Last fall though, as I drove by Red on my way to fish for trophy mackinaw trout at Caples and Silver lakes, I noticed that my little friend looked low and muddy. At first I attributed this to two consecutive winters with below-average snowfall, but when I saw the water level drop quite a bit further over the course of one week, I knew someone was draining Red Lake.

Then I saw the story in my local newspaper, the Tahoe Daily Tribune. Apparently, Red was in fact low due to the drought, so it was considered a good time to drain it even lower, to do some repair work on the dam. Fine, I thought, just don't lower it so far that you kill all the trout. But it just kept shrinking, then I found out that killing fish had actually become the goal of the operation! Again according to the Tribune, a hatchery truck accidentally deposited a load of brown trout in Red, and this was considered a bad thing. Even though browns are generally considered by anglers to be the most elusive, challenging and therefore desirable trout, even though they are welcome residents of Caples Lake just up the hill from Red, and of the West Carson River just downstream, and even though browns have the potential to evade anglers' hooks and grow larger than any of the lake's current species, in this case they were considered vermin, as if the Department of Fish and Game had dumped a truckload of rats at a campground.

They feared that the browns would eat or outcompete the more delicate brookies and cutthroat, and in a classic example of governmental reasoning, the Department decided to destroy the lake in order to save it. The water in poor little Red Lake was drained through its outlet creek, and to the credit of those conducting the operation, I understand that quite a few trout were flushed into the creek as well, where they could drop downstream to find a new home in the West Carson. Those that refused to cooperate with this forced relocation were left to wallow in the puddle left when the lake had been drained as low as possible; it was assumed that this small amount of water in the lake bed would either freeze solid in winter or leave so little unfrozen beneath the ice that oxygen levels in the water would drop to where the lake would experience what is known as 'winterkill', finishing off the last of the holdouts.

So when the ice melted last spring and Red Lake was allowed to fill up again, I wondered first of all if there was a single fish left alive, and second, what sort of hatchery fish would be put in the lake now that they had 'saved' it from the evils of brown trout. I talked to a couple of shore fishermen the first week after ice-out, and they had not even heard that the lake had been killed. "Damn, that explains it!" shouted one when I told him the sad story. "I've been camping here for two days and haven't had a bite! #*&%!!! government ought to put a sign up telling people there's no fish in here!"

I waited a few weeks before visiting again, intrigued by rumors that one fish had actually been caught out of the supposedly dead lake, a seventeen inch brown! I always like to root for the underdog, and so I wanted to hear that the brown trout survived, but at the same time I knew that if they did make it in any great numbers, another plan would be concocted to kill them. Then I received a reliable report of great fishing at Red for 10 to 12 inch brook trout, which had been planted in large numbers to replenish the fishery. This was the news I had been waiting for, so on July 28, I brought my motorized canoe and my three children to the lake for a little fish-sampling expedition.

We arrived at noon to find only light winds and a slight ripple on the water. There were quite a few shore anglers and campers present, but only one boat on the water, a small car-topper. Red Lake has no boat ramp, but there is one rock-strewn decline where small trailered boats can be put in if you have four-wheel drive. I unloaded my canoe and fishing gear as the kids skipped stones and chased minnows in the shallows, then we all took our shoes off, I pushed the canoe out into the chilly, snowmelt water, then held it steady as my children waded out and climbed in. After they made themselves comfortable on life-vests and seat-cushions, they managed to spill half a bag of potato chips before I even pushed off.

