Laguna Lake

Laguna Lake is located in Fullerton, California. My daily commute, for many years, took right past the turnoff for it, but I never checked it out until the capture of a giant turtle made the news.

"Old Bob" was a 100 lb. Alligator Snapping Turtle. The prehistoric monster, before his 2004 capture, trolled the waters of the lake terrorizing ducks and snatching fish from the lines of baffled anglers.

He was not a native, The largest freshwater turtle, the alligator snapping turtle is found primarily in southeastern United States waters. He seemed huge to those of us from California, but he was actually on the smallish side for one of his ilk. Adult alligator snapping turtles generally range in carapace length from 15.9 to 31.8 inches and weigh from 50 to 180 pounds. Anyway, he put the lake on the map for many of us.

Once I truly discovered it, I tried the fishing. The DFG stocks this park lake from late Fall to early Spring with Rainbow Trout and Channel Catfish from late Spring to early Fall. There are also Largemouth Bass, Sunfish, and Carp. I never caught much. While I consider myself to be an avid fisherman, I am not a very good one.Others such as the guy at UrbanFlyVentures have much better success.

And, truth be told it has be a couple of years since I last visited. But, I recently ran across a photo and had some fun reworking it with a PhotoShop app on my iPod and wanted to share it. Ah vanity.