Thanksgiving Trout

This Thanksgiving I was fortunate enough to have an entire week without hospital responsibilities and great weather to boot. No better time to go fishing.

First I drove west from Charlottesville and met up with Pat & Taylor to fish the Jackson River about 15 miles north of The Homestead Resort. Taylor's dad had added around sixty big rainbows to their stretch of the river a few weeks before, so we spent the whole day catching them on various bugs. Though certainly not the purest form of fishing, it was still provided good practice in fighting and landing big fish. We were also surprised to catch some big 12" fall fish as well.

After settling back in to Georgia for a few days, Steven Pruitt and I finally made a day trip happen after many missed promises. Steven and I went to high school together and were roommates at the University of Georgia. While I worked briefly as a maid at Yellowstone National Park during the summer before medical school, Steven worked as a fly fishing guide at Turpin Meadow Ranch in Moran, Wyoming, which is just north of Jackson. In retrospect Steven probably had the better gig. Anyway, last Wednesday we fished the Toccoa River in the town of Blue Ridge, Georgia with our dads. The weather was not nearly as warm as we were anticipating, and on the way up there was some doubt about the point of even going. But we finally made it and started fishing not long after daybreak below the Blue Ridge Dam. We had the section of river to ourselves for the whole morning, which indicates how cool the weather was considering that the parking lot is often full of vehicles. Steven was fishing about 100 yards below me when I looked up to see him fighting a fish. He yelled upriver for me to come that way so I casually walked over to the river's edge. He again yelled and I then realized that he must have a big fish on and needs help landing it. Sure enough it was a big healthy rainbow that took a size 16 prince nymph from beneath a submerged log. It was a great fish and definitely worth fishing in the cold all morning. And to think that we had questioned making the trip.

After stopping by the local fly shop and filling up with some hot barbeque, we headed upstream to fish the Toccoa River above the dam. The water was relatively high but still very clear and the sun was finally pushing the temperature into the tolerable range. We fished various patterns for several hours with no hookups and finally called it quits in the early afternoon. Another fisherman pulled up just as were breaking down our rods. After correcting our strategy for this section of the river (he strongly favored fishing woolybuggers through the deep holes) he showed us the Oyster bamboo fly rod that he crafted as part of a rod-building class in Blue Ridge. The classes take you through every step of the rod-making process over the course of two weekends or one full week, and in the end you have built your own bamboo rod.

On Thanksgiving day my parents and I went back to fish the Toccoa above the dam, but this time we went several miles father upriver to fish a stretch near the Benton MacKaye Trail, which is named after the Harvard educated conservationist who originated the idea for the Appalachian Trail. Like the AT, the BMT begins at Springer Mountain and works its way north through gentle mountains of Georgia, Tennessee and North Carolina. It crosses over the Toccoa River via a 265 foot swinging bridge, the longest of its kind east of the Mississippi River. The area is beautiful, but the water produced only one 10" rainbow that took a caddis pattern. There are almost certainly more fish to be caught here, and it's worth the drive just to see the bridge.

I was driving back to Charlottesville on Friday afternoon, which ended up being the mildest day of the entire week. The sun was out and it looked like a perfect day to be on a body of water. Unfortunately I was stuck in my truck, driving up I-81 knowing that Mossy Creek must be covered up with bugs right now. Serial calculations on my phone showed that I could be in the parking lot by 4:00 PM, which would only give me one hour of fishable daylight at best. What the hell, I thought. It's better to fish for one hour and watch the sun set on a farm than to have it go down behind me while driving east on I-64. So I drove the extra 20 miles and watched the sun set and missed several fish rising to a BWO. Well worth it. The weather on Sunday was nice as well, and I couldn't resist going back to Mossy to make a more thorough attempt to catch fish. There were two guys in the parking lot getting ready to leave, and one of them introduced himself as James Garrison. In addition to religiously fishing Mossy and nearby streams, he also contributes to the blog Fly Curious. I caught a few small browns on BWOs but couldn't convince any larger fish to rise.

All in all it was a week of good weather and even better fishing.

Mossy 10/16/11

Kyle and I crushed it at Mossy this past Sunday. Despite a bluebird sky, we did well on the surface as well as with nymphs. The browns took humpies with copper john/pheasant tail droppers all day like the world was about to end. We didn't catch any hogs, but we landed some beauties in the 12-14 inch range, mostly in the riffles. Fish were definitely paired up and tailing; looks like the spawn is on at Mossy. I fall in love with that creek a little more each time I visit.

