

Along with "rumors" of good sized bass.

And.... if you're adventurous... what about trout and tiger muskies in Green Lake??

Lone Lake on Whidbey can be good. Are you looking for something to fish after work?

Yeah, summer evenings, Saturday after yardwork, Sunday before early dinner.

I always like a "home lake". When I was in Kirkland, I used to fish Cottage Lake as my quick and dirty lake, and Alice as a nicer treat.

With what Zen says maybe Ballinger should be my Q&D lake, but I am still looking for that nice little lake that isn't hammered: Storm, Flowing? Roesiger? How are those?

Rob

Rob, Here's two for you. Roesiger... you'd already came up with that one.

How about Wagner also. Could be interesting. I used to fish it in the 70's and started going to it again in 2002 and 2003. It's a little north of Monroe.

Hey Rob, any tips on fishing Alice? I've only hit it once (this last October), and couldn't really get a feel for it. I plan to spend some time cracking it open since I live in the area, but anything you can share would be appreciated.

I like to fish Alice with chiros starting about now. See my notes on fishing them in the topic that Mike C started.

I tend to fish the middle of the lake. I like to fish chiros along the point on the far side. I also like to fish along the break between the shallow bay and the main basin. The other spot is along the shore to the left of the launch.

Probably the best time to fish Alice is when PDT kicks in and the days are warmer, the water is cool, and there are big midge and Callebatis hatches in the evening. I will tie on a dry and have a blast sight fishing. I do that on Cottage, too. Its the most fun that trout fishing is in my mind.

Rob

How does a guy go about fishing Roesiger? With 2 major basins and a shallow area, I can only bet fish movements are both interesting and a key to sucess. I fished it once, and was just baffled about what to do.

Your thoughts?

Thanks for the tips on Alice

If'n it was me, I'd target the upper edges of the dropoffs with a Green Willy for starters... or chronies under indicators on the 6-8' depths of the flats.

Or... do a search of Roesiger on the lake info page and see where people said they were fishing.

Roesiger is due for it's usual spring plant in March. Seems to me the state does it around the same date just as regular as rain.

My personal favorite in the area is Storm. Started fishing it in 1974 on the opening days. Our first boat had a big dryrot hole in it that we "patched" by putting a piece of masonite over it. (We didn't like seeing the water)

... and from some of the local info I've been finding.. Blackman's lake might be a good one to play on.

I got a nice small lake but don't talk about it! It's not too far from Flowing (which is an ok lake). Has anybody ever fished Chain Lake northwest of Monroe? My dad used to take be there on summer evenings. We used to troll flies before our flyfishing days (behind a torpedo bobber on spincasters). We used to troll the weed edge and catch many small bass and bluegill. Sometimes up to 30 in one hour. This was great fun when I was a little kid. Then one day we caught a 3 pound rainbow. Pretty soon we started to troll small flatfish a little ways off the weed lines and along the tips of logs in a deeper section of theis little lake. We soon started to catch large, fat rainbows. I've never flyfished this lake before since we now live in Puyallup and not Duvall. I really want to go up there this summer in my tube and try for some of thouse big boys agian. Please release all these fish as I don't believe that there are many of them since it's a small lake. But don't tell anybody since there was usually one 0-5 other boats on the lake!

Being that I'm usually slow things like open lakes but. They just put a few big fish in both Flowing and Blackmans. On Flowing you have two access the one on the North end you pay and the one on the south end you don't. And both lakes are year around lakes but Storm isn't. And if you go a little farther North you will be in the seven lakes area. And Lake Martha,Loma,and Goodwin are open year around. You also have the twin lakes N of Marysville (Gissberg Ponds). They plant these on a regular basis thru the year and usually put in about 10,000 fish of different sizes starting in March.

Jim

Come on, Ballinger is pristine compared to Cottage Lake! Keep in mind, it's electric motors only. . .

Ballinger has nice trout and bass. I saw a gentleman catch 4 bass over 10 inches (one about 15) 3 weeks ago on Ballinger. Olive wooly buggers work very well for the bass, and yellow humpy's (size 16) work well for the trout in June-early July.

FP