Desolation Wilderness Fishing Update
Well, a number of things have happened since the Desolation Wilderness Fishing Guide was published. First, The US Forest Service and the California Department of Fish and Game are cooperating on the management of fishing -- including the study of Yellow-Legged Mountain Frogs. A side-effect of the frog studies has been accumulation of a lot of information about the status of fish in the Desolation. In the future certain areas of the Desolation will be set aside for the study of frogs and a number of areas will be maintained as they have in the past as planted and wild trout fisheries. Second, I have decided to let loose a few pieces of information not in the original guide. One lake I kept off the map is probably safe to publicize -- Lake No. 3. It turns out that the State Trout (the Golden) can reproduce in the smallest of inlet or outlet streams. Before I published the guide I visited this lake during the drought years in early spring when rainbows and goldens spawn. Well, there were a number of spawners in the outlet as well as in little snowmelt streams. If you go downstream from the lake there are a lot of small fish. This stream goes for miles through desolate country and probably has fish in pools. Now, one other thing that is interesting about this lake is that according to Wood (p. 148) there is a cross-country route across the saddle between Red and Silver Peaks that links Lake No. 3 with the Leland Lakes (more goldens). Oh, and one thing I almost forgot was the DFG found some 2 lb. brookies in Lake No. 5. I haven't gotten one yet. And also, there is a lake that had some "Inadvertent" DFG plants 1.5 miles due west of Onion Flat (Rubicon Reservoir) and almost 2.0 miles NNE of Highland Lake. This lake will not be planted again, but I my last journey up there I heard reports of some 16 year old anglers that they caught "lots of 15" rainbows" there........ Last fall I took a long one-day hike up to Triangle Lake from Lily Lake -- and continued on with help from Wood's guide cross-country to Heather Lake. Triangle has lots of very pretty Eagle Lake put and grow rainbows. It gets busy there at times and people should know how to get to Lost Lake (you need a map-- a well-named lake). The best way is described in Wood's old guide: just when the trail to triangle makes its final descent to the lake, do not descend but follow the granite over to your left. Taking the "Sierra Sidewalk" gets you there easily with a map as long as you pretty much do not change altitude. Going down to Triangle and up the outlet of Lost Lake is much harder. In any case, Lost has many brookies that need culling so that we get some up to size. It has also gotten golden plants but I have never seen one there. At Heather I confirmed a few things: Heather is well-known for large browns. Problem is finding them. Thing is that every afternoon there is a good wind from the northwest across the lake. This brings in a lot of insects and terrestrials. The best place to find these insects is on the southeast shore (where they are blown by the wind across the lake). On this particular lake you actually sit at a high point on the southeast shore and watch for fish. Also you can use streamers for the large brookies that are also found in this area. One last thing is that there is a channel right at the outlet with another observation point on the opposite side from the trail (as well as from the trail). Large fish move up and down this channel looking for the red-side minnows on which they feed. I have yet to fully explore the inlet area of the water that comes in from Jack's Peak -- rather swampy but landed a nice fish from the boulder field on the other side of the swamp from the trail. One more lake that I put on the map in some more detail is Top Lake. This lake has some very large brookies. It also received golden plants and according to recent a DFG survey they survive. I have been pretty skeptical of this in the past -- but I guess they have found them alive there. In my recollection of the lake there is a granite shoulder that provides casting access to its lower portion where the large brookies are. On calm days in early and late season the will be seen leisurely taking midges. A negative side of publicizing good spots is that they can suffer. At my last trip to Susie Lake I got skunked at my sure-shot entrance spring noted in the guide. There should have been fish there. Hope all the big ones have not been cleaned out -- I doubt it. Will put new information out as it appears on my web site: http://www-leland.stanford.edu/~yesavage/ e-mail: yesavage@leland.stanford.edu phone 415-852-3287