All the rivers are blown out!! That leaves us that little jewel called the Swift River. The trout are there, the fishing has been great. I've had double digit days with dry flies BUT I have basically fished alone. Why? Because everyone heads to the Y pool. It's a common sight to see over 20 cars parked at the RT9 turn off and I know where the everyone is going - Upstream!!! Why not do some exploring!!! This past Sunday morning, after a late start, a friend and I had the ENTIRE section from the Duck Pond to the Pipe to ourselves!! We caught fish and it was great.
The section above RT9 has a lot of fish BUT it has a lot of fishermen. Let's spread it out. There are trout everywhere. Check my posts from the Summer of 2010 for info on the Lower Swift. It's great down there too AND it looks like a trout stream.
Ken
25 comments:
Ken,
Is the EB still blown out? I would think that it would be down to fishable levels by now.
The EB, from it's headwaters through and below Chesterfield Gorge, is not blown out but the road below the Gorge is blown out. I was there a week ago and the water was low but cloudy. Maybe it's cleared by now. I plan to check it out this weekend.
Ken
You're right Ken. There are fish throughout the river. I've been having good fun with hoppers and ants. Especially where the crowds are not.
The Swift has been fishing GREAT in all spots!
Ken,
Millers seems to be coming down steadily. What are the chances its fishable this weekend?
"Dido" to Ken's question!
ken, do you think there will be any fall stocking this year. i know they used to before the previous years when water levels were good. bbd
I floated the Millers yesterday from Wendall down to Erving and pulled out at the box car restaurant bridge. Tom Harrison floated behind me with 2 clients. We managed to scrounge up a dozen trout between the 2 boats. Not a bad day but not great. Water was still "warm"...
Oh, out of the 12 fish 3 were rainbows :)
3 trout out of 12? and what were the other 9?
Anonymous,
I saw someone drifting the Millers at Farley Flats Friday afternoon.
The Harrison's haven't done much guiding on the Millers over the last two years but with the Deerfield hurt by flooding I guess they are back.
It has been a strange year. I caught, as did most of who I guided, rainbows from Erving Center downstream well into the Summer. They didn't outnumber the browns but they were there.
Speaking of rainbows, the DFW has plans to stock the Millers this Fall.
I hit Wendell Depot Saturday evening. It was definitely wadable, but made getting to my favorite spots difficult. It was slow. I fished streamers for a few hours and only picked up 2 tiny smallies
Was on the EB yesterday up in the Gorge and got skunked. The water is a bit high still...but its now clear! Decided to end the day hitting the tributary that dumps into EB down by the dam. Caught a few brookies and atlantic salmon. The smolts looked pretty healthy for what they had to endure over the last two weeks. If you're near the EB, go down by the dam and you'll see where the waterline was after Irene hit. It almost looks like it was 100' tall at one point.
Ken, When floating down from Wendall what are the best places to exit? Looking on Google Maps is the Boxcar restaurant bridge where Arch St meets Farley rd? What would be the recommended pull out spots downstream from this point. Just purchased a small 2 main pontoon boat and trying to determine my strategy for the Millers. Also looking for the best place to enter if I was floating from Bears Den area to the UTD Pool.
Mike
Kozman,
I saw some online photos of Chesterfield Gorge DURING the flood. MY guess is that the water flowing through the Gorge was appox 30 ft deep!! I took photos of flood debris that was caught in branches that were over 7 ft over my head and I was 50 ft from a flow that was about 400cfs at that time. TheE
EB took a beating!!
Mike G,
You are a floater so I have this much to say: Everything that you have in your memory bank will work.
Mike,
post your email address/phone number and I will give you a call or email you. I float the millers alot, as well as the deerfieild, north, green, swift etc...I "learned" how to float ont he Salmon River...I have all my spots gps-ed and written down to put it an take out on the Millers...
That said, unless you have a winch on the bed of your truck like the Harrison boys and myself do, you better have 24'' biceps and Lance Armstrong endurance to hump that boat out of some spots...The Royalston-Bears den float is a tough one to take out, and FORGET about taking out above UTD dam... Wendall to Erviving (box car restaurant bridge) is an easy float and easy put it an take out...Down past Farley Flats you have the single lane bridge to take out...THAT is a beech...Thank god for winches :)
Ken, yeah, that was Tom Harrison in the grey boat and my and buddy in the blue boat...
...GSOutfitting?
Thanks Anon, much appreciated
mgodley@tiac.net
617.513.2516
Mike G
I’ve been reading this blog for a couple of weeks now, and I have to say thank you. It’s a great read and chock full of good info and comments. I’m very happy to have found it.
Anyway, after a couple of weeks of sulking about not being able to fish my local river (Ware) that runs through my front yard, due to pretty high levels still, I decided to take your advice and hit the Swift. It’s been a couple of years since I’ve fished it, as the Ware & Millers give me enough action year round, w/o the crowds that the Swift sees both above and below Rt. 9. I got there around 7am and was the first car in the flow gauge parking lot, but not for long. I started at the pipe and then went down below Cady Lane and worked my way back up. The action didn’t pick up until it got a little warmer out, but man did the sun turn on the dry fly success. I took a little break around 11am and came back around 1pm, and picked the day up just below the pipe and a little above the tree pool. I found a nice little feeding lane where 7/8 nice rainbows where pretty active. I caught my biggest rainbow of the year (No pics, but it was at least 21-22 inches and at least 2-3 lbs. Had a hard time getting it into the 19’’ net mouth and couldn’t get my hands around its girth) and 2 nice ones after that in the span of about an hour, all on tiny dries. It was a great day that probably wouldn’t have happened w/o your advice, so thank you. I look forward to hitting that stretch in the next few weeks now, pretty frequently. That is at least until the Ware’s levels come down a bit.
PCL,
Thank you for the nice words about the blog and I'm very glad that you did very well with dries on the Swift. If you fished on Saturday you may have been the fly fisher that I met that early morning. He too fished the Pipe and then headed downstream. Anyway, there's a lot of water that seldom, by Swift standards, that gets fished.
Nice to see your report!!
Ken
Hey Ken,
Looking to hit the Millers in the next 1 1/2 or so. Have you been out to the Wendell area yet? The Irving guages are finally sub 400s
next 1 1/2 weeks I had meant...
Fished Sat evening below Cady land and did well with Hoppers. Nothing like catching fish at the Swift on a big dry. All the other people were above the bend. Also, caught my 3rd Tiger in 3 diff spots in the last month. I wonder if they put more of those in this year?
Tony,
I plan to hit the Millers this week. The flow is good and I love September and October on that river.
Falsecast,
Were those tigers all caught on the Swift?? My own opinion - I don't know why the DFW raises and stocks those critters. They don't (I think) breed and they don't seem to holdover. There's so much more that the DFW can do with our $$$.
Ken
Mike,
IM headed west for chrome this week/weekend...Ill be back saturday. Ill give you a call/email then my friend. Sorry for the delay!
Ken,
Yes, all at Swift. One was a 19 incher from the bubbler run, another below Rte 9 bridge and the 3rd at downstream from Cady lane.
No, they can not reproduce, but are quite the fighters. Agree on the wasting of $$.
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