Mossy Creek 3/13/2011

After seeing that we were looking an almost 70 degree day on Sunday, Kyle and I knew we had to stretch some line. I did the same post-call maneuver of scrambling to grab my gear after finishing rounds. We debated whether the park or the valley would have better water levels after the torrents we experienced the week before. After much hemming and hawing we decided to try Mossy.

I've had mostly a hate/hate relationship with Mossy over the years. It's a beautiful spot, but the challenges posed by wary trout, the prohibition of wading, and the foliage in the river have led to more than one skunked day for me. The saving grace was that I would be fishing with Kyle. He somehow knows exactly where to find the prehistoric browns for which Mossy is so famous.

As it turned out, the water levels were spectacular. The stream was slightly stained and the moss patties covered generously by water. This was a boon considering the bluebird sky we had and it kept us from hanging up too much fishing kreelex (copper/gold of course). We started fishing by the spillway downstream from the church. Kyle landed one on the second cast right under the car bridge. This piqued our interest for sure, but we were unable to turn any other heads in the channels along the spillway.

Things really picked up between 4:00 and 6:30. The browns turned on so much that any kreelex swung over the moss and into the channels made greedy fish give long, sustained chase. Many fish just nipped at our flies, but we were able to land 9 between the three of us. We even saw pairs of browns tailing along the undercuts and running upstream spawning. This is the most activity I've ever personally seen on the creek save last September when dad and I ran into a large group of browns steadily sipping bugs off the top. I'd say it was a very solid day for Mossy. My opinion might be veering more toward love than hate at this point.

Martinsville AIM rotation and the Smith River

It's been a while since I've posted, but believe me when I say it's because I've been too busy fishing.

Upon hearing that I was placed in Martinsville for my Ambulatory Internal Medicine rotation, I quickly went to google to find out about fishing opportunities in the area.  I was dismayed when I saw no significant smallmouth waters in the area.  I tried to convince myself that no fishing was a good thing as I'd be able to actually get some studying done for the Medicine shelf exam.  I packed up and headed down, leaving my waders and fly tying kit at home.

Little did I know that Martinsville has a premier tailwater loaded with trout just 15 minutes away.

On my first day of clinic, I was fortunate enough to interview a patient who had a bass pro shop hat on, which meant I ended up spending most of the interview talking about good fishing locations (whoops!).  He told me about the Smith River and stories he's heard about people pulling monster browns out of the river in the special regulation section (always a good sign if there's a special regulation section).  He hadn't been up to the river in a while though and didn't want to promise me anything.

So after two days of researching the river I finally made a trip up.

Note: since it's a tailwater, the dam releases water for a certain amount of time each day which makes it unfishable.  The past month it was usually running from around 1pm to 6-7pm each day.  I'd recommend hitting up the water just when they turn off the generators.  It seems like the insect life plans their hatches for right as the water starts to level off which means you can prepare for top feeding trout starting about 20-30 minutes after generating ends.  To find out when they will be generating, call to hear the Army Corps of Engineer's recorded message at: (276) 629-2432.  Also know that since it's a tailwater, the water will be cold all the time making fishing for trout possible in the late summers while it also keeps the water unfrozen in the winters so if you want to fish a midge hatch in January, you can.

View Virginia Medical Fly Fishing in a larger map
I first set out to the special regulation section at 7pm to see what was going on.  Unfortunately, I almost died of shock when I got in the water without my left-at-home waders.  The waters in the section just above the bridge at rt. 666 were high still as it would take a while for the levels to subside.  So without even making any casts in the section, I shivered my way back to my car and headed up to Philpott Dam to see what was going on there.

View Virginia Medical Fly Fishing in a larger map
What I found was quite possibly the best half mile of water I've fished in Virginia.  Because of the difference in temperature between the humid air and the cold water, a thick 10 feet of fog sat over the water.  Through the fog I could just barely see rising trout.  And I could see them everywhere.  They were mainly in the seams feeding regularly on a decent hatch of tiny insects which I assumed were tricos.  Despite my lack of waders and a medical condition where I get paralyzed because of extremely cold temperatures, I wet waded in to try my luck.  I put on a a size 16 parachute and immediately started getting hits.  Most of the browns and rainbows were from 10-16 inches but I know I missed hooking on to at least two browns that were much bigger.  Unfortunately, because the generating schedule ends so late, it only leaves about 2 hours for decent fishing before it gets too hard to see with the lighting and the fog.  There are talks in the works though that will hopefully result in better scheduling.

