Pardee Resevoir 7/24/17

I had planned on spending a couple days on the lake but the heat scared me off.  Against my better judgement, I went anyway for an overnighter.  Its a beautiful lake with tons of camping, a cafe, and swimming pools.  Unfortunately, its hot as hell and a "no body contact" lake.  At 10pm it was still 91 degrees. 

I fished sunrise to noon with very little luck.  They had stocked the lake 2 days earlier and fishing was good by the dock, but no one seemed to be having much luck elsewhere.  I trolled live worms and Power Worms all the way to the river arm (about 1.5 miles from dock) with no luck.  My fish finder seems to lack the ability to find fish so I had to guess at what depth the fish were at.  Water temp was a whopping 78 degrees. 

I found a decent rock wall near the mouth of the river arm that hung over a deep hole, but most importantly it offered shade while I fished.  I hooked up one decent rainbow while trolling a spinner and live worm and a dodger, but nothing else worth mentioning. 

From what I understand, this is a great fishing lake and some friends of mine score some huge trout from there.  Unfortunately, I'm pretty green at kayak fishing so take this report with a grain of salt.  I did speak to several other fishermen on the lake and none were having any luck.  That made me feel a little better.  If I ever go back, its gonna be in the spring or fall... too damn hot!

Thanks for the report.   I have been fishing the lake for a long time myself but never on a yak i will give it a try next year when it opens on president day.  I have caught alot of big fish from there through the years up in to DD.  But from my experience i only trout fish there from February to end of april.  So mabey i will see you out there next year.    Boaters i heard were doing real good up untill probaly june.   

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Loooooove pardee and Comanche.  Havnt been in years.  Need to get out there the next time I visit family. 

I'm glad you at least hooked up for the efforts. To bear the heat and not catch anything can be demoralizing. I've put up with the Mother Lode heat 2 of the past 3 weekends with decent results at Pardee. I have a downrigger on my kayak, so that helps out tremendously in the hot weather. I landed personal best rainbows each trip: a 6.8 lbs. 23.5" 15' down on 7/8  and a 7.8 lbs. 25" rainbow 30' down on 7/22 - both in the narrows. In just 2 weeks, the ideal temps for rainbows moved 20' deeper from 15' down to 35' down. That can be the difference between a successful trip and a miserable trip.

If you ever want kayak trolling tips for trout , PM me before you head out and I'll be more than happy to give you a little intel - I do most of my kayak fishing in the foothills year round. If you're serious about trolling from your kayak, I recommend getting a Fish Hawk TD to take water temps from the surface to the bottom. It can help you get your baits in the feeding zone and not having to rely solely on your fish finder readings to locate where the fish are at. It also helps you to know what fish you might be looking at on your fish finder.

Well that's rewarding trip two Pb in two trips.  Bet you cant wait for trip number 3.   That is a good paddle all the way to the back.   

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Thanks everyone for the responses. 

MGOmini:  I'll have to look into the Fish Hawk TD.  I have a scotty laketroller installed on the kayak and I typically troll at 30' with it.  Its all guess work for me since I pretty inexperienced with it.  The Fish Hawk would eliminate having to rely on the FF or word of mouth from other fishermen.  Great tip!  What do you recommend for bait?  I was pulling a dodger with a spinner approx. 18" further down.  I also tossed a worm or power worm on the end of the spinner. 

That's a  pricey thermometer. ...$150

That's a  pricey thermometer. ...$150

But it's been worth every penny, IMO.
It helps to break myths like, "It's so hot out & the water temps are too warm for trout - they've gone deep."

7/8 it was 104°F & 80°F surface temps @ Pardee, but those ideal trout temps were well within long-lining gear, but I would never have known it without the Fish Hawk. I would have assumed the fish hanging @ 15' down were just bass...

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Thanks everyone for the responses. 

MGOmini:  I'll have to look into the Fish Hawk TD.  I have a scotty laketroller installed on the kayak and I typically troll at 30' with it.  Its all guess work for me since I pretty inexperienced with it.  The Fish Hawk would eliminate having to rely on the FF or word of mouth from other fishermen.  Great tip!  What do you recommend for bait?  I was pulling a dodger with a spinner approx. 18" further down.  I also tossed a worm or power worm on the end of the spinner.

I have the most luck pulling Rapalas (mostly JSR-04 thru JSR-07, & TDD-07's & 09's) & other plug-type lures like Mag Lips - most all have rattles, too. Colors are usually in the fire tiger, green, orange, or gold color ranges.
I always run them with some type of garlic or anise scent.
I've pretty well convinced that color coupled with the scent & sound creates aggresion/get-out-of-my-space territorial strikes rather than feeding responses - mostly because I've caught 9-10" dink rainbows on 3.5" deep diving Rapalas that have no business trying to eat a "fish" larger in diameter than their own mouth.

Don't get me wrong, I catch my fair share trolling dodgers with needlefish, kastmasters, spinners, etc. on top & on the downrigger. It's just that, from a kayak, plug-type lures are just so easy to use & so easy to get to the correct depth. I can run from the surface to 30'+ deep without special equipment, lead core, or heavy sinkers.

One other tip: Download the Precision Trolling Data App and pay for the dive charts for a few of the Rapala lures above. Nothing like knowing how much line to let out to put your lures right on top of the fish. [emoji106]

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+10 on the above post Mgomini

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Thanks for the reports and pictures guys.

Great tips MGoMini!  Thanks!