My Weekend Outdoors - 3/11/12

It was a pretty nice weekend here in the Northeast with warmer temps and clear skies, you know the kid of day you must take advantage of and spend as much time as possible outdoors and I did.  I did some backyard birding and photography, made a little maple syrup and even got into some trout with the fly rod and before I get yelled at, I even did some house work.

With the night time temps warming up the sugaring season may be coming to an end and I can't say I am sorry to see it end.  As tasty as pure maple syrup is, it is truly a labor of love and Monday started week 5 of the season which includes many late nights during the week and longer weekends.  On Saturday Bubba and I bottled up another 6 gallons which helped us get closer to the 60 gallon yearly average, down some from last years 101 gallons though.  When you poor this stuff over your pancakes you quickly forget about those late nights and long weekends. 

Where the Magic happens - 30 gallons of sap per hour

 

Finished Product

Makes the time all worth while

The activity at my bird feeders has really picked up over the past couple weeks with new visitors showing up which is a good sign spring is on the way as the birds start migrating back North.  The newest visitors around my house were Red-winged blackbirds, American Goldfinches, Common Crackles, Mourning Doves and finally a couple of Robins.  At one point I had 10 American Goldfinches enjoying my offerings at the same time.  I think that is a record for me.  The highlight though was a hawk that thought he would get an easy meal at my feeder.  He didn't but came close twice.  I'm not sure if it is a Coppers Hawk or a Sharp-shinned Hawk as they are very similar and hard to differentiate.  I do hope to see the Baltimore Orioles come back this spring.

Coopers or Sharp-shinned Hawk?

Mourning Dove

Red-winged Blackbird

Sunday afternoon found me fishing the Willimantic River TMA which is a fly fishing only section open year round for catch and release fishing.  I took a quick lunch run up there last week and was skunked but today was definitely more productive as bent rods and tight lines produce some nice trout to hand.  All released to provide someone else with the enjoyment they gave me.  I broke out the Greys Streamflex 10' 4wt and rigged up to Euro Nymph using a coiled sighter.  I picked up fish on brown rubber legged stonefly, a Frenchie style pheasant tail and a walt's worm.  I did miss a few as well.  The two best fish was a 14"  hefty rainbow and a 13" tiger trout.

This hefty 14"+ Rainbow took a size 18 Frenchie PT w/Orange Bead

This Rainbow trout took the size 18 Frenchie

Tiger Trout took the Rubber Legged Stone

A little video from the release of the bigger rainbow.  Looks like I need to work on my one handed video release technique though.  This was taken using my Olympus TG-310.

My daughter and I even got a little archery practice in and man were we rusty.  Not bad for a weekend outdoors.  So what did you do this past weekend?

Willimantic River TMA outing 5/29/11

I had the pleasure of fishing  the TMA on the Willimantic River with none other than JT from JT's Fly Shop Saturday morning.  We met at the abutment pool at 6am with a plan to get a little time on the water before the family woke up and the honey do list took over.  JT and I started out swinging wooly buggers with me at the top of the abutment and JT at the end.  The wall of mosquitoes was brutal but we fought through them and made our way into the water.

Had this stretch all to ourselves

There were plenty of bugs around but no signs of fish until one popped up out in front of me which was his first mistake.  The second was him taking the olive/brown bugger that I dead drifted his way – Fish on.  I LDR’d this brown but it felt good to get back at it seeing it’s been almost 2 weeks without fishing for me.
JT quickly hit his stride and had a fish on which turned out to be another brown.  It wasn’t long after that and he was locked again and a river dace came to hand.  Hey a fish is a fish, right?!    I hooked into another fish and once again I lost it during the retrieve.  What the heck?  While I was contemplating what I was doing wrong, JT continued to bring fish to had.  yup he caught a blue gill and a calico bass before finally catching another trout which turned out to be a nice little rainbow.  We got thinking and figured he only needed a small mouth bass and a brook trout to round out his catch.

