Fly Fishing Information On The Millers, Swift, Middle, West and East Branches Of the Westfield River and the Ware, and Mill rivers. YOUR BEST SOURCE FOR MA. FLY FISHING INFORMATION, the top ranked fly fishing blog in Massachusetts! WHAT FLY FISHERS READ!!
Jack Gartside and a few of those old Scottish tiers knew the value of aftershaft feathers. You know, the fluff that we peel off of the stem and then toss. Try working them into your larger soft hackles like 10's and 8's. It makes a world of difference as the aftershaft fluff is more lively than the traditional soft hackle fibers and it will give your fly some needed bulk to present a good profile in the water.
Aftershaft at bottom of feather.
I always wrap a partridge hackle in by the tip of the feather. With the fluff I tie in at the base of the feather. Sometimes I have to cut back on the base if the stem is too thick.
This pattern landed two skinny water trout (brown and a bow) on the Ware yesterday.
The Rain
Well, the rain finally came to Central/Western Ma yesterday as an on again, off again event. All watersheds got rain with some more than others. The Ware took the top prize doubling it's flow to 111 cfs as I write.. The others ticked upwards which is a good thing. Now we need another dose and not a deluge!
"It's an odd fact of life that whichever side of the stream you're on, two-thirds of the best water is out of reach on the other side" John Gierach
June is the month were we begin the transition from Spring to Summer AND making sure that we on on the freestones at the right time to witness the Damsel Fly hatch which may be the biggest insect hatch in terms of size and numbers for our central New England freestones.
What is a Damsel Fly? Without getting scientific on you just think of a large dragon fly that is a beautiful light shade of green AS A WINGED ADULT! Actually the adult is of little importance to the flyfisher or the trout for that matter. It's the nymph that creates all the action. Here's how it works:
Find a bright sunny day and be on the river around 9am. Watch the rocks along the shore and if your timing is right and the conditions are good the shore side rocks will be covered with Damsel nymphs by noon.
Now, the damsel fly nymph is fairly quick in the water and the trout will chase them as the nymph tries to get out of the water. I've seen trout BEACH themselves trying to grab one of these outsized morsels. I once was fishing the Bliss Pool on the EB from the other side and I could hear splashing behind me. The whole bank was full of trout chasing these critters. It's an easy guess that on a prime day these insects number in the thousands.
What Fly To Use
Forget the adult insect. The trout don't seem to know it exists. It's the nymph that is the attraction and a size 12 brown wooley bugger or a Gartside Sparrow tied on a size 10 dry fly hook will work.
Add very little weight to this fly because you will be fishing it in shallow water anyway.
The EB and the Millers are tops in Central Ma for this event and I have seen them on the Ware. You will probably not find them on a tailwater.
I was perusing the fly fishing web the other day when I noticed that this well known rod maker was selling the personal fly rod of the late, great fly reel creator Stan Bogdan. The rod was bamboo, of course, and was only 6 ft, 6 inches long which harkened back to a different time when rods were shorter and lines a bit heavier.
Backcast to the early 1970's before graphite took center stage. The old bamboo "factories" were dropping like spinners leaving only the individual craftsmen working with cane. Fiberglass owned the market and with good reason - glass was cheap, strong and easy to work with. If it had a problem it was that it had a weight problem in the longer lengths just like bamboo. (the odd 7.5 ft length was an American attempt to push the length of a trout rod out to where it was still a trout rod. 8 feet was the practical limit). Then graphite blew everything out of the water and overnight fly rods became l o n g e r and lighter.
The fly fishing industry embraced this stuff and pushed the "longer and lighter" mantra to the extreme (maybe that's why we have so many reports of broken euro nymph rods). But was it really necessary? The industry will say YES because it's their job to promote new products but personal experience would tend to disagree. Back in the day my 7 foot 5wt Fenwick glass rod conquered tiny streams where it was easy to fish in close quarters, and held up well on larger rivers. The truth is I didn't know that a 7 foot rod put me at a disadvantage because I was still catching lots of trout and with casting adjustments I could handle most casting distance easily..
I have realized that my average rod length has dropped in the past few years. My 9 and 10 foot graphite sticks are gathering dust and have been replaced in the lineup with 6.5 to 7.5 foot cane rods. I still fish graphite in the Winter (bamboo and ice don't mix) but my rods of choice are graphite, a 7ft 3wt or an 8 ft 6wt depending on what I'm throwing.
