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I spent a few hours at Trillium lake yesterday. This small gem in the shadow of Mt. Hood is very popular because it is only a little more than an hour from Portland, but it is still possible to have something akin to a wilderness experience there. Most of the people who fish at Trillium are either bait dunkers who hurl their offerings off a small pier, or an occasional kayak, canoe or row boat. I was the only float tuber there yesterday.
The lake is usually stocked with "catch able size rainbow trout" and a few trophy size fish and there are holdovers from previous years along with a small population of self-sustaining brook trout. I caught a few rainbows yesterday, but they were the cookie-cutter rainbows they put in there. Only a few other fly fishers visible but nobody seemed to be catching much...except for a pair of osprey who continued to entertain me the entire four hours I kicked around the lake. One of the skillful predators even got one of the rainbows I released. There vision is exceptional. From hundreds of feet above they circle, they fall out of the sky at top speed with their legs and talons coiled up, and then they strike deftly lifting a fish from just beneath the surface of the water. I'm going to get up there a few more times before the snow returns to Mt. Hood because of the osprey as much as the fishing. Weekdays tend to be better for all things connected to Trillium.

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