Spring Weather in February

It got over 60 here in Southern CT, where I spend every other weekend.... it may not have gotten quite that warm up where I usually live. But it was very springlike here today. The birds singing were species that would normally not be here now, the air was rich and sweat, the ground was muddy... it was like a day in late March or early April. Of course the water and it's inhabitants were not quite so quick to change schedule. Most ponds still have ice so around here my options were limited. I chose to fish a river that has bass, bluegill, crappie, carp, catfish, and sucker. I was not at all convinced that the predators in that list would feed well, the water is just too cold, so I targeted the bottom feeders. I figured that winter holdover white suckers were my best bet.

I used every technique and fly and my arsenal but the bottom feeders were not taking my presentations. I know there are fish in the river, and with the increasing water temperature surely they are eating, but there are still some holes in my knowledge and I was not able to shake the skunk.

Hooded merganser, Lophodytes cucullatus