Lake Champlain Region on the Fly: Rivers and Waterfalls

On Friday Noah and I left CT early enough that we would get to the part of Vermont we wanted to fish with plenty of time to work with in the afternoon and evening hours. The working plan from Friday night into Saturday morning was to start in the south end of one drainage and work north to the mouth. Basically it was and slow start in water with trout, fallfish, and panfish, then work up to pike and bass, then bigger pike, gar, drum, and, though we almost certainly wouldn't catch any....

In fishing a new watershed, there are a few types of structure I will always gravitate to. Dams and waterfalls are among the first spots I will fish on a new river. They are a choke point at the very least, a migration barrier at most for many species. There are always fish under a good dam or waterfall. 

Our first spot was probably the most likely to produce a trout. The water was cold and clear at 63 degrees. Some caddis were coming off. There were a lot of baitfish around including some of the biggest blacknose dace you could find. We caught no trout, though Noah did see what was most likely a large brookie. 

Fallfish, however, were willing participants. 

 Northward we continued, looking for more variety. We found it in a deeper pool bellow another waterfall. Bass, bluegill, pumpkinseeds, and an absurd number of cookie cutter rock bass provided an hour's entertainment, but it didn't seem like much of size was there and eating.

Numbers done.We didn't need to catch more of the same fish. We moved north once more that night, looking for pike in the spot where I caught my first on fly. The situation was very different from that trip, the water was more than four feet lower. The places I found fish that trip weren't fishable this time. It got dark before we could find any pike. It was an interesting night. Frogs and flies dominated the ambiance, though great horned owls and moose vocalizations interrupted the drone of grey tree frogs, green frogs, and mosquitoes.  Fire flies filled the field and the trees we camped near. 

The next morning we were up early to get to the final set of falls we would fish before actually reaching Champlain. 

The two species we really wanted here were freshwater drum and gar. It was pretty clear, based on the overall conditions that drum were probably the only of the two we could hope for. Gar are far easier to fish for if you can see them. Throughout the weekend, I saw gar come up and gulp air three times, all in deep murky water. What we needed was a calm, hot, sunny day. We just weren't getting that. It was the exact opposite. So we focused on drum. An unexpected amount of fishing pressure in the form of a derby probably threw of our chances. 

To find drum we needed to go right to the mouth of the river. We were seeing fish on the graph, lots of fish. A kayaker posted up right across from the launch was steadily filling a bucket with white perch.It seemed like we could get lucky here. But it seemed like finding a needle in a haystack. The needle wasn't a drum in general, it was the one drum out of the bunch that would be interested in eating something. Anything. And Noah found the needle. 

That was it, one of the two species we really made the trip for. Noah got his drum. In the end, I wouldn't find mine. Time would tell if I could add something else to my life list.