I eventually made the trek home that weekend to retrieve the rest of my fly fishing equipment and spent about 2-3 days each week fishing the Philpott Dam section.  In the end, Martinsville was a complete surprise and a great place to fish.  I'd drive the 2 1/2 hour drive down from Charlottesville anytime to spend a weekend fishing the Smith.  It's just that good.

Fishing Report: Mossy Creek 7-9

It's been a while since we've last posted.  Fortunately it hasn't been because we're not fishing.  We just have been too exhausted after trips to put up anything.  Hopefully we'll be able to make relevant posts now despite being two or three weeks late.

I got today off from my internal medicine rotation because I'll be on call tomorrow effectively ruining my weekend.  Since the last time we reported on Mossy, Kyle went back and actually caught another huge brown.  Ridiculous.  I'm pretty sure he's using dynamite.  Because I was not in attendance for his successful trip, I had to make yet another trip in search of big browns.

To make it for the morning trico hatch, I got to the fog laden river around 5:30 and found fish sipping flies off the surface all over the place.  It was obvious that they recently restocked the river because there was a swarm of something like fifty 6-10 inch fish in the pool just below the bridge.  Water levels were low but manageable and a lot of the mud that was present last time I was there was no longer an issue.  Essentially, it was a perfect day to fish.

I had a bunch of early misses that initially frustrated me as well as one hook up of a big guy on a hopper pattern that happened by accident while I was trying to untangle some line.  By the time I realized I had a fish on, he had already made an epic leap that dislodged the hook.  I'm kind of glad though; I would have been pretty disappointed about having my first huge brown caught by accident.

Starting at around 8:00, the stocked trout began to feed consistently on something small on the surface.  I tried some trico spinners with no luck but found that a tiny, size 16, parachute adams seemed to draw plenty of hits.  I was impressed by their eating habits.  Usually these stocked fish snub their noses at anything that doesn't look like a pellet.

Eventually I hooked my first decently large brown.  He had definitely been there a while and put up and awesome but muddy fight.  By the time I had him in hand, I was literally covered in mud.  But it was worth it.  He took to a tiny parachute adams down underneath the lower bridge in a pool surrounded by stocked trout.

Then I found the money spot.  I can't divulge where it is for fear of others taking to it and catching all the browns.  But I can say that it's freaking awesome.  I spent my final hour there honing my skills with a pheasant tail nymph pulling in fish after fish.  In the end I think I pulled in about 20-30 fish (and I tried to document a decent number of them just so Rich and Kyle would know I wasn't lying when I told them).

On a side note, I met another fisherman out there today who was there for the first time.  Got to talking to him and found out he was about fed up with the river considering he had had no luck and was tired of getting tangled up in the brush.  I gave him a kreelex and promised him it'd get results.  Sure enough, about 30 minutes later, he pulled in a decent size fish.  Not bad for his first day on the river having only just started fly fishing about a year ago.  The kreelex showed off how awesome it is yet again.

Arkansas River in Colorado Part 3

Terry, Dad, and I spent our last day fishing the Ark down by the Wellsville bridge. This is located just upstream from the Ark Anglers' private lease where Stuart took us the day before. Aside from that lease, I have not found a sweeter spot on the Ark downstream from Buena Vista. There is an island in the middle of the river just upstream from the bridge with excellent holes and riffles on either side. We got there very early to stake a claim, which was essential. There was moderate pressure that day with a few other parties of anglers coming out later in the morning and throughout the afternoon. The other fishermen were exceptionally respectful of our beats, and we all shared this stretch easily.

I spent the morning experimenting with different streamers and nymph rigs. I was having some trouble drawing a bead on exactly what the fish wanted, but with some help from my dad (and his ever calming presence), I ended up catching some very nice fish on a prince nymph/baetis emerger combo. Experience truly won out that day as Terry and my dad nailed fish all day long. The key was using the 5x fluorocarbon tippet that Dad bought the day before. That stuff is worth the money. It sinks like a stone and is completely invisible to the trout. We found fish mostly holding in calm slants within the riffles as well as along the foam lines, making that Thursday a wonderful lesson in reading the water.

Once the afternoon came, things really clicked in for the three of us and we had pretty consistent luck. In fact, just before lunch dad hooked into a huge brown implementing the drop and count method into the foam (see 2nd Ark post for details) at the upstream end of the island. Terry and I watched him from the bank while we chowed-down on some sandwiches. He sprang up from prone with fly line ripping off his reel. Unfortunately for him, dad failed to remember the boy scout motto "be prepared" and had taken off his vest as he edged up to the foam-topped eddy. Without a net, he had no chance of landing the monster and after a good fight the fish was gone. Still, hats off to our instructor, Stuart, who taught us a very productive and sneaky maneuver to hook some giant trout!

