Cross Lake 6/4: Got out on Cross Lake for the first time I'm guessing in 7 or 8 years. I had an email from an angler asking me about gar flies. He'd seen good numbers of gar in an area on the Seneca River, so I thought why not give the lake/river a shot. I invited my friend Jeff to come out with me. He's a big fly-fisherman and gar is on his bucket list.
Not a lot has changed here over the years. The launch is the same - fair but usable. I generally like gar fishing best here in the heat of the summer. This time of year with the colder water temperatures it's likely that a lot of gar are still in spawn mode up the river. We were not able to locate any concentrations of fish in the muddy river (likely due to the prior night's rain) or the lake. In the lake we did find a handful of gar, some bass and a few bowfin that were likely guarding fry on nests. That was very cool to see! There was a minor die-off of white perch in the lake - we saw at least a dozen. We had a few shots at gar but not many. Jeff had one grab his rope fly but not well enough to "hook." We had fun and who knows, maybe we'll come back here in a month or so if we don't try elsewhere for gar.
