Off The Beaten Track, This Weekend And Lenny The Machine

"The best fisherman I know try not to make the same mistakes over and over again; instead they strive to make new and interesting mistakes and to remember what they learned from them" - John Gierach

Sometimes it's good to drive past those local hot spots and get reacquainted with those seldom fished places. Many times they are "seldom fished" because they are on the short end of stocking run or maybe they're just a little to far away and the GOOD spots are right around the corner. Bondsville is one of them. That rainbow above was taken on a possum nymph by a client this week. It was a beautiful fish and probably hadn't seen an artificial fly in months. The same for the monster brown that we tempted but couldn't budge in low, dim light. I'll be back for him AND the brookies that seemed to have taken the night off. We saw no other anglers even though the Swift was jammed in the usual places.

If you're getting tired of the same old places take a few hours and check out Bondsville. The Y Pool and the Pipe will still be there. Bring a wading staff!!!

A possum nymph is as simple as you can get. Loose dubbing with some light copper wire to keep it all together and to add a bit of flash. I hit the back of this nymph with a brown sharpie for contrast. No beads but weight added to the hook shank is a good idea. Spawning brookies and redd robbing bows loved this fly last Fall which, by the way, is right around the corner.

The rivers are low but not that low. The Swift is holding steady but expect a flow increase if we don't get rain soon. The Millers and the EB are holding their own with very early morning and dusk being the rule. In fact, I heard of a banner EB evening on Wednesday with about a half dozen rainbows caught and almost as many lost and they were all caught on dry flies!!!!! Remember, we've lost a lot of daylight since we are almost 50 days past the longest day of the year. That means that the evening action starts earlier and you will not have to be out past 9 pm (unless you want to).

My friend Lenny is a fish catching machine!!!! Here he is on the Swift releasing one rainbow after another. That's the problem with the Swift - the bows are all identical!!

Catch some trout!!

Ken