Crushed The Chrome

I know I have been negligent in my posting, and I will explain soon, but today I absolutely crushed the steelhead. Most were 8-10 lbs but some were BIG, I mean real BIG. These fish were as bright silver and full of piss as I have ever seen.
They were eating pink egg flies http://www.anglersflybox.com/glo-bug-pink.html and almost nothing else.
Have to go but there is more to come......

Camping, salmon, and wild brooktrout

Wow the last few weeks have flown by,and what full weeks they have been. I have been tying flies, camping, and even managed a trip to a very remote wild brook trout creek that gave up a few spectacularly colored little gems,that rose to http://www.anglersflybox.com/dry-flys.html dry flies as if they had never seen an artificial fly before,then again they most likely never had.

The camping trip was fantastic, we had a very private site that sat up high over looking the lake and the weather was near perfect.I cannot believe how lucky we were with the weather as most of the summer has been just clouds and torrents of rain..

We were entertained by a family of loons which spent much of a day in front of our camp site with a baby loon that would hope on the back of its mother while she drifted around as the male dove for fish. Very cool to watch.

Unfortunately the batteries in the camera died ,so I did not get any pictures of the loons.

As far as fishing in the lake , it was non eventful. However later in the week I did some exploring of new streams, and revisiting some old haunts,and caught some really beautiful truly wild brook trout.I had almost forgotten how much fun it is to throw dry flies in small creeks, and dap the flies between boulders for fish that may have never seen an artificial fly before.

I also made a trip to the west branch of the Ausable, I used to love that river, and I still am awed by the scenery, but the actual fishery leaves much to be desired. Stocked fish with multiple hook scars, I will leave it at that.

In addition I fished another river that I had not fished in years, the only reason I revisited it is it happened to be the only stream I could find on the USGS that was not near flood stage at the time. Well I am happy I made the trip, it gave up some really nice trout and several land locks, all on dry flies..

The time between fishing,camping and working, has been filled tying flies and preparing to add to the selection of flies on the http://www.anglersflybox.com/site it will not be much longer and the selection will be much improved.

I think that sums up the last few weeks, I hope to get some more fishing trips in over the next few.

Fly fishing flies

The anglersflybox.com site will be expanding soon, I have been working hard at deciding what additional flies I should offer. Its funny, when I am tying flies for my self I normally stick with about 8-10 patterns, and with those patterns I can depending on hook size, be prepared for the rivers and streams I fish. But when it comes to deciding what flies to offer customers across the country, then it gets almost overwhelming. I get e mails from all over with people looking for all kinds of flies.Flies that I normally would not think about tying, and fishing with myself. So I will be adding about 24 more fly patterns to the selection in the coming weeks. I just hope I will still have time to fish myself....Just kidding.But years ago a good friend who owned a very successful fly& ski shop warned me not to get into the business unless I was willing to give up a lot of time on the water. He may have been right.

Fishing

After eating dinner the other night, my wife and I took a ride by the local trout stream, now we were just going for a ride so I did not have my fly rod with me. I should be smarter than that. Any ways it was a nice warm evening and I knew that there would be at least a few spinners dropping but when we drove over the bridge the windshield was instantly smeared with may flys. Damn!!!... So I parked the truck and watched in envy as several anglers picked away at the trout sipping the spent spinners of the surface.That was a few nights ago.

Well today was my day off and I had an offer to join several other guys fishing the Delaware this weekend, normally I would jump at the chance to fish the west branch, but I could not get my lazy arse out of bed till almost 7am, to late to really make the run down for just the day, so I hit a nearby wild trout stream instead. I did ok, landing several nice trout,but I noticed something disturbing. Every spot I fished there were foot prints from other fisherman,not good, In the past I have gone entire seasons in some of these sections and never seen another angler, now it almost looked like the trails along the salmon river. Like another Blog I follow said "never ever , ever talk about the fight club", well some one apparently has. Seeing signs of that much pressure on that particular stream kinda of ruined the trip.

So after I got home and ate dinner I decided to go back out fishing, this time heading to a more well known stream, the same stream I witnessed the spinner fall several nights earlier. Conditions were very similar to the other night, very warm and calm, just about ideal for some great dry fly fishing. The only thing lacking was the flies, and the fish. No mayfly's, no rising fish. I guess that's why its called fishing.

