"Fly-fishing is a magical way to recapture the rapture of solitude without the pangs of loneliness" - John D. Voelker, aka, Robert Traver
BWO - Size 22
Find a day in mid winter where the air temperature crosses the 40 degree mark and you will see these little guys on the Swift. The Y Pool will have them and so will the long flat above the Duck Pond. It is a reliable winter insect. As Spring rolls around you will find them at Cady Lane but their real season is the Autumn (a cool, overcast day is perfect!) Millers by Mormon Hollow
It's not just the Swift that has them around here but the little tailwater will have them all year. The Millers and the EB have had monster hatches in the late Summer and Fall and when I say "monster hatches" I mean insects that are so thick you almost inhale them! About 10 years ago I took a short scouting trip in March to the Millers at the Holtshire Road bridge. The water was high and discolored but the air had BWO's and the eddy just upstream from the bridge was full of rising trout. The river had not yet been stocked!!! The most concentrated hatch I've seen around here was on the EB in mid October. I took fish on dries from Les's Pool, Slant Rock and the Bliss Pool.
In the next few months I will review some of my favorite rivers right down to specific runs and pools with maybe a few stories to go along.
I'm still Guiding!!
Ken
11 comments:
Ken,
That BWO is going into my box.
Thank you for sharing it.
Bob O
You are welcome Bob O!!
Ken
I always enjoy your stories.
Another preachy post. Just because people don't specifically throw dries and soft hackles doesn't mean they are sinners. Nymphs and streamers have their place and I've spoken to people guided by you who says they used weighted flies AND split shot on their trip. Don't be such a hypocrite and push your biases on all your readers.
Pat,
What are you trying, unsuccessfully, to say? All I said was that under certain conditions small dries will work fine as will soft hackles (emergers) but I NEVER said that you shouldn't throw weighted flies. Do what you want. It's your time on the river. Some of my clients will use weight but only under certain conditions. Most do not and we catch fish! I fish and sell a lot of unweighted possum nymphs on line to know that this is true.
Ken
Historically, It was Skues, across the pond, who first tied the pheasant tail nymph. This was during the days of chalk stream club fishing with heavy regulations about how to fish, like only upstream casts and no weights. To overcome the weight rule he tied the fly with only copper wire, no thread. This was over a 100 yrs ago. And to quote the late great Jim Derin of Angler's Roost fame in Midtown Manhattan, "You might as well be fishing in a toilet bowl if your not using weight."
So for all of you that are weightless anglers, weight is here to stay, use it or not it's your choice.
"Doc"
re read your opening paragraph and tell me that you don't come across as preachy in regards to throwing weighted flies and "super ugly streamers", that "land like rocks" and should only be used in "rivers on mars". i've learned a lot from your blog and will continue to read but I don't think one style or kind of fly should pushed aside or put down bc its not your style. dont see why that cant be left out while still getting your point across about the effectiveness of unweighted flies. Happy New Year and tight lines.
Doc,
I love fishing soft hackled flies and I do well with them but you will never, never see me casting a weighted one. Same with any traditional wet fly. BTW, the creation of the PTN is, in most sources, credited to Frank Sawyer.
Ken
GEM Skues is dubbed the father of nymphing, and at the turn of the last century had a great debate with Halford of dry fly only fame as to the propriety of either. Skues may well have used/invented the pheasant tail nymph. However it was river keeper Frank Sawyer who is remembered for constructing his Sawyer Pheasant Tail with copper wire, rather than thread, I think, primarily for its weighted qualities. Even while nymphing, Sawyer was a sight fisherman often remarking on the tell tale white wink of the open and shut of a brown trout's mouth. He managed to employ many of the surface (dry) fly fishers technique while drifting his PT, or buzzers (as he called midges). The dry vs wet/nymph/streamer tension has been with us since the dawn of angling, and probably will endure to the final act. They beauty of the diversity is each has something to share, and to learn. Let's have some fun. Instead of finger pointing, let's go fishing. See you on the water.
Bob O,
I like your reference to the "telltale white wink of the open and shut of a brown trout's mouth". Back in the 70's a writer named S.L. Slaymaker once described it as "chalky jaws opening for a yawning take"
Ken
I stand corrected by one with more historical knowledge than I. But I still carry more soft hackles than PT nymphs.
"Doc"
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