Fishing Reports
Last week my wife and I camped a couple nights with friends at Black Pine Lake, a scenic gem visited mostly by locals of the Winthrop/Twisp area of the Methow Valley in Eastern Washington. It's technically in the Twisp River drainage, but just over the adjacent low ridge is Libby Creek. The U.S. Forest Service maintains a small campground and a couple docks from which it's handy to cast a line into the lake's clear waters. Managed by WDFW as a put-and-take fishery, the lake is stocked annually but has a few carryovers. More times than not, you can cast a small black leach out over the drop-off at the end of the boat dock and catch a few pretty fish. This year was no exception. In perhaps an hour I netted four fish, lost a couple others, and had numerous other strikes. The fish were cutthroat with a particularly noteworthy blue luster to their backs. Very pretty. All were about 12" or 13" and put up a lively fight.
A more well-known lake in the area is Big Twin: down much closer to the Methow Valley bottom. It gets the attention for its large fish and reasonable chance of catching them on dry flies. While I've not yet fished it, it's on my list. If you beat me to it but find yourself looking for a cool mountain evening and a pretty drive, get out your map and visit Black Pine Lake--just up there over the ridge.
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