I am from Costa Rica. During this Holy Week break I went fishing with my son for “rainbow bass” (Parachromis dovii), a cichlid and Machaca (Prochilodus mineatus), which is a feisty fighter related to the Brazilian piranha. We drove for four hours to Lake Arenal, and stayed at the Los Heroes resort and launched our boat from there. The water is clear but not like your many glacier lakes and the depth is mostly 30 meters deep. The ambient temperature high and the water probably was within 22 degrees Centigrade. We started using top lures like a tiger patterned Big-O’s for machaca. No luck then! We changed to heavier lures with our spinning tackle, Shimano graphite rods and Shakespeare Sigma 2200-035’s and Cotton Cordell Super Shots and I got a bite from a “rainbow bass”. We tried trolling with Big-O’s without any luck! There was quite a lot of wind which made challenging reaching to our favorite fishing holes! We are at the end of the dry season! The many rivers that feed the lake impoundment were down to a trickle, the lake was perhaps down in level 5 meters. We fished the river mouths, many coves, and parallel to the coves. My son tried his trusty Mepps #2 Comet , a killer with rainbow bass minnow, but lost it before I could yank it from and underwater log. We’ve been lucky before with these rigs and approaches! Can you point us in the right direction?
