Stump Lake is younger than it looks. Sometime around the end of the 1700s a spruce swamp in this grassland valley flooded, and the drowned trees stood in the water long enough to give the lake its name. What grew in their place is a long, shallow, mineral-rich lake beside Highway 5A that once gave up rainbows big enough to make it famous, and still turns up a big fish more often than its roadside setting suggests.
Most people see it through a windshield on the way between Kamloops and Merritt, and that light pressure is part of why it still fishes.
The shape matters more here than on most lakes, because there is no deep water to hide in. Stump is a long trough with grass hills on both sides and the highway along one shore. It is shallow end to end, with broad weedy flats at the north and south ends and open water between them where the wind runs. Those are its three parts: the north flats, the south flats, and the middle.
The north end is where to start in spring. A shoal there has a long history of chironomid fishing, and on a good morning the hatch comes off thick enough that adult midges blow onto your jacket and swallows work low over the bay. Trout feed in three to nine feet of water, close enough to see.
The south end has the same rich shallows and, in June, the damselfly hatch. Nymphs swim for the reeds and the trout follow them in, and for a few weeks the edge of the weed is the busiest water on the lake.
The open middle holds the lake’s kokanee and takes the full length of the wind, so it is the part to watch from shore before you go out.
Come in spring or autumn, because summer heat slows the lake down. When it does, the higher lakes up the Peterhope Lake Road are where the season runs later.
Fish in this water
Each fish is rated by its strongest evidence. A rating says how sure we are a fish is here, not how many there are, whether it is worth fishing for or whether you may keep it.
Confirmed
Recorded on this water in the last 15 years, or named for it by a fishery agency, its fishing rules or a fishing publication.
The lake has no deep basin at all, so temperature and wind drive everything. Its water is rich and hard, with a high pH, and that grows insects and fish well; the same chemistry, with drought, makes it a harsh place in a hot, low year. The weed flats at either end are the larders, and with no cold deep water to retreat to, summer warmth puts the whole lake off its feed.
Fish and forage
The rainbows are the fly angler’s fish, of a good size for a valley lake, with the odd very big one still around. Chironomids and damselflies are the main food, with leeches through the season.
When to fish it
The rules list no closure for the lake; check in-season changes before you go. Ice usually holds from November to about mid-April, and ice-off begins the best stretch of the year. April and May are chironomid months on the north flats; June brings the damselflies at the south end. July and August are slow in the heat. From September the fishing picks up again, and around mid-October the damselfly nymphs swim back out to deeper water, a second chance at the same fly before freeze-up. Fish calm days: on this lake the wind decides.
How to fish it
One fly at a time. Over the north shoal, hang a chironomid pupa under an indicator with a long leader, the fly set just off the bottom in three to nine feet of water. Start with green; as the hatch goes on and the fish get pickier, change to red with a black rib, then chrome with a black rib, then a black bead-head pupa. If the indicator stays still, move along the shoal rather than sitting on one spot.
For damselflies, fish an olive damsel nymph around a size 10 with a twitch-and-pause retrieve. In June, anchor in deeper water and cast towards the reeds, bringing the fly in the way the nymphs swim. In October reverse it: sit shallow and retrieve out towards deep water. If the damsel goes untouched, go back to the chironomid; the trout may still be on midges.
Access and safety
The lake is on Highway 5A, about 40 km south of Kamloops and about the same north of Merritt. There is a public day-use spot and launch off the highway. The recreation site sits in a sheltered bay on the south-east side, on a steep grassy hillside: take the Peterhope Lake Road turn and follow the signs left to Stump Lake, about 4.5 km from the highway. The old road from the Planet Mine subdivision has been decommissioned. The site is small, first come, first served, with a fee, a fishing dock (no mooring boats at it) and room for tents rather than big trailers. Water levels have been high, so go easy on the shoreline when you land a boat. The lake is open to wind along its whole length; stay close to shore in a small boat when it rises.
Regulations
Stump Lake has a boat speed restriction of 70 km/h. Region 3 (Thompson-Nicola) quotas apply: you may keep 5 trout and char a day (brook trout count here), no more than 1 of them over 50 cm, and 5 kokanee a day; possession is no more than 2 daily quotas. Only one artificial fly on the line. Barbed hooks are allowed on lakes unless the water-specific rules say otherwise; check the regulations for anything else before you go.
Calendar
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forage: chironomids, north flats, April to May
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fly: damselfly nymph, June (towards the reeds) and mid-October (towards deep water)
Related
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Peter Hope Lake: the deeper lake up the Peterhope Lake Road, with a big campground
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Plateau Lake: a small, clear, spring-fed lake in the hills beyond, up a rough road