Late Winter Update & March Guiding Schedule

 Two consecutive great ice years for Connecticut, what a treat! I've been greatly enjoying putting the hours in to get much better at hardwater pursuits, traveling a little further afield, and putting in as many consecutive hours out there as possible. Noah and I have been ice camping when the opportunity arises, even in some very harsh and cold conditions. It has been extremely enjoyable and I've been very okay without casting a fly into open water in a couple months. 

Lake trout are a fish that is growing on me more and more, both in open water and on the ice. They're aggressive but also moody, capable of producing blitz level feeding windows and long, slow periods just as easily. They're very pretty too, and they don't taste bad at all either... in my limited experience of exactly one laker kept. They're oddly like small bluefish in flavor. Tremendous fish, all around. We just need to figure out big lake wild rainbows and landlocked salmon next. 

On the home front, I've been doing quite well with big bluegills, not as well with crappie as I'd like, not as well with perch as I'd like, and laying into the stocked trout because, well, of course... that never changes. On the crappie and perch front I do have a hard time believing that over harvest and the now limitless regulations aren't at least partially to blame. Time will tell, but there certainly don't seem to be as many big crappies and perch in popular locations as there were even five years ago. This probably isn't an audience to whom preaching selective harvest would make any difference to, but man... I wish people were a little more conservative with their trophy panfish harvesting. 

On to March, though. The mud month is only seven days away, and it promises to be a very muddy March this year. There's a potential blizzard on the way as I write this, and still 2-8 inches of snow on the ground from the big January storm depending where in Connecticut you are. This is good; very good in fact. We went into winter with a big deficit and depleted aquifers, the more snow we get the better. It's good for river health but also good for floating. It looks like March will present a number of opportunities to float rivers, both for trout and Atlantic salmon. March is my personal favorite salmon month during the Connecticut season. Fish are often well spread, can be aggressive, and if you do want to keep one it is definitely the best time to get one that has much better flavor than they do when they're first put in. I'll be doing floats basically whenever the weather allows, as the ice is now leaving and many days in the long term forecast exceed 40 degrees. If you'd like to try it, let me know!

John Kelly caught this show stopper with me back in December.

When the Salmon, Willimantic, and Farmington are floatable I'll be doing those as well. As it stands those aren't, but they should come into form soon. The Salmon is still iced up heavily and at the least the Merrow Rd. gauge on the Willy is reading "ice effected, so for now it's a waiting game. We had a lot of fun on both rivers last year, though, and I'm looking forward to putting the NRS down both again in 2026! The Farmington is the Farmington... if you want to fish it I'll take you. 

Alternately, the carp season is coming and coming fast. Most years we do have great fishing in March, odds aren't bad that the same is true this year even though it feels cold now. April is filling in already. If you want dates in April, reach out ASAP while I still have some schedule flexibility. It's shaping up to be a really tremendous flood plain season. It sort of always is, though. If you haven't experienced that fishery, you owe it to yourself to do so!

Pete with a good un'

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Franky, Geof, Luke, Noah, Justin, Sean, Tom, Mark, Jake, Chris, Oliver, oddity on Display, Sammy, and Cris & Jennifer, Hunter, Gordon, Thomas, Trevor, Eric, Evan, Javier, Ryan, Dar, Eric, Truman, Collin, and Josey for making Connecticut Fly Angler possible. If you want to support this blog and access more informative content, look for the Patreon link at the top of the right side-bar in web version!

Early Winter Guiding Updates & Report

 Hey all! We're shifting into winter mode for sure now here in Connecticut, and with that comes some slight programs shifts. Let's start with the late fall recap, though. November was a fair month for clients with a few good catches, with some good some decent chunks of time for me to get out and do my own thing. Water levels were up and down, providing both good wading and a few floatable days on the Shetucket. My client Dar hit the best window I've had yet with a fairly steady bite until the water started to rise and shut things down for the day. 

He was also with me for a good flow window on the Housatonic. The fishing there has been a bit spottier when it's been high enough to float, likely because the fish had gotten comfortable in low water lies. 

Later in the month, Levi and I did an exploratory float on some big water without much idea of what to expect and low and behold! Big river Connecticut wild brook trout!!! A couple more floats down the same waterway, one I've wade fished here and there over the years, and I anticipate some more revelatory discoveries will come to light. I'm already impressed by the productivity of some stretches of these rivers that can't be reached any other way and don't see any stocking. Trout move, never forget that. 

The fish of the month of November goes to Connor Ferris, though, with a striper closing in on 20lbs. She was a gorgeous fish, and thankfully as she might have been one of the last of the year as weather does not look likely to provide safe and productive windows for canoe based stripering through December. Great work Connor! 

