This is a report of 2 days; a tale of free fishing weekend at Rowland Lake. Friday my dad and I went out with high expections of a lake recently planted with 6,000 plus rainbow trout. A lake with bass and bluegill and other species. A tale of 2 days of fun, but only 1 day of truly catching our limit.
Early morning for both days; Friday slightly less windy than Saturday which was a pretty good blow of gusts of at least 20 mph.
Friday: fished with spoons, spinners (Jacks and Roster Tail) and only had a few hits on small blue gill and some very small trout. Nothing to take home. Tried fishing with worms from top and bottom no luck; every power bait color known from top and bottm and no luck. Yet some late comers on the point limited out in less than an hour. On our way home I asked for their secret and as they were hooking up to fish for catfish they kindly showed me their secret (true fisherman are good sports); something called power eggs---- and yellow worked the best. But not just power eggs; power eggs using a sliding weight with the egg (2) floating 3 feet off the bottom just above the weeds on the bottom.
So, we stopped off at our local Buy Mart and picked up a couple of colors of power eggs and some treble hooks. By the way, Buy Marts are pretty good places to pick up fishing needs.
Saturday, free fishing weekend, we got out early again but some boats were already on the lake. Hooked up our "power eggs" as described and within 3 mins of settling in, I had my first strike. 2 fish within the first 15 mins and my dad and I thought we would be done in an hour. Well, best laid ....... the wind came up and put a damper on our spirits and slowed down the bite. The key seemed to be slider weight and 3 feet off the bottom, after a few more fish, I even switched to red/white/blue power bait and caught the largest of the day!! We both fished about four hours, and limitted out with planted rainbows between 6-12 inches (the last). They tasted like heaven when barbecued that afternoon as my dad drove up from California to spend a weekend fishing with his son (and a Mariners game the next day).
Side note: one of the boaters shared with us his and his son's catch: they drifted back in forth in the middle for most of the morning with a shiny fender tipped with worm. As he normally fishes for salmon, he showed us his small stringer; smallest was 15 inches and most in the 18-24 inch fat rainbows. So, they are out there! However, I wouldn't trade my 2 days and small trout for all the large trout in the world! I of course will be back to my favorite stand by lake, Rowland.

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