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A Description of Lake Chira

The Embalse de Chira is a reservoir built to provide water for irrigation in the south of the island, the dam was completed in about 1953. Shortly after the reservoir was filled Carp and Black Bass were introduced to maintain the water quality by controlling weed growth and insects. There are eye witness reports of 'big fish' being seen in the lake in the early 1960's but no one fished for the Carp until a few travelling anglers started coming in the mid to late 70's. By the mid 1990's Chira had become a popular Carp fishing destination for travelling anglers from all over Europe. Certainly between 1997 and 2000 there were articles about the lake in several fishing magazines.

The area and depth of the lake depends on rainfall, but even when the lake is only half full it is easy to find the depth in excess of 20 feet only a few rod lengths out. When the water is high at the dam end it could be anything up to 100 feet deep! In December of 2004 it rained for 4 days and the water level rose by at least 10 feet! This dramatic variability in the water level obviously changes the surface area of the lake, when full it is in the region of 200 acres and volume of over 4,000,000m3. At the moment the lake is nearly full so there are places to fish that haven't been fished for maybe 10 years, simply because there has been no water there! There are many bays, some of which are shallow bowls of mud others are deep craggy affairs. The top of the lake shallows off to nothing and breaks off into arms when the water level is high enough, which at the moment is the case.

The bottom is mostly very rocky with muddy patches and some light weed with thicker patches close in. In the summer a slimly thick type of silk weed appears all around the lake and lags your line that can be tricky to deal with. The higher the water the more chance you have of encountering submerged bushes that grow up during periods of low water.

The lake features bays and very steep banks, very deep water towards the dam, shallow water at the top of the lake especially in the 'arms'. There are no visible plant features such as trees, lilies, reeds or weed beds to speak of apart from the submerged bushes.

Access to the swims around the lake varies from fairly easy to difficult enough to put off all but the most adventurous angler. There are swims that are easy to reach where you can park nearby to limit the distance you have to carry your kit. However many of the swims are quite inaccessible due to the steep banks and rocky terrain making walking around the lake hard going even more so with a full load of fishing kit. Moving in the heat is exhausting and the altitude (about 1500m above sea level) compounds the problem as the thin air leaves you out of breath more quickly than usual, so do take it easy. Although it is possible to walk all the way around the lake, the far bank is only really accessible by boat for an angler, but the effort can be well worth it. In the summer the water is not cold so a small inflatable boat can be loaded with your kit and you can swim it across quite easily. I cannot emphasise enough how hard it is getting about this lake. To fish the most attractive swims you do need a car, and even then don't be surprised if even on an apparently short walk from the car to the lakeside, you are left puffing and blowing and sweating profusely, even more so on the way back up.

Scenery around the lake is fantastic. The lake is set in a deep valley high in the mountains just south of the centre of Gran Canaria. The mountains are covered with pine forests and really are a quite spectacular place to spend a few days fishing.

In the summer temperatures soar to 30oC+ from about 8.30 in the morning until the sun goes down with warm nights and almost no chance of rain although condensation is a problem you do have to deal with.

In the winter mid teens to low 20s Celsius is the normal day temperature and will still burn you if you are not careful, but the wind can be cold so warm clothes are essential. As soon as the sun goes down it gets cold although rarely freezing. There is a chance of rain in winter, about 2 weeks is expected between December and the beginning of March, which isn't much but when it rains it really rains, it is wise to check the weather forecast before you come just in case.

Are there any 'nasties' you should know about? Gran Canaria, being an island, has fortunately never been inhabited by poisonous snakes, spiders, insects or indeed any dangerous animals. The only pests by the lake are the mosquitoes against which repellents are effective. On the far side of the lake local shepherds graze sheep and goats leaving tics that will try to crawl up your legs looking for a warm hairy fold of skin to latch onto and suck blood, not the most pleasant thing to have to deal with.

The summer sun is the most dangerous thing for anglers. I always advise that people take a brolly for shade, as there is no shade by the lake, keep the breeze moving over you and drink lots of water. I can easily drink 4 litres of water in a day while fishing Chira in the summer, and I'm used to the heat! Sunscreen is necessary all year round.

The Fish

The lake has two types of fish. Big mouthed Black Bass and hard fighting Mirror Carp with all sorts of scale patterns ranging from fully scaled mirrors to perfect liniers to near but not quite leather carp (that's if a leather carp is defined as having absolutely no scales). There seems to be a huge number of Carp in the 15-25lb range, although there is little or no management or control of the fish populations to give accurate information bags of 5 or more fish a day in this size range are common place for most of the year. The Carp have been recorded up to 40lb+ in years gone by but 35lb+ is in my opinion a big fish from this lake, but they are there and they do get caught.

The Black Bass can provide good sport on light spinning tackle or with a fly. If you come across a feeding shoal of these aggressive fish you can almost catch one every cast. I have seen these fish caught on every imaginable type of lure, they will also take colourful boilies and even bare hooks when Carp anglers are winding in. The Black Bass in Chira are generally quite small but there have been stories of specimens of 7 or 8lbs caught here in the past. Again these fish seem to prefer the margins especially those with denser plant growth. Occasionally a Black Bass will pick up hook baits intended for Carp, but it is not much of a problem and certainly not one that needs any measures to avoid.

Since the lake has filled I have seen one smallish Common carp, at least 3 different Koi carp and a Golden Orf. None of these fish looked old so they must have got in there recently somehow, I would dearly like to catch one of these fish just for the novelty value, I'll keep you posted.