As for personal fishing, I've had a few real duds when it comes to mid distance and long distance trips, and some fairly poor success close to home as well. That all shattered  with this big hen on a twitched Ausable Ugly. Yes, she's a lake run fish, and yes, I know they get a lot bigger and nicer looking... but I don't get over to western New York that much and I'm taking her as a minor victory. Not my victory really, but almost cooler, on the same trip Noah managed his lifer laker when we took the canoe out over some of the deeper water that boat has ever been on. 

That salmonid-heavy program will continue into the winter here as we gear up for the next couple months of fishing. Three month NOAA temperature outlooks suggest slightly warmer than average conditions in Connecticut, but the early polar vortex breakdown doesn't make it feel that way at all and lakes and ponds are already freezing up. We'll see, if this winter shapes up at all like last I may just start guiding ice trips finally! But for now, the program is all about trout and Salmon. The big Atlantics went in the Naugatuck and Shetucket last week, some really nice looking fish this year, and as conditions shift I'll continue offering either walk and wade or raft floats on the Shetucket as flows permit. The Farmington doesn't yet look like it's going to provide us many floatable days, and the Housatonic has been a bit fickle for my liking, but that could change with just a couple of storms. If we get the water a few of the Eastern CT rivers are in play (Salmon, Willimantic, Quinebaug), so if you see that we've got some rain incoming and are interested in floating, reach out and I'll show you a side of Eastern CT trout fishing few know! Barring that rain, all of the TMAs are in play for wade trips. If you're looking to up your game for winter trout fishing regardless of tactic, just let me know and I'll set you up for success. It'll be a fun season, there's still a lot to love here in the cold times. 

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Franky, Geof, Luke, Noah, Justin, Sean, Tom, Mark, Jake, Chris, Oliver, oddity on Display, Sammy, and Cris & Jennifer, Hunter, Gordon, Thomas, Trevor, Eric, Evan, Javier, Ryan, Dar, Eric, Truman, and Collin for making Connecticut Fly Angler possible. If you want to support this blog, look for the Patreon link at the top of the right side-bar in web version. 

April Guiding & Updates

 Being a fishing guide in New England comes with it's fair share of wild cards. This is one of the more chilly, prolonged early springs we've had in a while, and it has made things interesting. Not bad, necessarily, but different. Bites I though were temperature dependent started before the water was "warm enough" (I wrote about this on Patreon), and I've had to stay really on top of things to stay in the game. Happy to say, though, even though a couple clients were stuck on what I might otherwise have considered poor condition days, we've consistently made the best of it. Here are some highlights: 

Trevor got invited along with his friend Jack and got a rather excessive first fish on the fly rod, this heavy and very spastic common on a warm but rainy morning. 

Brian Saunders took the first big-bug bass of the spring on a white Heifer Groomer. This fish measured the magical 20 inches. 

Brian Cowden takes the prize for prettiest carp so far this season with this heavy male, and taken on a day when it never got above 43 degrees and the carp forced us to search some of the thickest habitat.

So no complaints here, really. Every day has had it's highlights and a few have been extremely good. On my off days I've been taking every chance to use the NRS I've been borrowing from Drew Price, a boat I may very well end up owning. It extended my salmon season in the higher flows on the Shetucket and I'm now putting it down every trout stream I can when the flows bump. 

 

My prognosis for the rest of April is a bunch more carp and bass, because that's pretty much what I'm booked for. Unless you're interested in a night trip, I'm pretty much plum full till May. Next month I do have some open dates. The 2nd, 4th, and 5th currently are free. I have a bit of uncertainty mid-month as I may end up away for close to ten days, and some clients have already taken their dates, but from the 26th to the 31st I'm certainly open as well. Once I'm certain of that mid-month period though I'll update you all. During that time frame is an anything and everything smorgasbord. Want trout? We can do that. Want carp? Obviously. Big smallmouth? Heck yeah. Pike, suckers, largemouth, weakfish, stripers... just ask. May is a great month, one of the best. It will also be chaotic, so grab dates while I still have a fair amount. 

Over on Patreon, I'll be focused on my "Rowan Learns Wet Flies" series, as well as some more weather analogs and a few Small Stream Streamer Fishing Masterclass videos. I may start a weekly fishing-weather forecast there, if that would be of interest to the folks that support me over there. If you aren't subscribed, please do! I try to get out at least 4 different posts a week, and they're more how-to focused and informative though I post some short stories there as well. 

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Franky, Geof, Luke, Noah, Justin, Sean, Tom, Mark, Jake, Chris, Oliver, oddity on Display, Sammy, and Cris & Jennifer, Hunter, Gordon, Thomas, Trevor, Eric, Evan, and Javier for making Connecticut Fly Angler possible. If you want to support this blog, look for the Patreon link at the top of the right side-bar in web version.