The Ausable River

I ran a group trip to the Adirondacks a few weeks ago...I teamed up with Rich Garfield ( http://www.flyfishtheadirondacks.com ), and we split the group...We fished the West Branch of the Ausable and while the hatches were sparse the fishing was good...There was sporadic hatches of Golden Stones, ISOs and caddis...We caught lots of fish but most were in the 9-12 inch range...No big boys netted in the 3 days but we managed to land some nice ones up to 17inches...Mostly browns with the occasional rainbow and brookie...If we had one hot fly it was either a yellow stone fly nymph or the Ausable Ugly but we caught them on Stimulators, wulffs, Beadheads, Caddis and the Motherbiter...Basically anything we threw at them that was presented well....

While I believe the Delaware system is by far the best fishery in the East, I dont know if there is a more scenic river than the Ausable....Some pics from the trip....( My horrible pictures can never really show the beauty of this river, it must be experienced)

On a sad note...we stopped by Fran Betters shop...All I can say is that it is very sad to see Fran in this condition...I would rather remember him 25 years ago when I stopped in his shop and he handed me my first Ausable Wulff and full of advice for a young fly fisherman...

A New Season has Arrived...

I have not been true to this journal and let it lag again...I have been looking to start it up again and what better timing than the start of the Fishing Season and the arrival of the Hendricksons...

There has been alot of fishing since my last post...From Chasing Fall hatches in the Catskills to Tricos and Isos on the South Branch...The winter midge fishing was good but my steelhead trip was basically a bust with high water...

Hunting season was also a success with two deer in the freezer including a nice 8pt taken in the Catskills...

So I will again to keep this journal updated...I just may need a push every now and then....

Some pics of missed post opportunities;

Trico Time...

The last few weeks I have been fishing over some nice early morning trico hatches ..The fishing has been very good at times with early morning risers and cooperative fish...The hatch is an early one occurring around 7:30 am and lasting up to a few hours...The spinner falls occur almost immediately and at times there is an overlap of the emergence and the spinner fall...

I have been having success with a parachute size 20-22 and a size 22 black beadhead nymph or size 22 pheasant tail on a dropper 24-30in below the dry...It has been about a 60/40 nymph to dry catch ratio..

Stealth is absolutely necessary, the streams are clear and low and these fish have been getting alot of pressure from not only fishermen but natural predators as well with this seasons conditions...

Typical Trico Water...

Jessie's Catskill Intro

Jessie called me in early July to discuss booking a Catskill day trip...There is nothing I like better than taking people fishing on the rivers that I love soo much, but conditions forced us to delay the trip for a month...Finally the water temp and flows was perfect for some fishing...I really wanted to show Jessie a good sampling of these famous waters so I put together a good agenda to fish the Beaverkill, Willowemoc and East Branch of the Delaware Rivers...While we did get to fish on all 3 rivers during the day and the fishing was good for mid-summer, with a mix of dry fly and nymph action, I felt we just scratched the surface on showing her even a sampling of the system...But it was only one day and a fisherman can spend his entire lifetime exploring the trout waters of the Catskills....

I will let Jessie describe the day in her own words...She is a regular on http://www.njflyfishing.com using the name ONEMORECAST...This was her post on our day togther...

A Catskill Odyssey

People have different reasons for hiring guides. Some want to be put on big fish, others want a learning experience in a place they’ve never fished before. I belong to the latter category, so in an effort to shorten up my Catskills learning curve, I decided to hire a guide (Dan Ansbach, known as “bkill” on this site) to show me around the Upper Delaware system. After a couple of postponements due to weather and flow/temp conditions, we settled on this past Saturday.



The day started off at the Beaverkill, where we covered one well known spot, Hendrickson’s Pool, and a few nameless spots. Being August, it was no surprise to Dan to find the river devoid of people. Not many bugs, but tricos were doing their thing and my first fish came up for one in the back eddy of Hendrickson’s, despite some rookie mistakes on my part.

After that, it was on to Roscoe, where we stopped by Mary Dette’s shop. It was great to meet her and support her business by buying a bunch of flies. Too many flies. After a slice of pizza, we went back to fishing.

Casting into tricky currents proved to be the lesson of the day as we moved on to other Beaverkill spots and the Willowemoc where we prospected with big dries in fast water. I missed a hit in one spot, while retrieving my fly and had a nice rainbow break me off in another. Expect the unexpected, I told myself. At the Willow, we threw a mix of dry flies and nymphs, which brought out one fish (landed) and another missed hit. I found the Willow to be very picturesque and we competed for spots with some feathered fish-killers at times. Again, no human anglers on the river.



After another break, it was off to the East Branch, which told a different story. We spotted didymo in this section, accompanied by these clumps of beige-ish "bunny fur" blooms.






We did see anglers on this stretch of water, however, they were few and far between and we could fish wherever we wanted. We attempted stalking a few browns rising to sulphurs in a deep, glassy pool.





Once I was in up to the belt of my leaking waders in 50 degree water, and STILL too far away from the fish, it didn’t take long before I gave up and said “let’s go”. On the way back downstream, good news! We spotted some more rising fish and the better news was the water we stood in didn’t go past the knees. Despite frozen feet and a bunch of poorly aimed casts across another tough current, I finally drifted a fly right over a steadily rising fish. The head comes up but was it to MY fly? Gee, I’m not sure. I do nothing, while Dan says “Set! Set!” “Oh, that was me?” What a dumb blonde! How many times have I heard if you can’t see your fly, set the hook if a fish rises anywhere it? Must work on those reflexes! Tie on another, more visible fly (hey – these are old eyes here!) and I finally hook one on a take I could see, a fish with some heft. He threw the hook after less than a minute and that was the end of the fish and the end of our day.

