Refreshing trib opener this year, anyone else agree?

[Harrison]

It is refreshing to have experienced the best opener in recent memory.

 

Fish were stacked with the low water and lack of rain. Especially in the branches off the main rivers/creeks. Ready to eat if you were stealthy enough. Spent the day Saturday fishing a small branch almost laying on my belly not to spook them.... awesome weekend. I love the super stealth approach. Reminded me of the early 90's a little. You know your into it when the pool lightens up at dawn and all you see are tails in the slack water angled towards bottom.

 

Anyone else find this opener amazing?

Edited April 26, 2010 by Harrison

[Twocoda]

shootin ducks in a barrel...it was a very good opener but not as good as last year when the water levels were higher .....i hope this whole season can be compared to last year though ...it was amazing and this year in right on track to "one up it "... ....

 

i havent played tennis in 25 years but i have tennis elbow

[rock34]

I had fun

[packrat]

Was one of the best openers for me and the big guy---came away with a "hat trick" of 5 browns, couple bows and one speck.

 

 

Doesnt get any better then that

[tributaryhunter]

i agree it was a really good opener this year, landed 25 or more steelies this opener including small ones and a couple bonus browns

[Fang]

I decided to sleep in and broke a 23 year old tradition. Took a road trip and walked the river on Thursday night and found 2 things. Absolutely no water left and only 1 pool with 4 almost dead trout. These fish were so beat up, one had almost no skin left on its back.

 

Unfortunately the river I fish is very tiny and lacks any flow of water to begin with. With these water levels I walked up dry creek beds for most of the trip. All the log jams and undercuts that normally will hold late fish in the spring were all out of water.

[Harrison]

I decided to sleep in and broke a 23 year old tradition. Took a road trip and walked the river on Thursday night and found 2 things. Absolutely no water left and only 1 pool with 4 almost dead trout. These fish were so beat up, one had almost no skin left on its back.

 

Unfortunately the river I fish is very tiny and lacks any flow of water to begin with. With these water levels I walked up dry creek beds for most of the trip. All the log jams and undercuts that normally will hold late fish in the spring were all out of water.

 

Hopefully we have a good rain coming soon so these fish can get out. On the waters I fish the numbers are atleast 5x what they have been previously. Heading out tonight to a smaller trib, hopefully I don't run into what you did Fang.

[ehg]

Judging by the plethora of trout opener reports, i think many would agree that this spring has so far been successful.

The eastern tribs really fared well by the looks of it.

[mudddtoy]

my best opener ever,38 hours no sleep banked over 30 fish , lots of fish and people, the one thing i seen this year that hasnt been a problem other years on my local trib was the amount of crap people left on the banks, in a 12 hour period i had to ask 5 diffrent people to pick up there garbage as they were leaving,and most of them looked at me like i was dumb, one guy would have even been a problem till he realized there was 4 of us 2 of them ,i dont get it, any how good opener and everthing lived to fight again

[Guest gbfisher]

It was interesting. We fished some private property and did as well or better than last year. There was virtually no flow in any of the frog water we fished in comparison to last year as well. It was funny to see 30 fish only 1' away from our floats that were sitting as still as they were until a handful of chum was tossed into the pool. It made for an instant triple header. When someone would hook up the next would throw in (like and ass.. ) he'd get one as well. It went on like that until we left. All fish went back. Sadly I doubt they will even get back to the lake without some water.

It was a small stream with some very hungry fish. Only the second opener in 15 years I've been to. I usually fish off the beach this time of year up until May 1 opener.

[vinnimon]

i agree it was a really good opener this year, landed 25 or more steelies this opener including small ones and a couple bonus browns

Oh yeah!!!!

[timmeh]

Nice to see most people doing well. My opener was a little tougher, but it was my first go with the fly rod so that was expected. The water levels are really disturbing though. Can't imagine what things may look like in the fall

 

I think the low water is part of the reason why the numbers were so high this year. Those conditions really school hungry fish up together in the few deeper pools. In some of the smaller tribs it's like shooting fish in a barrel if you've got your stealth on.

[Harrison]

I hit the smaller eastern trib yesterday, she's loaded. Super spooked however. Had to walk down stream and drift somewhat blind before getting close to the pool and shutting it down instantly. Singles and itsy bitsy stones were the ticket. Wish I had a couple of the ones Spiel tied!

 

Water level is pretty low but the creek still looks healthy. A good rain and they should clear out in a hurry.

[steelhead197]

i agree it was a really good opener this year, landed 25 or more steelies this opener including small ones and a couple bonus browns

 

Your welcome!!!!lol

[steelhead197]

Oh yeah!!!!

 

Your welcome too!!! LOL

[torco]

I wouldn't call it refreshing.

 

I was fishing in the durham region quite high up my local stream (well its where I grew up and fished before moving away) and there were lots of steel stacked up in anything they could remotely find as "deep water". But the levels are far too low and I have never seen as many dead steelhead in the stream as this year. I am very concerned about the low water levels this year.

 

I also don't like the whole shooting fish in a barrel mentality. One spot I did not fish was loaded with 10-20 people by 7:00pm friday night. Granted it was full fish but I don't see the fun in being shoulder to shoulder with miles of stream to fish and hammering these poor fish as its the only spot with any real depth.

 

Anyways end of my rant. I still managed to get some nice fish, mostly on the smaller side. My real goal was browns, so I failed on that front.

 

But it was still nice to get out on the river.

[vinnimon]

Your welcome too!!! LOL

Thank you shaynebow.Next Sat?

[Paully]

This year really was like shootin' fish in a barrel.. walk to a pool "fish on".. head over to the next pool "fish on"