# Heenan Lake

Source page: https://carsonriverresorts.com/heenan-lake

Fall catch-and-release season · Six miles up the Monitor road

Six miles up the Monitor road is the lake California raises its Lahontan cutthroat in — 130 acres at seven thousand feet, open catch-and-release for a short autumn season. There is no camping at Heenan and nothing sold there. The closest beds and campsites to the water are ours.

Heenan Lake is where California keeps its Lahontan cutthroat. The state's
broodstock for the threatened native trout lives in this one 130-acre lake,
and the cutthroat CDFW plants in the East Fork past our gate are raised from
it — so are the big ones that turn up down in the canyon below Hangman's
Bridge. [The fishing page](/fish) covers the river. This one is about the
lake.

It is a wildlife area, not a park — 1,700 acres of Jeffrey pine and
sagebrush the Fish and Game Commission set aside in 1983, unstaffed most
of the year, with parking, portable toilets and a check-in that appear
for the fishing season and then pack up. The turn is easy to drive past:
southeast on Highway 89, past the Highway 4 junction, entrance on the
right about two miles later. Thirteen minutes from our driveway.

The steel sign at the gate is the rulebook, in cut letters. One
correction to it worth making, because anglers still repeat the old
version at our counter: the Friday-through-Sunday restriction died in
the 2021 regulations overhaul — the lake fishes every day of its
season. And one gap worth knowing:
[CDFW's own page](https://wildlife.ca.gov/Lands/Places-to-Visit/Heenan-Lake-WA)
words the season as September and October, more narrowly than the
sign's November 30. Their regulations govern, so a late-season trip is
worth a call to their North Central Region office, (916) 358-2900,
before you load the truck.

Plan like there's no signal, because there isn't — no cell, no public
Wi-Fi, and no license counter. Buy the California license before you
come and settle the map at the cabin.

Where you sleep is the easy part of the plan. Nobody camps at Heenan —
CDFW doesn't allow it, and there is nothing up there to rent, buy, or
plug into. [The nearest beds and campsites are ours](/book): seven
cabins, eleven riverside sites and the RV row, back down the same highway.
The regulars talk about the first hour after sunrise; from here you're
on the water for it, instead of driving in from Gardnerville or South
Lake Tahoe while it happens.

Two stops make the trip. [The General Store](/general-store) on the way
up — the lake takes artificials only, so check your box against the
tackle wall before the drive, not at the gate. And in October,
[Monitor Pass](/explore/monitor-pass) just beyond: the aspen turn in
gold blocks then, so the regulars fish the morning and drive the pass
in the afternoon. [The fall calendar down here](/events) fills in the
rest. Deer season runs alongside: Zone X-8's general hunt opens Sept. 26,
and [the deer season page](/deer-season) has the Department's sheet
deciphered the same way, with the nearest lodging inside the zone.

## Heenan Lake, as the Department has it

| | |
| --- | --- |
| **Water** | Heenan Lake, 130 acres, in the 1,700-acre Heenan Lake Wildlife Area, Alpine County |
| **Season** | Sept. 1 through Nov. 30, every day of the week |
| **Hours** | Sunrise to sunset; night fishing prohibited |
| **Limit** | 0 trout — every fish released |
| **Gear** | Artificial lures with barbless hooks only |
| **License** | Valid CDFW fishing license, bought before you come — none sold at the lake |
| **Access** | On foot from the parking lot; lot, portable toilets and check-in open only in the fishing season |
| **Camping** | None on the Wildlife Area |
| **Horses · Dogs · Drones** | No horses; dogs under the owner's control at all times; no drones without a Special Use Permit |
| **Telephone** | No reliable cellular service on the property |

Season, hours and gear from the California Freshwater Sport Fishing
Regulations, §7.50(b), Heenan Lake. The Department's Wildlife Area page
still describes the fishery as September and October; the regulation,
which governs, has run it September 1 through November 30 since the
2021–22 season. Check the current booklet before you travel.

## The regulation, as printed

**§7.50(b)** — Heenan Lake (Alpine Co.). Sep. 1 through Nov. 30. 0 trout.
Only artificial lures with barbless hooks may be used. Fishing hours:
sunrise to sunset. Night fishing prohibited.

*California Freshwater Sport Fishing Regulations, Title 14 §7.50(b).
Condensed; the booklet governs.*

## On the water

- License bought before you leave — there is none at the lake.
- Pinch every barb, including on the lures you brought last year.
- Keep the fish in the water. If it must come out, hold your breath: when you need air, so does it.
- Lines out at sunset.
- Park outside the gate and walk in.
- Dogs under control; no horses; no drones.
- No camping on the area. The resort is on 89 between Markleeville and the lake.

Anglers who fish it say the shore works but the water works better: float
tubes and non-motorized or electric boats, which is all the Department
permits. Flies — woolly buggers, leeches, scuds, prince nymphs, zug bugs.
Lures — Kastmasters, Panther Martins, Mepps. Expect wind, and algae in the
warm weeks of September.

*Boats per the Department's board at the gate; tackle from local fishing
reports, 2003–2023. Angler custom, not regulation.*

## The map

**Parking** — 38.657° N, 119.919° W, off Highway 89 at the north-west
corner of the area. Walk in from here. **The lake** sits at 7,084 feet,
with the spillway at its west end and Heenan Creek feeding it from the
north-east through Company Meadows. **The boundary** is the heavy black
line: Toiyabe National Forest lies west of it, Bagley Valley and its
springs to the south.

## Posted at the gate

The Department's boards at the parking lot, paid for in part by the fly
clubs, say what its web page does not: nearly a million eggs are collected
here each year, Heenan holds the only brood stock of the species in
California, and the fish now occupy a tenth of their historic streams and
under one percent of their historic lakes.

**Welcome · Trout Have a Tough Life.** Land fish quickly, unhook and
release under water, remove only the hooks you can see, clip the line on a
deep hook, never squeeze or touch eyes or gills. Non-motorized and electric
boats and float tubes permitted; no motorized vehicles on the area. In a
thunderstorm, get to shore.

**Lakeside Dining.** Cutthroat live up to twelve years, and adults ambush
chub and suckers. In May the bears come out of the aspens to fish the
spawning creek, and pelicans, eagles and osprey work the lake. Watch from
across the water.

**Fishing for Our Natural Heritage.** One of California's few designated
Heritage and Wild Trout lakes. Over 1,200 fish spawned a year, females
averaging a thousand eggs. Clean boots, boats and gear against mussels,
mudsnail and Asian clam — and there is an angler survey in the brown steel
box by the driveway.

*Boards photographed at the Heenan Lake parking lot, September 2026. The
kiosk was donated by the Granite Bay Flycasters and High Sierra Fly Casters
with the Federation of Fly Fishers.*

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Carson River Resort · 12399 Highway 89, Markleeville, CA 96120 · (530) 694-2229 · store open 8am to 6pm, every day.
Machine-readable facts, units and policies: https://carsonriverresorts.com/api/agent/index.json