I can truthfully say that my shorter rod length doesn't handicap me. On a 30 foot wide stream how could it? And on larger rivers I'm only concerned in that first 30 to 40 feet. I have no problems mending line or with line control Now, I'll draw the line at some of these "trick" rods that are in the 5 foot range. Novelty has its limits.
The Rivers
Every river is now within the "good flow" range. Even the Millers has stared to behave (537 cfs as I write) and with a dry forecast things look great this week. The EB, the Ware, especially the Ware have been producing well. And don't be a 9 - 5er. Fish through dusk!!
Ken
Wednesday, May 12, 2021
Sure, sometimes a non-angler will ask how I can stand to hook, play, and land these increasingly rare fish that I claim to love and respect so much, adding to their already heavy burden of survival. To that I say, "It's because life is more complicated than either of us could ever imagine". John Gierach
I love all rivers, large, small and somewhere in the middle. I love transitional rivers that border on cold and warm (big insect populations and big trout live there). I guess I can say that I love freestones the most. What about tailwaters?someone may say. All I can say is if I were to have the best day of fishing in my life I would want it to be on a freestone BECAUSE I wouldn't have to deal with the tailwater crowds or artificial conditions. In fact, the best days of fishing, for me, have been on freestones.
There is something natural about freestone streams just like fishing a bamboo rod as opposed to man-made composite materials. And also a freestone river is subject to the weather that we have on that day. A tailwater is usually the same if we don't have flows subject to hydro power generation. Fishing a tailwater can be done at bankers hours because of the artificial flow of the river. It's always cold. Freestones, especially in the summer, fish best in the very early morning and at dusk when things are cooler. It's my favorite time!!
I used to find myself getting into the Millers at 4am in early July when there was still some darkness to show a few planets and stars. In that dim predawn light you could make out the rise forms of dozens or maybe hundreds of trout as they rose to drifting nymph forms and I caught a lot of rising trout UNTIL DAWN when the whole show would shut down. 15 hours later I would be back as the evening, or should I say the "Dusk Rise " would start. This went until after dark and it was great. I played under Mother Natures Rules and not a dam release schedule. It was great!!! This is flyfishing on the Millers, the EB and the Ware and you may have the place to yourself (no crowds).
"Tailwaters are what Thomas McGuane called "the great theme parks of American fly fishing," with their more or less stable water temperatures and artificially inflated populations of insects and fish. They are irresistible for all kinds of reasons, but all of those trout breed the peculiarly postmodern sense that anything short of a 20 fish day is a bust, so when things are slow there's the temptation to lie about numbers or to vaguely allow that you are "getting your share" - John Gierach
Many may not realize but the first of the tailwaters was unleashed on the American fishing public in the late 1930's as a solution to power generation and/or flood control. Turning natural rivers into refrigerated trout zones was not the intent but a biproduct of the design. Also, tailwaters are not the trout heaven that we imagine. There have been some major fish kills below the dam(s) when released water has a low oxygen content. That will kill off more trout then when Mother Nature rewards us with a drought.
The Rivers
As I write:
The EB - at 514 it is fishable but maybe not crossable in all sections
Millers - at 1060 cfs it is slowly rounding into form. Look for a flow of 500 cfs or less.
Ware - 248 cfs is good. Fish this river
Swift - 45cfs - Yes, it got stocked again. Very fishable as always.
So what's wrong with warranties? Actually everything! Let's say you buy a rod for $800 and it breaks in half on the first day out (this happens, check the web). You send the rod back with $50 and wait for the repair or replacement. In the meantime you are saying things like "$50, that's reasonable". Did it ever dawn on you that part of that $800 price tag may have been made up by factoring in the cost of the warranty. Maybe you are paying on it twice! Remember, the rod companies are NOT going to loose money on you!!!
I like an honest warranty that covers materials and workmanship only. The fly fishing industry sailed over the Falls when it offered "no questions asked about the dumb ass way you mishandled the rod" kind of warranty. Maybe we would appreciate the craftsmanship more and take better care of rods if they were not so easily replaced! I've only broken ONE composite rod in five decades of flyfishing!!!! Ken
Gauge Pool
Shed a tear fellow Swift River anglers. Mother Nature dumped a load into the river in the form of a large tree right into the beloved Gauge Pool. One of my favorite places to swing a soft hackle or drift a dry has now been cut in half. If you remember last Summer you may recall the HUGE dead pine that broke in two in the same spot. Now, some good citizen armed with a chain saw went and took that old pine out. Maybe the same thing will happen with this new obstruction.
