Fishing at Little Sheepeater Lake, Idaho County, Idaho

• Overview

  Idaho County, Idaho, is where Little Sheepeater Lake sits. Elevation runs to 7,661 feet. The water measures roughly 5 acres, so nothing here is far from anything else. The closest town, McCall, is 47 miles distant. It is 129 miles to Boise, the nearest city. Rules here are straightforward: one county, one set of rules.

• Where to Fish on Little Sheepeater Lake

  Depth remains unrecorded, so treat the first session as a survey. A soft bed grows weed late into autumn, which keeps fish shallow. Still water like this holds fish on the edges rather than out in the open. Records held for Idaho County cover rainbow trout, Chinook salmon, cutthroat trout, bull trout and brook trout. Several of these carry legal protection or closed seasons; the rulebook comes before the rod. At Little Sheepeater Lake light and wind decide more than tackle does.

• Seasonal Patterns

  Temperature averages peak at 53°F in July and bottom out at 18°F in December. Winter puts a hard lid on this one. Ice fishing carries the winter, and the water opens about mid May. The lid tends to go about mid May and return around mid November. The weeks after the thaw and the ones before the freeze are the strongest. Keep it in mind when planning a trip to Little Sheepeater Lake.

• Tackle & Baits

  Public data does not answer the access question here. There is no mapped parking or launch close by, which usually means walking in. For the trout, small spinners and a box of nymphs cover both approaches. A landowner's word beats anything printed elsewhere. Where parking is tight, arriving early solves most problems. For a change of water, Lemhi Lake is 1.4 miles distant. None of that is settled for Little Sheepeater Lake in what we hold.