I had stung a bunch and landed two and learned a thing or two about the rivers. I can’t promise I’ll retain it all, but hopefully, over time it will come back to me with each experience. Overall, a fun time in the mountains!

Dan "the Man", rigging me up while I cast dry flies with the spare rod.



Willow Brownie



#20 Sulphur, but there were a mix of sizes

WATER, WATER EVERYWHERE BUT......

It seemed like a simple plan..Take advantage of the recent heavy rains and spend the weekend on the Beaverkill, Willow and East Branch..The Beaverkill hit 16,000 cfs this past Wed but as always, it dropped like a rock and was running 1200 cfs when I arrived Sat afternoon..The only problem was it looked like chocolate milk..There was alot of damage and erosion on the upper Beaverkill...Rt 206 was closed due to the flooding...The East Branch wasnt much better, so my options were the West Branch or the Willowemoc..The Willow was running high and slightly off color but very fishable...I stopped by a friends house and convinced him to go fishing...We hit the the Willow around 6:30. There was very little bug activity but the fish were hungry and hitting big dries...We both landed a few nice fish and lost quite a few in the heavy water..
The next morning the Beaverkill was still running brown, so I hit the no-kill section on the Willow...Again the fish were cooperative in the heavy water..I was fishing a high floating size 12 attractor with a beadhead Pheasant tail dropper...I missed a few fish in the fast water, and landed a few nice owns before lunch..It was equal between the dry and the nymph but I landed more that were hooked with the nymph...Black Clouds and Lightning chased me off the river, so I took refuge in the Catskill Flyfishing Museum and it was a good choice because I was stuck there for at least a 45 minutes as the skies just opened up...


We were wishing for rain, but this is just too much!


The Museum

Afterwards the Lower Willowemoc was unfishable, all the tribs were dumping liquid mud into the river..I drove upstream in hopes of finding some clear water and once I got above Debruce I found some fishable water...Like the morning, The fish seemed eager to feed and I landed another handful of fish, all small browns, on the tandem dry/nymph rig. At this point the sky was blue and the sun was out but I could still hear thunder in the distance...All of a sudden I noticed the water getting darker and faster. It was like I was fishing a tailwater and someone opened up all the gates..A few minutes later I was standing in thigh deep brown water and wished I had a wading staff...I bailed out and hiked back to the truck....


BEFORE


AFTER


A Trib about 2 hours after the rain

The tribs on the Beaverkill and Willow really took a beaten in last weeks flood, there are piles of stone and debris, some which are 3 feet higher than the main river, at their creek mouths...Be careful when wading, I noticed alot of changes to flows and pools!!


A Willowemoc Brown from the No-KIll


An Upper Willow Brown

The Adirondack's Ausable River

A couple weeks ago I led a trip to the Ausable River in New York's Adirondack Mountains, which is arguably the most scenic river in the East...It is also one of the most diverse with slow, deep pools, riffles, Large waterfalls, fast chutes and heavy treacherous pocket water...Low water and High sun made the conditions challenging. There were no bugs on the water, but we found some fish that were cooperative...Most of the fish were stacked in the deeper pools in the fast pocket water. There were some tricos on the water, and we caught some fish that were sipping early in the morning and at dusk in the slower water...The largest fish landed was a 17inch rainbow and a handful of other bows in the 14-16in range were released, but most of our catch consisted of 9-12in Browns...Only one brook trout was caught...Of course the big one did get away, I was 3 feet from netting a 18-19in brown when he made one last run into some fast water and came off..We lost alot of fish in the faster water and had a few breakoffs and more misses than hook ups (but that can be expected when fishing pocket water)...Besides the fishing, we enjoyed some Lake Placid restaurants and attractions...As always, a great time on an exciting river in a beautiful setting...

Summer has Arrived, So has Opportunity..

I have never bee a "summer" type of guy..I would like to think it is because I am an Eastern trout fisherman and the two don't always mix well...I Love Spring and Fall and enjoy the solitude of Winter. While I do look forward to wearing shorts and backyard BBQs, the trout fisherman must become an opportunist once the rivers drop and the water temps rise...So that is exactly what I have become over the last month, an "opportunist"..When the water temps were too warm for trout fishing I was hitting up some of my local ponds and I wasn't disappointed...The bass and bluegill fishing has been red hot in the evenings. I have been fishing mostly with large simulators, sometimes just adding a twitch and other times stripping in, either way the fish have been all over the flies...As for trout fishing,I took advantage any cool nights and rainy days and would hit the water with fair results.. I have had a few guide trips and while the fishing was slow, we did catch a few nice trout along with a mix of redbreasts, rock bass and smallmouth. But most of the fishing has been early morning or late evening...The morning fishing is my favorite with fish lazily sipping spinners in the deep pools. The fishing hasn't been easy but I have fool a nice one now and then...

Last night a friend and I hit up a private stretch of water on one of the more popular rivers in the state...Typically the trout fishing would have been poor, but what is special about this stretch is that there is a large dam which has created a small Tailwater fishery for a couple hundred yards below the dam. With hot and humid weather all day, there was zero bug activity, but that didnt stop the fish from hitting our flies..We caught and released about dozen wild browns from 6 to 11 inches all on dry flies and didnt even get to the deep pool below the dam...Walking out of the water both of us knew we were lucky to have such good trout fishing on such an evening.. Sometimes it pays to be an opportunist...