Tag Archives: Farmington River guide

Chunky Farmington browns on streamers

On Thursday night, the Farmington crested in the upper TMA at around 1,500cfs. By this afternoon, is was still pumping out 750. Winds were gusting to 30mph. What a great day for some streamers.

I felt like fishing something new, so this morning I went down to the bench and pulled out a size 6 streamer hook. Since I didn’t know how much the water had cleared, I went for high-visibility. On went a gold bead, seated with some heavy wire. Made a tail out of marabou and gold Krystal flash, a body of gold mylar braid, and a doubled white marabou collar as long as the fly. On top, some silver Krystal flash. Any self-respecting ambush predator should be able to see that.

Line choice was a bit of a puzzler. I hemmed and hawed, and finally decided to go with an integrated full-sink tip, not so much to get the fly down — that would certainly be welcomed in areas where the current slowed — but mostly for casting in the banshee wind, and to keep the line below the flotsam that was sure to be bobbing merrily on its way downriver.

Yowzah, it was cold. I immediately regretted leaving my fleece vest in the truck. The wind chill had to be in the 40s or 30s. Some pinhole leaks in my waders and 53 degree water certainly didn’t help. But at least I was no longer slinging mulch in my garden. Even if I was able to do that in the comfort of a t-shirt.

The river was off-color, more of a tea-stain than muddy. As I suspected, lots of leaves/branches/twigs combos in the water. There were bugs out, but their presence was mostly belied by the legions of swallows working overhead. And yes, there were trout.

I spent most of my two hours working the banks, casting and stripping in short bursts. In my first cycle through the run, I took four browns and dropped a couple more. The trout weren’t particularly big, but most of them were chunky holdovers that fought well in the current. (Sorry, no pictures. Left the camera at home. Too cold/lazy to get the iPhone out.) I had a few swipe, miss, and come back for seconds. That’s always good for a thrill.

Dropped a handful more on my second and third go-rounds, and that was it. Pretty soon it will be time for streamers under cover of the night. And if I’m lucky, I’ll be fishing in shirtsleeves.

Paul’s First Brook Trout

I had the pleasure of guiding Paul for four hours today on the Farmington River. Paul told me he wanted to concentrate on fishing streamers, so we set off for the upper TMA rigged with a beadhead black and grey bunny thingy fly. Believe it or not, before today Paul had never caught a brook trout. We took care of that in the first half hour with a kype-jawed buck.

The size of the fins on this brookie lead me to believe that he’s lived in the Farmington his entire life.

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Today the trout took the fly on the dangle and on the strip. It rained on us, but we both found it relaxing and beautiful. Either way, it beats sitting at a desk. Adding a couple more notes: water was about 430cfs (that figure has gone way up with the afternoon rains), lightly stained, and temp was low/mid-fifties. Very little in the way of hatch activity: a few clunky light colored caddis and a smattering of tiny BWOs. We saw only one rise.

Lousy fishing, terrific class

Many thanks to Mark, Ron, and Ted for taking my Wet Fly 101 class yesterday. We had excellent weather and a good group of anglers who came loaded with questions. Unfortunately, we didn’t find too many cooperative trout (I found the wet fly fishing to be slow on Friday, too).  But the day will come when those bashful fish be racing to get to that soft-hackled fly, and then it will all fall into place. We learned some new water, and plenty of new fishing tactics. Thanks again, guys.