Willimantic River Brown Trout

I picked up one more brown trout at the Abutment before we both decided to head down stream.  JT decided to switch over and do some indicator nymphing while I stayed stubborn and worked my buggers.  JT headed down to the pool just above 84 and I worked from the abutment down to him.  I picked up a couple more dace and rolled a couple of trout one of which broke me off.  This was the second break off in two weeks within a few feet of each other.  I now have 2 trout with my buggers stuck in their face.  I want my buggers back!
I made it down to JT just in time to see him lock up on a another brown.  He was working hard for that SMB and Brookie but he just couldn’t produce.  IT was now 10:30am and it was time to head out.  It’s amazing how fast 4 hours goes by when you are on the water and no one is around.

JT Working over the Bridge hole

The Willi was in good shape this morning however a little low for me.  Temps in the mid to upper 50s and fairly clear with a little color.  I did see a caddis or two come off but that was about it.  It was good to get out and on the water especially with the man himself.  JT definitely had the hot hand this mornign and I’m sure he will be manning the counter at the shop bragging about his skills and the spanking he gave me.    That’s ok because I plan on sending him a picture next week of a large Penns Creek wild brown trout.

Now it' off to Central PA to fish some of those famous limestone creeks.  According to the reports the flows are high and looks like we will get to witness our first Green Drake hatch.  I hear it is something to witness.

Tight Lines!

Finally Some Time on the Stream

The sap was all boiled and bottled, the weather was spring like and my house chores complete, so it was off to fish a local TMA (Trout Management Area) to see if I couldn't get into some open water trout. 

The first stop was my home stomping grounds of the Cole Wilde TMA located on the Willimantic River.  I wasn't sure what condition the river would be in with all the rain last week and the snow melt off so I was prepared for the worst but was pleased with the conditions of the river.  The water was high and it was running fast but much clearer than expected.  I noticed plenty of winter stones fluttering about and scurrying across the rocks but no fish activity.  I was also the only one fishing which was a sign that the preseason stocking hasn't occurred yet.  Oh well, that just meant that I would have to work hard for a fish which was fine with me as I was just excited to be on the water and using my new Greys Streamflex 10' 4wt.

I decided to do some indicator nymphing using a woven stone fly as my anchor fly and a small black Pheasant Tail nymph as a dropper.  Up until this trip I always used a 9 foot rod and I really didn't think that a 10 foot rod would be much of difference but that extra foot really helps with line control when nymphing.  The Streamflex was a pleasure to cast and handled everything I threw so needless to say i am very pleased with the new rod.  I worked over my favorites runs with out a single bump and no sign of fish anywhere.

I knew some of the TMA's had been stocked as I had reports from friends of their "slamming the stockies" outings, but that wasn't the case on the Willi so I packed it up and headed down to another TMA on the Hocknum River.   Once again I was greeted with a pretty open and easy to access stretch of the TMA all to myself so honestly I was expecting the same results as on the Willi.  The water was moving fast and high just like on the Willi, except it was a little cloudy.  I got all rigged up for some nymphing again and worked about a 200 yard stretch of water with not bumps and not a single fish seen.  There were stones fluttering around as well as what I would gather were midges.  As I was working the last stretch of water by my truck a couple of guys stopped to chat and see how things where going.  Turns out they were just on their way back from another TMA where they said it was like opening day.  Loaded with fisherman and fish.  It was the same TMA that I was getting the "slamming the stockies" reports from my buddy so I wasn't surprised.  We chatted for a bit and I decided it was time to head home.

So my first open water trip resulted in a big ZERO as far as fish count goes, but it was great to be back on the streams and to fish my new rod.  The upcoming weather forecast looks more like winter than spring but that's okay because the rivers and streams are open and flowing so the trout fishing will only improve and what more can you ask for.