This trip was the best thing a boy could ask for. I had an awesome time roaming the country with my dad, got to fish with him and another great pal, and even learned a thing or two about throwing dice in Central City. A long road trip was just what I needed after four months of boards studying. If you have the time, I highly recommend savoring the journey and not just the fishing part of a trip. Tight lines, and thanks to everyone in Colorado who helped make our trip a success.

Arkansas River in Colorado Part 2

Day two on the Ark was pretty tough with much colder temps and high winds. It amazed me how much the weather could change in the mountains day to day with highs only in the 40s after 70s the day before. We caught fewer fish, but they were hard earned and still absolutely gorgeous. Sefan at Ark Angers saved the day by putting us on a public stretch not far from town for the afternoon that produced some nice browns. I have the spot marked on the fishing map.

After a tough day two, we decided to book a morning guided wade trip through the shop. I think they pulled out all the stops for us and called in a true ringer named Stuart Andrews. Stuart has been fishing for about 40 years and really knows his stuff. The wade trip was on a private lease starting below the Wellsville bridge that had a great mix of deep pools, short cliffs, and some shallow pocket water on the sides. We started out showing off our casting "prowess" for Stuart who fine tuned our strokes. I was amazed by how he could make small adjustments to my casting and cause huge improvements in minutes. Again, hiring a guide every once in a while is a GREAT idea and made our third and fourth days on the Arkansas truly memorable.

We fished nymph rigs with a small chartreuse Copper John dropper. That little thing was deadly! I had never seen chartreuse copper wire like that before, but it imitated the chartreuse caddis larvae we found teeming under the rocks. Here's another pearl, go ahead and spend the extra money for fluorocarbon monofilament for your nymph rigs. It's completely invisible to the fish and it sinks like a stone. Just another trick I learned from Stuart. This setup gave us a real edge and we caught some truly stunning browns and 'bows.

As for actual fishing techniques, I learned a few awesome tricks from Stuart. First and foremost if you don't know about fishing the foam lines, try it! Stuart reminded us that wild fish don't like to expend a lot of energy while they are feeding. No joke, but how does that help you? Well, look for the seams between faster water and more calm water. These are generally the places where foam bubbles will form and make streaks down the current, and they are perfect spots for trout to lay in wait for food being swept downstream in the faster water.

Stuart also taught us some secrets about finding big fish. If you are on a larger river with collections of foam in the deep eddies along the banks, get your nymphs in there! You'll see lots of spent flies lying in the white foam and maybe even some trout sipping there. Also, bigger fish feel secure because the foam forms a canopy protecting them from birds like ospreys. The trick here is to sneak up on your belly very slowly, and with just a little fly line out, drop your nymphs right into the foam. You may see a take on your indicator, but if not just count to five and blindly set. Repeat this maneuver and work around the foam until you hook a 20+ inch brown.

Not only is he among the best fishermen I've ever met, stuart is also an accomplished artist. His compositions capture the American West and the changes that we have made on the landscape as we have tried to tame it. He has some really beautiful works, and I hope to own a few of them whenever I pay off my student loans. Check out his gallery online, it is worth more then a few minutes of your time. Thanks for your expertise and teaching, Stuart. We hope to fish with you again sometime soon, hopefully on a high mountain lake trip for cutthroat.

Arkansas River in Colorado Part 1

After finishing Step 1 of the USMLE (the licensing exam to become a doc in the U.S.), I needed a big change after sitting in the library for 3 months. This was the perfect opportunity to take the road trip my dad and I had been talking about for years. Randy and Richie’s excellent adventure rolled out from Virginia on April 7th and returned April 20th. We saw incredible countryside, met interesting and very welcoming people, and experienced some of the wildest tourist traps this truly amazing country has to offer. I’ll limit these next few blog posts to the fishing highlights in Colorado, but as I hinted before, the journey was just as fun as the fishing.

Dad and I stopped in Oklahoma City to pick up our friend Terry Weber. Terry is a great fishing buddy and he took a bunch of the pics you’ll see in the next few posts, so hats off to him for adding to the blog. After picking up Terry, we drove through the panhandle of Texas and northwest New Mexico en route to Colorado. It was breathtaking standing on Mount Capulin in New Mexico and watching the Great Plains sweep up into the Sangre de Cristo range of the Rockies. If you can’t tell yet, I fell completely in love with the West on this trip.