As of Right Now
The Ware River - 476 cfs and not coming down = too high to fish (this river was a savior the last two weeks) This river is a brown trout river if there ever was one!!! Soft Hackles and size 14/16 possum nymphs have ruled!
The EB - 1000 cfs = forgetaboutit!!!
The Swift - 46 cfs = fine as usual
Millers - 1930 = It's going to be a while
The Farmington (WB) 440 cfs PLUS the Stillwater flow of 291 = 731 cfs which is fishable but be careful.
Look at the bright side - we needed the water and now we have it. Anything's better than a drought!!
This Blog
I'm beginning to believe that this is the only Ma blog that ACTUALLY reports of fishing conditions, names the rivers and pools where we fish, and will share info on the flies that we use. I use the collective "we" because my reader comment section is full of helpful and friendly fly fishers that don't mind sharing information. There are no State Secrets on this blog, just good useful info on our rivers. Let's face it - there really are no secret spots and to act like there are is foolish. To write about a good day on a river without naming the section of river or EVEN the river is putting the spotlight on yourself and not on the river.
Readers - Keep up the good work. You have made this a source for fly fishing info!!!!
"Hell, give me Greenwell's Glory and Campbell's Fancy and Beaverkill, all wet and about size 12 and May on the Big River and anyone else can have whatever else he wants" - Catskill angler dreaming of the Beaverkill River, circa 1930
The "Evening Rise" is my favorite time to be on a trout stream and that is during the months of May through August. Without a doubt, this is the time that trout appear to awaken from their mid day siesta and start their evening prowl as the air and water temperatures begin to dip.
Now, if you spend most of your angling hours lined up at a tailwater you will miss my point because tailwaters, with their manmade temperature regime, take a lot of the anticipation out of our planning. Everything stays pretty much the same but not on a freestone. Noon on a hot July day will make a freestone appear lifeless but get there at 7pm as the shadows lengthen, the Cahills and March browns begin to take flight and the trout begin to rise. This is life on the Millers, my favorite evening river!!!
It is safe to assume that 80% of my casts after 7pm are with dry flies and nothing fancy either. The Comparadun changed my dry fly life decades ago and a Olive or Dun colored Comparadon in either a size 14 or 16 will imitate most of the freestone mayflies during late Spring and Summer.
Strategy
That bent rod in the above photo was the result of a good plan. First, I got to the EB around 6pm on a bright, warm afternoon. Nothing was rising yet so a deer hair caddis around a size 12 was tied on. This fly, in my opinion, represents not only caddis but different terrestrial insects too. I worked the head of riffles and the trout smacked it. Then, around 8pm, the first of the Cahills appeared and so did the trout. On went the Comparadun and the fun lasted till after dark.
Equipment and Rivers
Anything 4 or 5 weight will work from 10 ft graphite rods to 7 ft bamboo (go with the bamboo). Leave the ultra light trick rods and that euro stuff at home. Your traditional equipment will work fine. The Millers, EB and the Ware are great evening streams.
Last Fridays rain set us back a bit. Here are the rivers as of 5:30am on May 4th:
Ware - 253 cfs High but fishable. Lots of browns
EB - 772 cfs The gauge is below the dam so the river up by the Gorge may not be as high. If it's a true 772 it's too high.
"I'll never forget the day that I got to cast a real, by God, 8 foot, 6 weight GARRISON! It was the first genuinely classic rod I'd ever gotten my hands on and when I walked out on the owner's lawn with it and began to cast, I thought the sky would open up, a shaft of light would descend and everything would suddenly become clear. What became clear was that I was casting a perfectly serviceable 6 weight rod, maybe a little on the slow side for my taste." - John Gierach
T.S. Elliot was right when he said that "April is the cruelest month." He must of been a fly fisher! High water through the first of the month, some daytime highs in the 70's, coupled with morning lows in the 20's and then a heavy 12 hour rainfall. Some rivers will be up for a while (Millers), some will go down as fast as they rose (EB and WB) while others will just be less extreme like the Ware.
The Ware
The last two weeks have been good on this river if you have the patience to slow it down and fish with the flow rate and water temperature in mind. Heavy flow (now) requires some weight to your offering. Temperatures in the mid 50's allow us to use emergers because you will not have to fish deep with them. Trout will actively pursue insects at any level of the flow when the temperature is right.
There are some nice browns in the Ware. One 15 to 16 inch fish had perfect fins, a perfect tail and a perfect color.
Thank You!
We had some great comments on the last blog post about our stocking policies. This may be the only online format in Ma that brings these issues up. Let's keep it up in addition to our fishing tails!
