Brookies on Dry Flies and the Law of Large Numbers

Returned Monday night from a long weekend at our friend Greg Senyo's cabin in the Allegheny Mountains. We hosted a group of Orvis Cleveland customers for a weekend of relaxing and mountain trout fishing. I think it's safe to say that everyone had a ball and some beautiful fish came to hand, including a number of them on my little 7' 4-weight J.S. Sharpe "Scottie" cane rod, which is always a treat to fish. I'm still sifting pictures (I know, same old story right?) but I'll recap that trip soon, hopefully before the weekend.

In the meantime, my buddy Jeff has been picking up the slack. He sent me this great recap of a day on the boat chasing stripers with his pops. Here's what he had to say:

I’ve fished the waters in and around Cape May, NJ since I was capable of standing on a boat. In recent years I’ve experienced more fishing and less catching. I’ve targeted flounder, weakfish, bluefish and now the ever popular striped bass. The only issue has been the dwindling populations of striped bass, thus the number sweet pics of me and my trophy bass have gone exponentially down. As the Dudes have posted recently my friend JD has begun to perfect the art of fly rodding for bass. However, the hero-shots you see do not come without extreme frustration and hundreds, if not thousands of casts. We’ve fished days with picture perfect tides, winds, temperature only to end the day drinking and asking “what the hell?” Is it our fly selection, depth, retrieve, timing, location? Who the hell knows.

This is where the law of large numbers began working on our side. It’s like firing lines out to girls at the bar… you might get the occasional nibble but unless you are talking to the right girl at the right time with the right line a nibble is all you’ll get. Well perhaps a slap but that’s a story for another time. As with wheeling girls, fishing is all about timing, patience and let’s face it, luck.

I fished over the holiday weekend and the tide seemed alright, the weather was nice, a bit breezy but nothing I couldn’t handle. I was out with my dad and fished the same area I’ve caught fish before but had struck out on with JD in recent attempts. We showed up on the outgoing tide and birds were hovering over a pod of silverside baitfish. My dad and I anchored up and I started whipping a variety of flies through the pod of bait fish to no avail. After my 8th fly change, a black gurgler finally produced the preverbal nibble in the form of a flying striper. Frustration set in and a combination of light and tide running out forced us back home empty handed, except for the Bud-heavies. We went back the next day and somehow I was given a second shot. The bait fish were in the same exact spot and I could see tails slapping the water. This time I changed up my retrieve and finally I was rewarded. I could see my fly in the water and saw the swirl. Like reacting to the slow- motion take of a cutty on the South Fork, I paused…one Mississippi, and set… fish on. It’s a great feeling that always keeps me coming back for more, and more. I might not be setting records for fish per cast but finally getting to scratch that itch feels oh so sweet. "

Hangin' around...

Still looooots of snow in the Bighorns.


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Slam on the 'horn

Fished the Bighorn today...

Caught one of these...


And did really well with these too.


She's at 14k and going up! Islands are gone, banks are eroded, and last week it even closed 90. Hello high water June...



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Winter's Back...

Dudes,

I am snowed in.  Another 4-6 expected tonight.  I'll take some pictures.

-B

State of the Dudewater Union

While it may seem like all's quiet on the Dudewater front, don't let the silence fool you. Despite the endless monsoon that's been walloping the Eastern U.S. the last two weeks, We've been fishing like maniacs because, well, that's what you do this time of year. All that fishing hasn't left much time for blog posts, so let me briefly bring you up to speed:

We had planned for months to spend the week of the 16th of May at a favorite spot on Penn's Creek, PA. With big rains in the forecast and the river already flowing at above average levels we made a difficult (but not that difficult) last-minute call to accept our friend John Miller's inivitation to spend the week on the West Branch of the Delaware. It was a wet week, but we we're not dissapointed with the fishing. I dragged the big camera up there only to find out that I'd left my SD card in my laptop, which was at home. Subsequently, all the choice grip-n-grins from last week are on Brett's camera and it may be a while before we see them; more on that later. On Friday we said goodbye to the Big D and dashed home for all of about 37 minutes before jumping back in the car and driving East again to host my Orvis Cleveland Warmwater Fly Fishing school. The fishing was tough but the school was a successful one and I'm looking forward to chasing some of those big bronzebacks for myself...

Meanwhile our buddy JD was stalking the Jersey shore searching for stripahs. Haven't gotten the details yet but looks to me like he found 'em.

