Me, McConnell and Murphy
May 18

by Ron W
(Kamloops)

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I decided to avoid the highways and campsites this long weekend so I thought I'd give "McConnell Lake" my token try for the year. I've never had much success on McConnell but I keep thinking that one day I'll get lucky. I've caught many fish over the years at "Lac le Jeune" and had fifty fish days on "Stake Lake" but my best day on McConnell Lake has been two fish. I've also never landed a fish over two pounds in McConnell and for some reason seem to lose far more fish than I land on this lake.

I started fishing just after nine and headed for the small islands with the bird boxes. I've always thought this was a promising area with lots of structure. I fished around this area casting a leech and letting a chironomid dangle on the floating line for approx one hour. I didn't get a nibble or see a fish rise. I talked to a couple of fishermen who were trolling around the lake and they told me they had only seen two fish on their fish finder all morning.

I decided to try another spot and headed for the other side of the lake near the old Lac le Jeune/"Logan lake road". As I got to an area across from the parking area in approx the middle of the lake I noticed chironomids rising around me.

I also saw a few fish rising.

It was around 10:30 and I had this spot to myself. Everyone else was fishing around the shoreline and there was no obvious reason to me why the fish would be in the middle of nowhere other than that's where the chironomids were hatching.

I stopped, cast out the chironomid and left it sitting and then cast out the leech on the sinking line. Half way through my retrieve I had a strike and hooked a small acrobatic trout. He was approx 13 inches and I quickly released him and cast again. Sure enough another fish struck, this one slightly larger. I released him as well. Just then my reel started singing on the rod with the "chironomid (black with red ribs)" . This fish was larger again and put up a good fight. After several runs and jumps I landed a 17 inch silver torpedo. The fish had hooked itself better than if I had set the hook with the chironomid buried in the roof tip of the mouth. I administered last rites and gutted him. He had deep orange flesh but not much in the way of stomach contents.

Finally, I was in to great fishing at McConnell. On my next cast I had a strike but missed the fish. Just past 11:00 am Murphy's Law took effect. The wind started to pick up and a steady rain started to pour down. The chironomids and the fish stopped rising. I'm a fair weather fishermen but tried a few more casts since the fishing was so promising. Nothing doing. As quickly as the fishing had turned on, it turned off.

I left the lake and loaded up all my wet gear in the rain. My new personal best on McConnell is now three fish.

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