Still on Dries

There are some spots where the panfish are still eating dries. That little millpond that is a couple hundred yards from home is still fishing very well with dries. To my surprise the redbreast sunfish are also still hanging out in the stream that gives the pond it's water. Even in a fairly heavy currant they were coming up for dries!

The Crazy Shrimp was also productive, but the only way I could get fish to take it was with a very gentle twitch and using dapping to get the fly to the exact right spots. It was fun to watch the goofy little sunfish sneak up on the fly as it jigged near their hideout. 

Post Turn-Over Largemouth Bass

That time of the year has come when some of the stillwaters are "turning over". The cooling surface water is trading places with the warmer water at the bottom. I signal that this transition has occurred is clumps of dark brown algae that have also made the switch. Often times fish start to cruise just bellow the surface before that water cools, and while this is happening there is some good fishing to be had. I took advantage of that tonight on a local farm pond. I used unweighted woolly buggers on a medium retrieve, just under the surface. This was good for three late season largemouth. None were particularly impressive, but the fought hard and the takes were heart stoppers! I probably could have used a small popper for these fish! The last bass of the season? I hope not....

Brook Trout in Strange Places

It's brooky time. I don't do very much else (fishing wise) during late fall and early winter. The brookies are active and I have streams close enough to me to fish them in the few hours I have after school. Today the stretch that I fished the most by far last fall. It fished well! I caught brookies up to 11 inches, and lots and lots of fish. I was hoping to run into the vibrantly spotted residents of this stream using streamers. I fished a slow stretch with the Edson Tiger, seeing a lot of brookies still on redds. Eventually I found one that wasn't spawning, a gorgeous yellow spotted hen. The water is very low again and super clear, which tells me the rain was not sufficient to refill the dying aquifers. At least the brook trout are still surviving, and they were out in force today! I spooked about 20 fish from 3 to 10 inches along one flat stretch.

After fishing out the upper stretch I decided to go for a long shot. I went downstream from the highway, a piece of water I have fished before but was never productive. The reason is most likely the pollution seeping out of the old bridge and the nearby sewage pipe. There is oil on the surface of the seeps and red sludge flowing from the bridge pilings. I got a heck of a surprise when a gorgeous wild brooky on the Crazy Shrimp first cast! The next pool down I tried my Pine Special streamer and got some strong takes, including from a brooky of about 8 inches. The short wet fly hook I use for this streamer may have meant the fish were short-striking. But the CS came to the rescue again and caught me a third and final brook trout. It looks like the natives are reclaiming this section of water!

The Crazy Shrimp

"The Crazy Shrimp"

The Crazy Shrimp is a brooky trout fly I created the other night using pink floss, copper wire, flashabou, and a blend of possum and UV ice dub in shrimp pink and yellow. It looks like a freshwater shrimp, cress bug, sow bug, scud, or any number of things. It has huge appeal for brook trout when fished like a wet fly or stripped downstream like a streamer, and of course it would take fish dead drifted as well. Yesterday it took some very nice brookies, and today I wanted to see how it would work on a classic freestone. 

I chose a stream I haven't fished in a couple of months. It has some big wild brookies in its many runs and pools. It is certainly the prettiest stretch of water in the area, particularly in the spring with all the fresh green in the deep ravine and moss on the waterfall rocks, but also with the winter's first snows. 

In the pool above a native brooky took the Crazy Shrimp. It was on and off in a second.

While I was sitting in the spot from which I took the picture bellow something very interesting happened. I caught one brooky out of the tail of this pool then began casting towards the head, where the biggest fish usually sits. I got a take, but the brooky came off right as I got him to me. To my surprise, he stayed a few feet bellow where he came free and began feeding again! I cast to him a few more times and he bit the fly, but only very gently. Then I watched his buddy swim down to join him. I put the fly in front of them and the newer one nailed it. If you don't move abruptly, you can catch brook trout three feet away from you!

There was one pool that seemed to be the sweat spot. I hooked five different fish there and landed four of them. This struck me as odd, and naturally so.... I have never caught fish out of that pool before regardless of how good it looked! Perhaps the new tree that fell in it provided enough cover for the char to move in. The best of the day was one of the fish out of this pool, a healthy male who apparently shares my lack of fashion sense... he looks like he forgot to put on his spawning dress! 

The streams are treating me well despite how dry this summer was.

A Memorable Brook Trout

These are the last days of fall. If you are a small stream wild brook trout fisherman these are the glory day. Rain has come and cleared the big leaf blockages that made fishing nearly impossible a few weeks ago. The fish are either in the process of making brand new brookies or nearly finished with it. Regardless they are very digressive right now. In my opinion this is the best time of year to get out and catch some of the largest residents in the stream.

Yesterday I asked RKM if he wanted to fish a favorite stream of mine (fast becoming my number one favorite, now that my home water isn't fishing so well). He was there with me to observe what is likely one of the biggest wild brookies in the whole state of CT, and I think it would be difficult for any brook trout nut to stay away from a stream like this for too long. He picked me up a little before 9:30. 

When we got to the stream it was flowing much better than it had been before the rains, but still a little low. That isn't saying much, this stream is the perfectly suited for these fish that have been living in it for thousands of years.

Woody debris is a big part of what makes this stream so remarkable.

 I started out catching a number of the little guys that make up about 90% of the fish population in the stream and probably 20% of the diet of the really big ones that live here. I remember seeing one 10 inch brooky with a 3 incher sideways in its mouth. The hot flies today were subsurface, though Kirk had a few come up for a bomber. I was using a crazy shrimp/scud pattern I tied last night and it did the charm, while a soft hackle was the taker of Kirk's fish.

One of the main reasons I enjoy fishing this stream is that it can be very good sight fishing. At the tail of one pool I saw a number of decent sized brookies working. I put the scud in front of them and gently stripped it back to me. I got them to chase it, but they wouldn't take. Then I sped up the retrieve and a nice one nailed it. It turned out to be one of the most beautiful brook trout I have ever caught. LOOK AT THAT TAIL!!!

After our short outing RKM went to watch some football and I went to see if I could find some spawning brook trout at the lake and a few of it's tributaries. I didn't have any luck there so I went to a stream I was told holds brook trout. It does, and I caught one in a deep mill pool. Quite a productive day in my book!