Christopheraaron

So, are we fly fishin this time? LOL

Hey Brad, I may be able to make it, I'll let you know tonight. Same area as last time?

So you're going to start shooting at it? Sounds like it would be easier to trap it if it's just one animal wouldn't it?

Yellow bellied fly catcher shot is great, nice work Joey!

Hit enter by accident, please disregard the post until I've edited.

Sunday I got a text from Dundassteelheader, asking if I wanted to go out for brook trout, already being on my river for 2 days naturally I said hell yes! Fishing was tough this weekend with the cold front, on Sunday there was a massive hatch of hendricksons on the river I fished which made for a 30+ fish day with good numbers of fish over 11", but for whatever reason overnight the fish completely disappeared. We got to the river at around 8:30 and started where I had landed most of my fish the day before, we fished it with dries, nymphed it and threw spinners though it without a sniff. So we headed down to the better morning spot, where the sun first hits the water and fish are most active in the morning, not even a fish sighted. Ok I said there's one more pool in this area where we should be able to sight fish to some fish, sure enough there were fish sitting there eating something (my guess is hendrickson nymphs or chironomids). The only problem with this pool is that it's upwards of 8ft deep and there is no room to get your fly down if the fish aren't rising. After 15 minutes of failed nymphing we decided it might be more productive to head downstream and try for the bigger resident browns. Neither of us had fished this area before so it was an exploratory mission which yielded terrific results, I would post pics of the area but it's so close to a road I would be worried someone would recognize it. After just making my first swing through a nice little cut I hammered this small 11" or so brown. A trip upstream gave me one more fish (a little bigger) hooked but not landed. We quickly discovered that our flies and setups were way undergunned for these waters and with only those 2 fish hooked we headed back upstream to see if the brookies had come out now that there was some cloud cover. There were now a few hendricksons flying about along with small fish rising, and when I say small I mean too small to even consider eating a #14. We picked off a few little guys and tried everything we could think of to get bigger fish but it was not to be. Sean still had to get back home so he called it a day while I stayed to see what I could salvage of the day. At around 4pm the rain finally hit, and so did the fish! Even with next to no bug activity fish were rising all over the place, but they were extremely picky. The only things I was able to get them on were #14 quill body adam's and sparse #16 parachutes, these are the results. Now to get a little off track and go on a rant. I would say that the area I fish is one of the most popular areas around for citiots to go on the weekend, every day I am asked at least 10 times what I'm fishing for, have to retrieve 5 soccer balls and I constantly have to put up with kids throwing stones in the water while their parents watch. That I can deal with, but this is what I can't. A guy comes over to me, around 30 years old I'd say, asks what I'm fishing for, what they're eating, not anything strange. He leaves, and arrives 20 minutes later with a 9' steelhead rod and a box of worms! I should clarify that I am fishing a no kill zone, with no organic bait. Before he can even start another person tells him the regs, he says he wasn't aware of them. So he throws on a pink steelhead worm under a massive drennan float and starts dropping it right on top of the rising fish (and over my line)! Not five minutes later there are two of them doing it! By now every single fish is spooked, so I left and came back ten minutes later when the both of them had given up. I really don't miss steelheading at all. Anyways, another hour went by, I caught a couple more mid sized fish, missed a couple of decent ones, any then the rain came back. I couldn't really track my 16 dry fly anymore to I switched up to the fly I am most ashamed to fish, a #10 bugger. I kid you not when I say this was my second cast, a new pb for me, at least 15" probably 16". I ended the day on that high note and wrapped it up. Oh, and here are a few pics from the day before. tight lines, Chris

Well you just messed my day up, now I'll have that song stuck in it! I'll be fishing resident trout today and then maybe some more of the same or pike tomorrow, Monday not sure...

Angling specialties in Concord definitely sells them, call and see if they ship.

Nice catch! The Grand river steelhead fishery is mostly a fall fishery (as far as I know, correct me if I'm wrong) so I'd say you got very lucky getting to catch one so late! You may get another this spring but you'll certainly do better if you go down in around October.

Mitchell is a good lake for small boat for sure, look at rivers too, the Holland is in your area and has some decent fishing.

LOL, second time I've heard that story and it just keeps getting better!

I was thinking of the one Brad mentioned to me, based on the portage/paddle length and second portage length it sure sounds like it.

I had a feeling that was the lake, really need to get out there! Great report guys!

Oh well, I guess that limits the rivers it could be haha. For those of us that already know where this is, which I imagine is most, has anyone else gotten rainbows that high up? I guess that's where they stock them, but I've never caught one until now.

I guess I should bring some bombers next time

Hmmm, don't atlantics have clear dorsals?

LOL, ya a lot of people think that at first when they see it. I think if I ever get a bamboo stick I'll be too afraid to use it, fiberglass has a warranty

Definitely is, and a lot of it is a lot more accessible than people may think. Sadly not atlantics, just very silver browns (had to check the fins, thought they were at first too). I do think I got an atlantic last week though, didn't get to check the fin before it jumped from my hand but I'm going to say it was one anyways LOL.

Ya, gas burner. One thing I kind of wonder about this method is dealing with wind, building bottom bp certainly helps a bit with that.

I don't think there's anything I enjoy more than fly fishing trout streams less than 30 feet across with ultra light fly gear. I only have 1 "secret" creek and it isn't even all that secret, but that's fine by me as I find the popular trout streams often have amazing fishing and when you take into consideration how many people fish them they really aren't even all that pressured compared to say any steelhead river in the world! For a couple months I have been staring at a beautiful little 2wt butterstick in the corner of my room waiting for a chance to try it out, I had thought that this opportunity would have been on trout opener but looking at the rains we had and the still cold water temperature it had to wait. But in the last week the water has finally climbed above that 50* mark and I knew then it was time to fish. One nice thing about this time of year is the water is cold enough that the fishing only really heats up around noon, so after sleeping in on Saturday the car was packed. Waders, vest, fly box, rods, reels, leaders, let's go fishing! I would talk about how the water looked, how many people were there, what bugs were hatching, but I think it would become too obvious what river this is if I did, so here are some pics. This last fish I've been waiting for for a long time. My previous PB for a brook trout was only 10.5", over 3 years of brook trout fishing and I had yet to hit the magic 12" mark. So here's what happened. The pool I fish is a deep riffle the empties into a pond, usually I ignore the head of this pool because it's not very conducive to dry fly fishing, but I decided what the heck since the fish were hitting so well and decided to put my fly under the low handing pine branches to see it anything lived there, turns out something was! I could just see a head rise to take the fly, I set the hook, it bent the rod in half and started doing the classic big fish bulldog, and just as quickly as it began it ended as with one head shake the hook was spit. I felt pretty awful about that but knew that fish was still there, he wasn't moving and he had to keep eating. So I fished for 10 minutes downstream of the fish and then punched another cast into the head of the pool. First cast and he took it, this time I wasn't making the same mistakes, rod tip to the side, take my time, slide the fish into the net and its picture time. Tight lines, Chris 0

Awesome guys! Now Brian, you had your sign, right?

TBH I haven't fished really above the 401, but, if you aren't seeing any deep water, go downstream. Also, I believe you are looking for a streamside rod.

Don't ya love that the same company who makes aspirin makes grub killer? LOL

Don't trust other fishermen, half of them are flossing fish and a quarter of them don't have a clue that they might not be fishing ethically, just stick to deeper pools if at all possible.