After a drive full of gawking at the still snow capped peaks of the Rockies, we pulled into Salida, CO and met up with the staff at Ark Anglers. Stefan was our point man for the entire trip, and he did an amazing job of both putting us on the fish and getting us oriented in town. I highly recommend booking guided trips through the shop; they are first class outfitters and very friendly people. I want to make sure y’all make no mistake about pronunciation when you call the shop in Salida. I automatically went for the Spanish pronunciation, but I quickly discovered that the local folks call it “Suhl-eye-duh and town just up the road is called “Boona-vista” (Buena Vista). I guess that’s about the same as us calling Staunton here in Virginia “Stan-tin”, but these things never cease to amuse me.

On the morning of the 12th, Terry and I headed out with Will, a fellow Okie and our first guide from Ark Anglers, for a 14-mile float trip on the Arkansas River from Salida to the boat ramp at Rincon. I had never floated for trout before, and fishing with Terry and Will made for an awesome trip. We started out fishing right in town and had early success on some white articulated streamers that Will ties. I looked for some in shops during the rest of the trip, but was unable to find any like them. Will, if you’re out there reading, post me the name of those flies or please tell me where I can score some. They were money! One fish chased a Will-tied streamer for a solid 10 feet. Just as an aside for Chuck Kraft, the Kreelex also worked beautifully in Colorado throughout the trip, and we handed them out like candy at every fly shop we visited.

Will also taught us a new streamer fishing technique that definitely adds more life than simply stripping in line. You can really make a streamer dance by using the rod tip to jerk the fly erratically toward you, making it seem like a distressed and enticing meal for a trout. Another thing I didn’t expect was the success we had fishing our streamers just under the surface. The fish really went wild after using the rod-jerk technique to make the fly skip the surface a little. Terry and I both agree that the best part about having a guide is LEARNING. Being put on fish is obviously fun, but learning new techniques and about the way fish feed and what they eat really adds to your repertoire as an angler. Thank you again for an awesome float, Will.

We ended up catching about half browns and half rainbows that first day. Most of the rainbows came after we switched to a two fly nymph rig with an indicator. I am a new believer in using indicators after this trip. Waiting for that thing-a-ma-bobber stop dead in its tracks or jump a few feet really puts you on edge. It also doesn’t hurt when it results in a tail dance by a fat rainbow covered in spots and stripes. That reminds me, we didn’t catch a fish under 10 inches the entire trip, and an average brown in the Arkansas from what I can tell is probably 14 inches. Every single fish we caught had vibrant color and they were all much harder fighters than the fish back East. I think that’s about enough for now.

Check back soon to read about more adventures in Colorado and some other very helpful techniques I learned out West.

New Year Resolutions

Everyone is making resolutions; Ridiculous resolutions that inevitably fail by the time February comes around. So instead, I thought I'd make some that may actually have a fighting chance of coming to fruition (this, of course, all hinges on whether we'll have time to fish while busy on clinical rotations). Here are mine:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/captkodak/ / CC BY-NC 2.0

1. Catch another gar. After I reeled in one of these prehistoric monsters last summer, I became OBSESSED and went on numerous occasions out to the Rivanna with the only goal of pulling in another to ensure the first wasn't just a fluke. I even bought heavy duty gloves to make sure I wouldn't lose a finger or two while trying to get the hook out. Alas, I received some head turns but never a solid bite. So by far the top thing on my list is to snag one of these guys again.

Huge Mossy Creek brown caught by Shane from Mossy Creek Fly Fishing (photo courtesy of MCFF)

2. Catch more brown trout (big ones). This may sound picky but really it means a lot more than it seems. Practically the only place to find decent brown trout around here is Mossy Creek. From our past posts about Mossy, you'll know that it's always a challenge to fish out there and going home skunked is a very real possibility. So this year, how about we pull in some of those famous monsters that the guys over at Mossy Creek Fly Fishing seem to pull in regularly.

3. Float the Jackson. Hopefully when I'm stationed in Roanoke in August I'll have some time to hit up the nearby Jackson River. From what I could tell from our quick visit just below the dam, the river is loaded with healthy fish and ideal water temperatures to ensure good fishing year round. Let's just hope that if I do float it, that I don't meet any angry landowners with shotguns.

4. Successfully fish the Shad Run. Okay last year I went out and tried my best to fish the Shad Run down near Richmond. This year, I think I'll play it smart and wade the Rappahannock instead. Also I'll probably need to get a sinking line and some properly made shad darters. Hopefully this time my trip will be more like Gordon's from Albemarle Angler as seen in the video above.