Wishin I was Fishin

This would be the perfect evening to be standing waist deep in a cold trout stream casting cdc spinners to the trout sipping flies of the surface. Oh well, I hope to be on the stream tomorrow a.m. .

Blizzard in May

After driving 2 1/2 hrs I pulled into the parking area, geared up, and then walked the tracks about 1mile, crossed 2 fields and a side channel before finally settling on a place to start fishing. It is a beautiful stretch of river, and the fish certainly were happy in that section. Pods of large trout were feeding the entire length of the pool.
I spent the next 7hrs fishing through one of the best caddis hatches I have ever witnessed. I also managed to land what was probably the largest brown on a dry fly and 6x tippet, that I have ever caught. By the end of the day all of my matchinghttp://www.anglersflybox.com/tan-elk-hare-caddis.html caddis patterns were chewed beyond recognition, and was stuck using a may fly pattern that I performed a little stream side modification on.
So I started back to the car, this time walking near the bank and with the improvised fly managed to nail 3 more big browns that were feeding near the grassy bank.

Not Much Of A Hatch

I took a ride to a near by trout stream this afternoon and a few hendericksons and blue wing olives were coming off and were not going un noticed by the trout.I took some pictures and a short video but didn't fish until latter in the evening, hoping some larger fish would be up,that was a mistake, the air temp dropped fast and the bugs and fish were a no show. I guess I should have made a couple casts to these fish instead.

Dry Fly Season

I had the day off from work Thursday and since my honey do list was complete, I did a little fishing.

First place I hit was a small creek just up the road that is full of stockies and the crowds that follow. While there are some hold over trout and a few wild fish in the upper reaches, the typical trout from this particular stream is the pale cookie cutter , small finned, stockie. Not really my thing, and after catching several of them I took a walk to a fairly difficult spot to access.

In the past I have caught some of those few and far between holdovers in this section and after about the third drift through a nice seam with a pheasant tail nymph, I added to that tally.

It was a nice brown trout, and I should be happy to have a trout stream so close by, but it just was not the experience I was looking for. So I hiked back to the car, then drove by a couple other spots on the river which all had cars at them and headed home.

Once home I checked the water level of another area river on the usgs site.It looked ideal,but this river is about 35 min's away, and by this point my wife would be home from work shortly, so I decided against going.

While eating dinner I kept thinking how the water level and water temp were just about ideal for the other spot.

Forty five minutes later I was pulling off the road next to the river. I only had 2 1/2 hrs of day light left,so I quickly made my way down stream ,past several nice runs to the "hole". Sitting on the bank tying on my http://www.anglersflybox.com/phtapa.html"go to fly" for this spot I could hear fish gulping flies off the surface.

The pool is tricky, its deep,with deceptively swift currents between the bank and the slick the fish feed in. I love it. After a few moments I had my target picked out. This was the experience I was looking for. Wild, selective trout, 6x tippets, and difficult drifts.

He just kind of slurped the fly off the surface, made the heavy head shakes that big browns do, then bull dogged around the hole before I finally slid the net under him. A beautiful brown trout,fat,bright colors, full long fins,and sharp teeth. Just one trout like that, to me, is more rewarding than catching dozens of hatchery fish.

After releasing the brown back to the pool , I noticed a large trout down stream from the other fish rising, making the classic head,dorsal, tail rise. First cast to him he took , and snapped my tippet like it wasn't even there. I'm kind of happy I didn't land him, that fish will be my goal for the next trip out.

A perfect way to finish my day off.

Lazy

I know , I have been neglecting this blog, Its just that filling orders and checking in on the local streams has kept me away from the keyboard. I will catch up soon... I think.

The anglersflybox is getting busy.

Wow, one can tell that parts of the country are already in the midst of some great flyfishing, as the fly orders have been picking up over at the anglersflybox.com.

As far as fishing around here, from what I have heard the steelhead fishing is ok, not alot of dropbacks yet, but the trout streams are looking good for this time of year. I typically do not start fishing the area streams till mid to late April, but given the water levels I have seen I may start a little earlier this year.

Almost ready

Was out yesterday and checked on some local trout water.Its looking good!

Now I need to hurry up and get my Sage fly rod sent back to Sage for repairs.I broke it towards the end of last season and because I have been focused on steelhead fishing, and tying flies since then, I have been putting off mailing it out for repairs.