So now it's back to business as usual for me, getting ready to chase some warm-water quarry close to home and planning my next adventure. Brett on the other hand is Wyoming bound for the summer. He should be arriving at the gates of trout heaven any minute now and hopefully will give us an update when he gets a chance.

Spoils of The Savage

The empty Budweiser can on my nightstand explained why I'd slept through my alarm. It was almost 7:00 AM and I was pissed I'd slept in. After having gotten a taste of the Savage and its seductive pocket water the day prior I was itching and anxious to get back in the river. Fishing fast, bouldery pocket water is addictive in that it tantalizes the imagination. Every gurgle and swirl and divot and eddy and riffle could hold a trout and on the good days, they do. The cloud cover overhead and my tendency to be overly optimistic about the fishing had me feeling that today could be one of those days.

Still sporting my Jockeys I strolled out onto the porch for a prognosis. The pool behind the house looked inviting but showed no sign of rising fish; I could enjoy my coffee at a leisurely pace.

Brett and I enjoyed a fishless first hour but it was not without exclamation. Brett had opted to swing for the fences from the get-go and rigged up a grossly oversized streamer on a short, stout rod. While I was plunking for dinks he managed to move two garantuans that I'm sure he'll describe in detail in a later post. Still, with no fish to hand by 9:00 we decided to explore some agua nueva. Eventually we stumbled onto a pod of midging dinks (gorgeous, wild dinks, mind you) and Fast Jimi managed to get on the board...

Not to be outdone, player #2 topped my high score..

Around Noon a familiar face showed up. After spending the wee hours of the morning in the woods chasing gobblers PJ had bagged his thunder chicken and was ready to tango with some truchas. We enjoyed a cold beverage over the story of his trophy bird and then relocated. The Savage smiled on us again...

After bringing two stunningly beautiful browns to hand within minutes of each other Brett and I agreed it was best to quit while were were ahead. We'd gotten a taste of the fantastic fishing in this area and agreed that we'd be back. And we will be.

Maryland, The Deets of Day .5 and 1

Around this time of year the steelhead run starts to wind down.  Last year was very early, and this year it feels like it never really got going.  It's about this time when I start to get antsy to get out of town, make my way to Wyoming, and start my summer in trout paradise.  When Jimmy called me last week and said that we had an opportunity to fish a bunch of different watersheds in western Maryland I jumped on it.  I'd heard a lot about this area before from a couple people, and a fly shop close to Baltimore that I pop in to from time to time - the dry flies, bigger fish, and diversity of water available to fly fisherman had me chomping at the bit to get there and give it a try.

I pulled in to the cabin at Savage River Outfitters where Jimmy and I would be spending a couple days, met the owner, and took a walk with him down to the creek right behind his house.  Fish were rising everywhere to a thick midge hatch.  After trying to wrap up the conversation without being rude, I rushed back to the car, threw on my waders, and started fishing.  I fished until dark, caught some great fish, including one really nice brown, and then came back to the cabin and fell asleep on the couch waiting for Jimmy to get in.  

The next day we started out upstream of the cabin in a nice looking piece of smoother water.  From what we'd been told, the fishing didn't really turn on until later in the day, but we figured that in some slower stuff we could still get in to something early on in the morning.  After working the run pretty thoroughly with a dry we got to the head of the run, which was some pretty great looking trout water.  A couple quick rig changes, and this guy decided to come out to play.

Right after we sent this fish back home a guy showed up behind us and asked if we were Jim and Brett.  It was PJ, the head guide at Wisp Outdoors, who was the Orvis endorsed guide service of the year in 2007.  PJ had been turkey hunting early, but was meeting up with us to fish for the rest of the day.  He suggested we pack up and hit a little brook trout stream a few miles up the road.  Jimmy and I were happy to follow.

We fished some fantastic looking water.  Pool after pool after pool and still not a single rise.  Then like someone flipped a switch, we started to find the pretty little natives.

By late afternoon we'd made it all the way up this creek to some private property, and it was time to turn around.  We decided to fish one section of the Savage before calling it a day.  Most of the river is pocket water, and Jimmy and I were fishing 10-11 foot rods in order to high stick flies through pockets that you just couldn't fish with anything else.

Before dark we landed a couple fish working the pocket water above a beautiful pool.  We split with PJ, and started to get ready for the next day...