I had heard a similar statement many times before, and every time, I had ended up disappointed.

I would be getting ready to go fish a lake, and somebody would tell me something like this: “Yeah, so-and-so caught 50 fish there the other day!”

I would then head to the lake — and land a measly one or two fish.

So, when I walked into the Hook Fly Shop in Sunriver on Wednesday morning, I rolled my eyes when shop owner and guide Fred Foisset told me this about East Lake, which we were about to go fish:

“I guided a father and a daughter, and she had never fly-fished before. Between the two of them they caught 52 fish.”

Great. I figured I might as well just drive home.

Lucky for me, I did not.

My mind was changed just after Foisset powered his boat to the northwest corner of East Lake and set his anchors in water about 10 feet deep. Through our polarized sunglasses, we could see fish everywhere as thick clouds gave way to blue skies.

In about 20 minutes, I had caught and released three rainbow trout, a brown trout and an Atlantic salmon.

All I needed was a kokanee for the “East Lake Slam,” the unofficial name for landing all four of the lake’s fish species in one day.

Three weeks ago, East Lake — at 6,381 feet in elevation in the Newberry National Volcanic Monument east of La Pine — was still covered by ice. It was not completely ice free until two weeks ago, about three weeks later than usual.

Most of the snow around the lake has melted now, too.

“Three weeks ago I was up there, and it was like backing your boat down a hallway,” Foisset said of the snowbanks that lined the road. “But fishing tends to be pretty good when the ice is off.”

No kidding.

We continued fishing in the aquarium-like cove, using pheasant tail flashbacks and chironomids as our fly patterns. We employed strike indicators as well, but sometimes we didn’t need them — in water so clear we could see the fish taking the fly well below the surface.

“You can do that in this area, but it doesn’t happen very often,” Foisset said.

Most of our fish were rainbow trout, splashing out of the water as we brought them into the boat before releasing them. None of the fish was extremely large, ranging from about 10 to 16 inches in length.

But on light 3-weight fly rods, the action on the line was pretty thrilling.

By about 1 p.m., Foisset and I had landed 47 fish between the two of us, including 10 Atlantic salmon and two brown trout.

Foisset motored his boat toward the east shore, the still-snowy slopes of Paulina Peak rising above the far end of the lake. We wind-drifted for kokanee, using a callibaetis fly in about 20 feet of water.

After 15 minutes, I felt a tug and set the hook.

Moments later, the kokanee was in the net and I had the elusive East Lake Slam.

“You can have days like this through September,” Foisset said. “This was just a half day. I’ve had hundred-fish days in the past. I think the best fishing is yet to come.”

David Jones, owner of East Lake Resort, said the past few weeks have been incredible for anglers at East Lake.

“Part of it is timing,” Jones said. “It’s been a long winter. I’m sure the fish are starving and the water is starting to warm up. It’s always been a very productive lake. It just seems to be more so this year.”

Jones added that the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife’s removal of the invasive tui chub in East Lake has helped the fishery as well.

Next week, the ODFW — in the second year of a five-year plan to improve fishing on East Lake — will begin trapping and removing more tui chub from the lake. The invasive species has harmed the rainbow trout fishery by competing with young trout for food sources, according to Brett Hodgson, a Bend-based fisheries biologist for the ODFW.

Last summer, about 70,000 tui chub were removed from East Lake, Jones said.

The ODFW will also attempt to keep the remaining population of the species in check by stocking in East Lake a more aggressive strain of rainbow trout (from the Blackwater River in British Columbia) that will eat the chub. Stocking of those trout will begin next year, according to Jones.

While the fishing on East Lake has been “dynamite,” Jones said, the resort owner still warned of the typical midsummer slowdown on the lake.

“But the accomplished fly fisherman can always have a good day,” he said.