I turned on my quiet, powerful Minn-Kota electric motor and headed out into the middle of the lake, then steered toward the dam as I let out lures far behind the canoe on six-pound line. As soon as I had two lines out and the rods resting in rod-holders, one rod's tip bent over and started twitching. "Joe, you're up!" I told my eleven-year old son as I set the hook and handed him the rod. He quickly reeled in a fat brookie, and before I could net it, the other rod started to dance. "Arielle, your turn!" I told my five-year old daughter, and with the assistance of her older sister Jessica, she worked in a bigger brook trout, this one a solid 14 inches. This mayhem continued for the next two hours, as we trolled the entire lake and caught fish from one end to the other. They bit a variety of lures, including small wobbling plugs, flies and nightcrawlers behind small dodgers. Nightcrawlers were the most productive, but the artificial lures made it easier to release fish, since on the flies and plugs they came in hooked in the lip or mouth. The first two trout to bite on worms swallowed the hook, so after putting them on a stringer, I used my wormthreader to position the hook toward the front of the nightcrawler, leaving a long portion trailing behind the hook-point. This encouraged the fish to strike this rear portion and hook themselves in the mouth, allowing me the pleasure of catch-and-release baitfishing. For a good tutorial in the use of wormthreaders, visit www.wormthreader.com.

No, we didn't catch any brown trout, but we did get over a dozen brookies, losing several more, before the wind picked up and thunderheads gathered overhead. The Tahoe area has been experiencing scattered thunderstorm activity nearly every afternoon of late, and at Red Lake the mountains can block approaching storms from view until they are nearly overhead. Please keep an eye out for changing conditions and exercise caution, as we did by getting off the water when the sky grew ominously dark.

I let the kids take a quick dip in the lake, ordering them out when we heard thunder roll fairly close by. Joe and I then hurriedly cleaned our fish; their rounded tail fins indicated that they were indeed hatchery trout, stocked this year. They seemed to be adjusting to their new home quite well though, as they were all fat, their stomachs were filled with a variety of insects, and their flesh had the orange-pink hue that comes from just such a natural diet.

As I finished gutting one fish and picked up another, I noticed a strange, green appendage growing out of its back. It was a tag; a thin, plastic cylinder implanted into the trout's back near the dorsal fin. It had "CDFG" (California Department of Fish and Game) and the Department's address printed on one side, and when I turned it over, I saw- "$10 Reward". Sweet! That covered covered my gas money for the trip! Just then a shore angler walked by and we traded fishing reports- he told me he had also been catching brook trout and nothing else, and he directed me to a sign tacked to a tree nearby. The sign gave information about the tagging program, including what information to include when you mail in the tag (which can pulled out of a fish you wish to release), and a phone number to call for more information.

When we returned home I pan-fried our fish, and the kids set upon them like piranha, reducing them to skeletons in minutes. I managed to get a few bites without losing a finger, and found the Red Lake brook trout to be delicious. My anger at the decision to drain the lake thus tempered, I called the CDFG contact number and spoke to fishery biologist Kyle Murphy. Kyle was friendly and informative as he admitted that there was in fact a mix-up last fall, causing brown trout to be put in the lake, and he made a strong case for the resulting action to remove them. He told me that the Department's goal was to maintain Red as well-stocked, 'everyman's' lake, where the greatest number of people have a chance at catching something. He agreed with me that brown trout would be great at avoiding anglers' hooks, and would grow large, primarily by eating hatchery fish. In such a small lake, he told me that the probable result would be a low catch rate for the general public, with a few lucky or highly dedicated anglers catching a few monster browns. While this sounded great to me, I understand that the agency's mandate is to provide the most fishing opportunities for the greatest number of people, and so I guess I can understand their decision to drain the lake... sort of.

I was further soothed by biologist Murphy's report that 7,500 brook trout were planted in late June, including 400 of them with the ten-dollar tags. In that they were all 12 inches or less at that time, he was quite pleased to hear my report of a fat, 14 inch fish with a belly full of bugs, indicating a great growth rate and quick adaptation to natural foods by trout raised on a diet of hatchery pellets (if you've ever caught a hatchery rainbow with nothing but sticks and cigarette butts in its belly, you know this is not always the case). Kyle also told me that Lahontan cutthroat trout have been reintroduced to the lake as well, including some large brood-stock fish over 20 inches in length. Okay, in that they have pretty much restored Red Lake to the quality fishery it was before they drained it, I forgive the California Department of Fish and Game, so long as they don't do it again! Along those lines, in the unlikely event that any of my readers do pull a brown trout out of Red, SHHHHH!

Until next time,
Mark (The Trout Whisperer) Wiza
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