First fish of 2010

Well I had some things to take care of yesterday morning and decided to skip work and get some fishing in before running out to pick up my daughter.  I packed up and headed out to a local TMA - Trout Management Area - located in Northeastern CT.  The Cole Wilde TMA is located in Tolland and Willington on the Willimantic River.  The TMA starts at the mouth of Roaring Brook off Route 32 and ends downstream at the bridge on Route 74.  This section of water is designated as Fly Fishing only and is also a Catch and Release area meaning all fish caught must be released back into the river.  Many of the TMAs throughout Connecticut are open year round and most are Catch and Release or in some cases limited harvest.  This offers some good fishing opportunities to those willing to brave the cold water and weather throughout the winter.  The majority of Trout waters are closed as of the end of February and open back up for opening Day on the third Saturday in April.

I arrived at the river to find another fly fisherman with the same thing in mind.  As I put on my cold weather waders and prepared my gear I watched the other fisherman and noticed he had hooked a trout which was a good sign for sure.  I was hoping that the I would time my fishing with some sort of bug life hatching so I could work on my "match the hatch" skills.  Matching the hatch basically means trying to figure out what bug life is in the water and in the process of hatching into a flying insect.  The fish will key on the bug life and changes going on under water and start to feed on these insects so our job as a fly fisherman is to figure out what is going on and trying to offer a fly that matches the bugs the fish are seeing and feeding on in the water.  Much easier said then done for sure.  Before i started fly fishing I always thought that it meant drifting a floating fly on top of the water and a fish will just come flying up from the depths and devour it, atleast that is what I had seen on TV and in Magazines.

I've learned so much over the past 3 seasons of fly fishing and one important item is that the majority of a fishes food lives under the surface and actually in the lower 3rd of the water column.  These insects all start out as some type of creepy crawling type of bug normally refereed to as a Nymph or Larva where they spend their time hiding in weeds, attached to rocks, under rocks and sticks, where they remain until they are ready to change into adults.  Some insects even form a layer of protection like a cocoon out of sand, gravel and even sticks such as these cased caddis shown in the picture to the right. These nymphs live on the bottom of the stream until it is time to tun into an adult and they start to work their way to the surface in what is know as as an emerger stage.  During this emergence, the nymphs are much more active as they fight their way to the surface which is what the fish are keying in on.  As they emerge to the surface they actually stop just under the surface and begin to molt into an adult where they will break through the surface and fly away, well that is if a fish doesn't get hem first.


So with all my new found knowledge and having plenty of room to experiment with my fly fishing technique I decided to start out with a technique called nymphing.  Nymphing is basically presenting flies that represent the nymph or larva stages of the bug in the lower part of the water column along the bottom of the stream.  There are many different nymphing techniques so I won't get into much detail.  I was using an indicator - some type of float that rides the surface of the water that is supposed to help you detect when the fish takes your nymph.  Well for over an hour I worked a few small sections of water where I knew there was fish and as far as I could tell, I didn't get a single nibble.  I started to see some adult stoneflys on the surface of the water and even watched a fish rise once or twice.

I only had about an hour left to fish before I had to leave so I switched over to Old Faithful - An Olive Woolly Bugger.  As I have written in another post, they claim there is no wrong way to fish a Woolly Bugger and it is a great fly that represents so much from a baitfish, leeches to nymphs.  It didn't take me long with old faithful to hook and land my first trout of the 2010 season.  It was a nice rainbow trout about 10 inches in length.  It put up a wonderful fight considering the water was barely reaching 39 degrees.  I brought the fish to net and removed the barb less hook from his mouth and took a picture of him and released him back to fight another day.   That one little trout made my whole day and brought a huge smile to my face.  I continued to work the bugger in the same general area.  sometimes I would just left it dead drift along in the current, sometimes I would strip it in to give it a swimming action and sometimes I would just twitch it along as it drifted and swung in the current.  I ended up catching 4 more fish, 2 more rainbows and 2 browns all of which brought a smile to my face and released back into the stream as I thanked them for their participation.   All in all a wonderful day to get a little fishing in.

I did miss 3 fish, but what do expect from a long winter off.

CT DEP Fisheries - FAQ
CT Fly Fisherman's Association