5. Catch more fish than Rich. Hey, I at least had to have something realistic on here right? Rich, you just been SERVEDDDD.

Fishing Report: Mossy Creek 9/9/09

Cam, Kyle, and I skipped town yesterday afternoon to check out Mossy Creek. We had classic Mossy Creek weather - dark and rainy with a few breaks for sun to peak through. The river was pretty low when we started out and the grass has grown quite a bit over the summer, but once the rain came, the river swelled a couple of inches before our eyes. Even though we had perfect conditions, we had some trouble landing trout. Kyle and Cameron each hooked up with a couple of nice browns on hoppers, but they all broke off. The browns were in all the usual places, undercuts in the bank, and popping out from under the moss in the channels. We did manage to land some chubs, however (Dad, you can still lovingly call me the "chub master" if you must).

Despite my history of marginal luck there, I still love fishing Mossy because the fishing is technical and it is one of the prettiest places around. Going fishing with my buds Cam and Kyle was perfect way to get back to fishing after a month on the sidelines.

Fishing Report: Clinch River and Big Tumbling Creek

Over the 4th of July weekend, I took a trip down to Southwest Virginia to see friends and to fish. I got a recommendation to first check out the fee fishing section of Big Tumbling Creek below Laurel Bed Lake. While the area was beautiful and the stream reminded me a lot of the other creeks in the area (Big Stony and Little Stony), the fishing was hardly respectable. I find it a shame that such a wonderful stretch of water was turned into a section used for the cheap thrills of catching stocked trout. Granted, the fish were much better than the usual stocked fish you find around Virginia.

One of the beautiful falls marred by the masses of worm cans and broken off fishing line.

I also got some funny looks from the locals as I fished in my waders and with my flyrod. Although they in return got some funny looks from me as I wondered what could possibly be exciting about sitting around a small pool with a worm on a hook or perhaps some powerbait. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against that form of fishing. In fact, I'll throw a worm out every once in a while but it doesn't make sense to do it in a would be an awesome brook stream.

The view looking out onto Laurel Bed Lake

So after I hooked a few browns and returned them safely back into the water for a few more days of life before someone else thinks they are worth removing (for bragging or eating?), I headed back down the mountain and went to check out the smallmouth population at the Clinch River. For the hour I was there at the Nash Ford, I caught quite a few smallies most of which were small but there was the occasional large one. All in all, I think it's a fantastic river. I wish I had had more time and my kayak with which to explore it. I apologize for not taking pictures, I was in a hurry and would rather catch fish then record them.

My styrofoam bass poppers delivered on this trip as they have on others. I'll have the instructions up soon.

Fishing Report: Beaver Creek in Ottobine, Va and Mossy Creek

Sorry for the dearth of posts from me recently, but as Cameron said, we have been soaking up the good life since exams ended.  Last Tuesday, in order to stop living in the library, my dad and I woke up early and headed for Beaver Creek in Ottobine, Va.  We could not have asked for a more perfect day on a spring creek in the valley.  It was overcast all morning with only slight clearing in the afternoon.  In my experience at places like Beaver Creek and Mossy Creek, if it's a sunny day you should reconsider fishing there.  The fish will be holed up and not taking much without tree/bank cover or clouds.

We started off the morning fishing with the old standard, kreelex.  Silver and gold was the hot pattern, and we pulled in 6 beautiful rainbows before 10:30 with them.  We caught most of our fish dead drifting kreelex from upstream into dense overhanging tree cover and then taking a few quick tugs on the line.  I would recommend bringing a net with you to beaver, because unlike Dad I left mine at home and landing some of these fish proved quite a challenge.  

After spending the morning fishing Beaver, Dad and I went on a recon mission to Elkhorn Lake on a tip of some good brook trout fishing there.  Unfortunately, when we got there we saw that the road up to the lake was closed for maintenance until June 30th.  During this detour we also decided to stop at Mossy Creek and try our luck.  True to form, Mossy was a tough fish.  We arrived right as the sun broke through the clouds, taking away our ceiling.  I managed to catch a chub (Dad took to calling me the "Chub Master" since it was so big), and he caught a small brown trout.  

At this point the afternoon was growing late and I decided to head back to Cville, while my Dad (more intelligently) returned to Beaver Creek to fish the evening.  Dad, being a more experienced angler decided to diversify his fly selection at this point.  He caught a few more 'bows and a brook trout on flies ranging from kreelex to parachute adams and bead head red squirrel tail nymphs.  This is how he managed to catch all three species of trout in Virginia in one day.  I call that "fishing the cycle".

