Once Upon A Time........

 

"Give a man a fish and he has food for the day. Teach him how to fish and you can get rid of him for the entire weekend." - Zenna Schaffer

Red Quill

The dry fly was created in Jolly Olde England by a Mr. Frederic Halford. Samples were sent by mail to a Mr. Theodore Gordon in the USA who immediately began to modify them. This transaction changed the lives of both of these men and anyone who else who liked the idea of catching trout on a floating fly.

The first generation of transatlantic flies floated on stiff hackle tips and really didn't look much like the natural aquatic insects they were supposed to imitate. Improvements came quickly in the form of better floatants, thinner tippet material, better roosters and a million other things that has jacked up the price of our pastoral pastime into the thousands of dollars not counting travel and lodging expenses!

The mantra of many of us is: If I can afford it I'll do it. That is music to the ears of me, a former salesman. But my head still spins when I think of a guy I met who was into the sport for less than 10 years but had over 50 fly rods. I told him that they have treatments for that compulsion. 

He just laughed!

The rivers are dropping.

The Worst Spring

    " Never approach a bull from the front, a horse from the rear, or a fool from any direction"-Steve Mathewson

Yes, some of the rivers are receding and some are not.  The Millers dropped 690 cfs in the last two days. At 2550 cfs it's in tough shape but heading in the right direction.

The Ware has dropped 156 cfs over the same time span and as I write it sits at 345 cfs which is fishable if you are a good and careful wader.

The EB and the Swift are a mess!!!

The great news is that there is no real RAIN in the forecast for the next week.

Ken

In Praise Of Browns

 Backcast to the mid 1980s when the Deerfield/Millers Chapter of Trout Unlimited convinced the Ma DFW that the Millers was a BROWN TROUT river and should be managed as such. Our Chapter worked with the DFW to sample the river by electroshock back in the early Fall of 1990 and the results where predicted. We sampled the river and came up with ZERO rainbows (thousands were stocked that Spring) but we came up with a good number of browns even though very few were stocked that year.  We fin clipped the browns that Spring BUT we came up with a fair number with intact fins.  A few of the DFW guys said they looked like wild fish or maybe were survivors from a stocking two years before. In any event the browns seemed to do well in the Millers but the rainbows "not so much"!!!

Anyone who fishes the Millers knows that by Summer the bows pull a disappearing act but the browns continue to want to play.  This should show us that rainbows are a waste of a resource. Browns are the way to go!!!!

The Flood

We are still dealing with high waters but it will not last forever. 

Ken

Colliding Seasons

In "normal" years we hit the rivers by late March, toss leaden flies to stupid hatchery trout and then by late April Spring is upon us with shrinking flows, warmer temperatures and rising Trout!!!

That will not be the case this season. There's just too much water on our part of the planet to recede that quickly and before we know it the shad will start charging up our coastal rivers followed by striped bass.

That's when the real fishing starts!!!!

I'm getting to the point where if the fish I catch was stocked I'd just as soon fire up the grill and enjoy it.  It's probably a rainbow with next to zero chance of survival and can easily be replaced with a stocking truck visit. (you're right, I don't think too much of hatchery bows.)  I give a pass to native brook trout and brown trout because of their ability to survive.

More rain from Wednesday to Saturday.  Tie some shad flies.

Ken

The Riffle Beater

 

I could see the trout working the choppy surface and I really wanted to take a shot at it BUT made it almost impossible to float a dry amidst the chutes rapids and the boulders. I came back 3 days later with a fly that would take the abuse and still float.

1. Size 10 or 12 standard dry hook

2.Wing - white deer hair

3.Body- Senyu Laser dubbing (a light color)

 4. Tail - Golden Badger hackle fibers

5. A long Grade A golden badger hackle

This fly really shines on rough pocket water ( Millers in Erving) or the EB but is only so so on glassy water like most of the Swift.  

Always carry some!!!

Rain

Eastern Ma had 2.5 inches of rain on Saturday

It will be awhile.

Ken

Slowly but Surely

 

There's a fine line between fishing and standing on the shore like an idiot" - Steven Wright

The great deluge may be over.  Rivers, which have been busting their banks for two weeks, seem to be in retreat.

Here are the numbers for today and where they were last Wednesday, the day with the highest flows this year.

Millers (today) 1670 cfs, last Wednesday 3000 cfs

EB (today) 1080 cfs, last Wednesday 1830cfs

Swift (today) 650 cfs   Last Wednesday 716 cfs

Ware River (today) 690 cfs  Last Wednesday 841 cfs

Don't start fooling yourself that it's safe wading because it isn't.  Give it a week!

Ken

 

Flood Update

 

No, I didn't catch this brown recently because the rivers have gone crazy.  As of this morning the river flows are as follows:

Millers - 3000 cfs

Swift - 716 cfs

EB - 1830 cfs

Ware - 841cfs

I believe that this is the highest I've ever seen these flows and I'm not being overly cautious by saying that you shouldn't even attempt wading flows as dangerous as these.  These rivers could drop by 80% and they would still be too high. I could suggest a "thin blue line" but they may be flooded too.

Hold your horses and take a deep breath, Real Spring will be here shortly followed by a bone crunching drought (most likely)!!

Tie Flies

Ken