Tip of the Week: Whitewater

Jul25

You know all those snotty, pocketed riffles on the Farmington that were impossible for you to fish during the rains and high flows of June and early July? Well, no one else could fish them either. But now you can. And they’re loaded with trout that haven’t seen an artificial fly in weeks. I know, because I waded one of those runs today.

In just two hours, idly swinging and dangling wets, I caught over a dozen fish. I fished four flies — a deer hair head/wing soft-hackle, a BH Squirrel and Ginger, a March Brown soft-hackle, and the Drowned Ant — and caught trout on all of them.

Regardless of June rains, this time of year is a good time to focus on riffly water. As water temps rise, trout move into these oxygen factories. You’d be surprised at how big some of the fish are, even though the water’s not even knee high. Wet fly, nymphing, even bushy dries like a Stimulator will all take fish.

Here are some of today’s customers.

Several smaller wild browns like this one. They fight like tigers.

All the really cool stoneflies hang out on this rock to smoke cigarettes and shed their exoskeletons.

The last fish of the day, taken on a size 12 March Brown soft-hackle.

On the Drowned Ant, size 14. This one had some shoulders, and really clobbered the fly.

6/1/13 Farmington River report: Catch-and-release works.

Jun2

Fished the Lower TMA last evening from 6pm-8pm. I haven’t fished the lower river at close to a 1,000cfs in a while, and I was curious to see how some of my favorite spots fared in the higher water.

It was still crazy humid, but the water was warm enough (67 degrees within a foot of the surface –don’t worry, it’s colder along the bottom) to defeat any notion of those classic Farmington River fog banks. Visibility was good, although there was still a light stain. My plan was to fish wets with an emphasis on Light Cahills (three fly rig from top dropper to point: Squirrel & Ginger, Partridge and Cahill, Light Cahill winged wet), but the hatch never materialized. I only saw two lonely creamy duns, a few stray caddis, and the omnipresent swarming midges. That last crew made me happy I had a cigar.

Catch-and-release works. Some sporting bird of prey tried to drill a hole in Mr. Brown’s head, then had the decency to let him go.

Fished a long deep run for about 45 minutes, waiting for a hatch that never happened. So I hiked upstream about 500 yards, and fished a series of rapids, walking, wading, and swinging the flies close to shore. Took the bird-wounded brown above in that maelstrom, along with a JV Atlantic Salmon.

Finished up in a deep pocketed run where I took a leaping brown on my second cast. Signs of good things to come? Sadly, not. One more courtesy tap, and that was it.

Farmington holdover browns on wet flies

May15

Spent a few hours today doing some advance scouting for Saturday’s wet fly class. Found fish everywhere I went. Gloriously alone today, but that won’t be the case on Saturday. Water was a crisp 50 degrees, skies overcast, and a few showers here and there. We need more rain than this.

Not a lot going on bug or rising fish-wise, but I did see some light tan caddis, about a size 16, a few lonely Paralepts, and mounds of miniscule midges. I was fishing a Squirrel and Ginger as the top dropper, Leisenring’s classic Iron Blue Dun in the middle, and a black bead head grey soft-hackle nymph on point. The trout were split right down the middle, half of them on the Squirrel and Ginger, half on the point fly. They took the fly with gusto. Powerful, demonstrative hits.

A lovely Farmington River holdover brown that took the top dropper, a Squirrel and Ginger, on the dead drift.

Two trout of note. The first came where a riffle dumps into a long, deep pool. I was being lazy, mindlessly fishing wets downstream, when I looked above me and saw this pocket that I’d swung flies through a thousand times before. I made an upstream cast to it, letting the flies dead drift, when I saw a trout flash at an emerger just below the surface. Just as my brain was forming the thought, “Must cast there again,” I realized the emerger was my Squirrel and Ginger. It was a handsome holdover brown, metallic and buttery.

A little farther upstream, there’s a sapling that hangs over the river like a drunk caught in mid-stagger. Its branches drag in the current, and the shade from its leaves clouds the already mysterious waters beneath it. It’s one of those spots where there’s always a fish. But not today. Well, not on the upstream side. Just below, whack! This brown did her finest impersonation of a steelhead, cartwheeling out of the water multiple times. I could see it wasn’t a big trout, but I almost put her on the reel. Up and down the pool she went. Foul hooked, I wondered? Nope. Just a fat, obstreperous holdover brown, about 14″, with the Squirrel and Ginger lodged neatly in the corner of her mouth.

For a moment, I considered putting her on the reel. She had some shoulders, this one.