Two Flies, 6X Tippet

Not twenty-four hours after my two day stint in the Appalachians crouching underneath the new spring foliage making sidearm casts with a two-weight rod to fish no greater than my hand, I found myself in a quite different set of circumstances. No longer were backcasts being snagged by twigs and thornbushes. Casts of only a few feet were no longer adequate and to throw out line with a two-weight would quickly be looked upon as amateur and ridiculous. And to say I had previously been tortured by trying to match a hatch now just sounds silly.

I stood with one foot in New York and the other in Pennsylvania making casts with my new San Juan 5/6 weight rod from Fly Fishing Benefactors, with 9-10 feet of leader and tippet, trying to convince a trout, big enough to eat a small child, that my fly looked just like or hopefully more enticing than the other thousand that cruised through his feeding lane. I was on the West Branch of the Delaware and the fly fishing was awesome.


Three years ago, my friend, Scott, convinced me to follow him up into the Shenandoah Park to learn how to fly fish. This past week, he and his dad were kind enough to let me tag along on their yearly trip to where American fly fishing started. He told of tales of huge fish, expertly thrown casts and fly hatches that make the water surface look like a miniature regatta. I thought I understood. It was only when we started driving by the river did I realize what he meant. Through the bug splattered windows I could see the hoardes of flies and a river alive with trout gently sipping insects off the water's surface.


Within thirty minutes we were out on river staking claim to shallow pool of water with at least twenty trout feeding simultaneously. On the trip up from Virginia, I had been taught the Rusteikas West Branch of the Delaware mantra by Scott's dad: "Only two flies, 6X tippet." So when I was finally on the river, I resisted grabbing for my 4X and my kreelex streamers, and instead heeded their advice hoping it would bring me good fishing karma.



The two flies we used for the extent of the trip were a Hendrickson comparadun tied in several ways (with CDC wings, CDC loopwings, snowshoe rabbit's foot wings) and rusty spinners. Within minutes of being on the water, Scott was able to tell the majority of the fish were sipping on the duns. So we set to work trying to fool these leviathans into taking our imitations as apple caddis flies swarmed above us and the sun slowly started setting.


It couldn't have been more than thirty minutes before the master had a healthy 18 inch brown
trout in hand to show the apprentice that he knew what he was talking about. "Two flies, 6X tippet." "It's all about presentation." "He has to see your fly first, not your line."


Still, it was hard for me to break some bad habits. A fish started sipping bugs just upstream from me and the temptation was too great. A few casts later, my flies gently disappeared. I set the hook and *snap*. The hook was set, but the wrist action that would have sent a Rapidan brookie flying straight out of the water didn't have quite the same effect on this fish. A fly was lost but a lesson was learned.


Two more lost flies due to snapped tippet later, I hooked a large brown but hardly even knew it happened. With the sun starting to hang low over the Catskill Mountains, our artificials became lost the masses of other flies as the spent Hendricksons finally laid their eggs and died. So when my fly was taken amidst the others, my only indication was a flash of the trout's belly and a sudden whirring of my drag. I successfully stifled a yelp of excitement and tried to act like I had fought a fish of this magnitude before. Five minutes later, however, when Scott took the picture of me with my first brown trout on the Delaware, it was quite difficult to hide my excitement and surprise. See below:



Later in the evening, the dead flies started to finally clear from the surface of the water and in the dim light, Scott caught another trout, this time a fat rainbow.


Obsessed, we continued to throw line out as we walked slowly back to the car through the ever-darkening evening. Silhouettes of trout could still be seen rising, disturbing the water in the slow stretches of water. But eventually it became impossible to see where you were casting or what you were casting to. At the car we found out that Mr. Rusteikas had caught two trout on rusty spinners right near where we parked the car.


The forecast for the next two days looked ominous. Sure enough, the next day brought with it clouds and a blustery wind that swept upstream at over 15 mph and a chill that kept the fish down and prevented any significant hatch of flies. The river seemed completely different than the lively river we had fished the day before. It was hard to imagine there were scores of huge fish waiting patiently for the next batch of flies to hatch.


Thankfully, the third day's forecast turned out to be quite inaccurate. After a few light showers in the morning, the clouds broke up and the wind died down just in time to allow for a heavy hatch of caddis and Hendricksons. Having held off on lunch until the hunger pains were too great, Scott and I decided to leave our favorite hole to grab a bite to eat around 3 p.m. only to return to find out that the Hendrickson hatch had picked up just after we left allowing Mr. Rusteikas to pull three good sized trout out of our section of river. The day continued to be successful with the occasional fish breaking off the fragile 6X tippet. I tricked a big brown into taking my dun in the slow shallow waters that left me with a sore forearm after he was set free. Scott also hooked a big brown in the evening on the first cast into the fish's feeding lane.

The final day was perhaps the best. The weather had settled down and the hatch was heavy. As the apple caddis started to come off the water, Scott started stalking a fish in the upper parts of our section of river. Mr. Rusteikas and I sat on the shore humored by the intensity with which Scott was inspecting the water planning his attack. We hadn't seen any fish actively feeding yet as it was still early. Less than a minute after a sarcastic remark from me about how ridiculous Scott looked trying to catch a nonexistent fish, suddenly his line became taut and a healthy rainbow started jumping. Eating my words, Scott continued to pull in six fish the rest of the day. I, on the other hand, continued to stalk the large browns sipping spinners in the shallows and had a successful day pulling in four brown trout.



Later in the day, as I'm casting to a fish on the far bank, I hear distant conversation between Scott and his dad about a fish Scott had just landed whose mouth had not one but three flies in it. After inspection and debate, it became clear that Mr. Rusteikas had in fact hooked the same fish the day before and had lost his now found (and still in good condition) CDC comparadun to the fish. Seeing as it was quite the fish tale, I have no doubt that it will continue to be told in the future, except perhap the size of the fish will continue to increase as will the number of flies in his mouth...



Overall, it was an amazing trip. Unfortunately, Scott and his dad have gotten me hooked on fishing for large trout now. I'm going to have to restrain myself from trying to head back to the Delaware for the sulfur and green drake hatches and instead fish Mossy Creek in the hopes of pulling a big brown of the waters there.


Thanks again to Scott and his dad for taking me on the trip!


Tight lines.

Mossy Creek Finally Delivers

After about 5 trips out to Mossy Creek with only meager results, I finally was able to pull in some decent sized brown trout. Perhaps it was the rainy weather, or the change in my retrieve, but whatever it was, it finally made for good fishing.

Yesterday I went out by myself as the folks over at the VDGIF were unable to send out the passes to the other VAMFF guys who were planning on coming along. While this was unfortunate, it did give me a chance to try out new flies and explore the creek a little more.

I parked at the church and headed upstream fishing extremely fast. I only hit the water with streamers where there was a decent hole for fish to hold in next to the far shore. (In my opinion, fishing the middle of the stream is a waste of time. Only extremely active/stupid fish will chance being out in the middle. The larger wiser trout have found overhanging ledges and fallen debris next to the banks to keep them safe.) So I headed upstream in this fashion until I literally got to the end of the road. The public section of the stream ends in a nice little convergence where the "mossyness" of the creek is quite apparent.

The whole trip upstream I was dead drifting kreelexes (including some of my own versions of the fly). On the trip upstream I had only one trout take but he got off before I even had a chance to see how big he was. For what it was worth, he felt big...

I also saw a large trout way upstream practically near the end of the public section that was sipping flies off the top. I unfortunately couldn't get him to take. From what I could tell he was sipping on subsurface flies that were extremely small. Unfortunately, my griffith's gnats and my comparaduns weren't tricking him.

After a disappointing first 2 hours, I headed back to the stretch of water near the parking lot. At that point I decided to mix things up. I started using a quick retrieve in which I let the fly dead drift downstream a little ways to get some depth to it and then started retrieving about 8 inches of line as fast as I could as the streamer swung out across the pools. On my second try of this I hooked a good sized brown trout which somehow popped off my kreelex before I could get the net in the water. I first chalked the change in success up to the new retrieve but then noticed the rain had finally started to come down so perhaps it was just the change in the weather....

I then kept fishing downstream for about 30 minutes and hauled in two nice sized browns pretty much one after the other. It was awesome to finally pull in some trout of this creek with some size to them. Beautiful fish that looked extremely healthy. I would have kept fishing but I started getting sloppy on my cast and the rain wasn't making things too pleasant either. All in all though, it was an awesome day out there. It solidified, yet again, my thoughts that the kreelex is the best streamer out there for fishing in Virginia. Thank you Chuck Kraft.

Here's another pictures of one of the browns: (I realize that I have too many pictures of me holding my fish awkwardly, I'm going to have to mix up how I do this without keeping the trout out of the water for too long.)