Chasing the Cicadas

jifigz

jifigz

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Today, I drove to a stream that I found cicadas on a few days earlier. I figured I would return now that the cicadas have had a little time to be out and about and maybe the trout have been seeing them. I tied up a single weird looking cicada fly that I invented earlier today and headed off to the creek. Even though the fly was only "so-so," I figured that the fish would eat it if they were keyed in on it. Well, I got to the stream and fished through light rain off and on again for the first few hours. The cicadas were humming so loudly in the trees. They would start a chorus and go wild, and then stop for a bit, and then start. Even though I was surrounded by cicadas, I only saw one, and that was dead one that was floating downs the stream, wings splayed out almost like a spent spinner.

I only cast my crude cicada fly for about 5 casts. The heaviest tippet I had was 4x, and it was twisting it up as if it were a wild growing jungle vine. It was unfishable. What I really needed was small micro swivel or something just a few inches ahead of my foam fly. I ended up fishing a mixture of dry/dropper, bobber fishing, and swimming a bugger around. I caught fish on a variety of nymphs, and the bugger was the real star of the day, but I couldn't get a fish to eat a dry fly. I only saw a few bugs, and I saw at least three different types of mayflies, but a trout wouldn't eat a dry. There were a few splashy rises, so trout were eating some sort of emerger occasionally, but it wasn't enough to make me swing soft hackles.

I ended having pretty good fishing despite the fact that I wasn't catching them on cicada dry flies as I had intended. I probably landed close to fifteen trout, and I caught two "good ones." The one fish was my best wild brown in years. It ate a woolly bugger being stripped through a little riffle, and I am guessing it was about 20", but really, really fat and well fed.

Although I couldn't catch them on cicadas, it was a good day. I will return to this stream in about a week and see if they are ready to eat cicadas then.
 
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nymphingmaniac said:
many have written it takes time for fish to be on them. Last time I fished the cicada patterns I used 3x short leaders. Minimal false casting. A swivel might work. I might try it
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Sure, and that is why I am going to be visiting streams often that have cicadas. I have time to spare, and I don't want to miss it. I do think that cicadas are the most overblown hatch in fly fishing, though. Come on, it is 90% hype.

I have never had a good trout fishing cicada experience. I am hoping. My fondest memories of cicadas is watching carp sip them from the surface of Raystown Lake many, many years ago while I was on a bass boat. Now that was awesome! I am just hoping I find big trout acting just like those carp were acting so many years ago.
 
Thanks for sharing. Planning to fish my cicadas on 2X. Definitely takes a little while for the fish to learn they are good food.
 
That rules. Good for you, regardless of the cicadas.

Today, I fished 2 streams in 4 spots between 9 am and 3 pm. USGS had me convinced high water had calmed down, but, in reality, everything was just slightly too heavy to be fun.

I was moving up and up in elevation trying to escape the flows. I finally found myself on a brook trout stream that's lined with tons of pink granite exposed bedrock, and I got absolutely wrecked. Not even like taking a dunk wading - just full on from standing on the rock to being on my ***. Was not enjoyable, and I took the skunk to add insult to injury.
 
Great fish. The big one is fantastic but I love spots on the fish in the second photo

I caught two and missed one on cicadas this evening. I'm using 3x and having no issues. I only got on the water for the last hour tonight. I'm hoping I can find some daytime action tomorrow.
 
I had a couple hours to fish last Monday and spent as much time feeding cicadas to trout as I did fishing. Not many were eaten but it was interesting to see what the cicadas did on the water. Nearly without fail, they buzzed their wings furiously creating constant small ripples. This will be almost impossible to reproduce. I'm hoping they'll see enough dead cicadas to not key in on those making never ending rings of water as they drift.
 
They are like a tiny motor boat on the water. A lot of movement.
 
A Buddy and I fished our tails off yesterday trying to get trout on cicada patterns. We had small smallmouth and fall fish trying to eat right away in the morning, but the cicadas weren't active and the trout weren't on them. Caught a few on buggers. Storm rolled in at lunch, relocated and the sun came out. The cicadas got very active and the fish (big fish) started eating. They were all tucked into cover along the bank or under over hanging trees. Because of some of the lies and strong current, you had to use long downstream casts and mend to get your flies there, which puts you at a disadvantage fighting big fish. I lost 4 battles with upper teens and larger fish.

By 330 or so the fish were very keyed in, smaller fish and fallfish were out mid channel, big fish were still tight to cover and needed a good presentation. Until a coldfront came in ahead of the evening storms (which shut the cicadas and fosh down like a light switch), this was the most fun dry fly experience I have had. Between us, I think we landed 5 browns over 18in. All very fat and full of cicadas.

We covered a lot of water to find this spot. Including the morning, we fished almost 2 miles of a very large creek/ river.

I fished a 6wt with a short stout leader, pretty good workout after casting those big flies and wading in strong, waist deep water all day.

i hope all get to experience what I did yesterday.
 
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lycoflyfisher said:
A Buddy and I fished our tails off yesterday trying to get trout on cicada patterns. We had small smallmouth and fall fish trying to eat right away in the morning, but the cicadas werent activr and the trout werent on them. Caught a few on buggers. Storm rolled in at lunch, relocated and the sun came out. The cicadas got very active and the fish (big fish) started eating. They were all tucked into cover along the bank or under over hanging trees. Because of some of the lies and strong current, you had to use long downstream casts and mend to gst your flies there, which puts you at a disadvantage fighting big fish. I lost 4 battles with upper teens fish.

By 330 or so the fish were very keyed in, smaller fish and fallfish were out mid channel, big fish were still tight to cover and needed a good presentation. Until a coldfront came in ahead of the evening storms (which shut the cicadas and fosh down like a light switch), this was the most fun dry fly experience I have had. Between us, I think we landed 5 browns over 18in. All very fat and full of cicadas.

We covered a lot of water to find this spot. Including the morning, we fished almost 2 miles of a very large creek/ river.

I fished a 6wt with a short stout leader, pretty good workout after casting those big flies and wading in sgrong, waist deep water all day.

i hope all get to experience what I did yesterday.
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Yo, Lyco, if you don't mind me asking, what county were you fishing in?
 
dudemanspecial said:
Its hyped up because it's rare.

Great post and nice fish. Im going out tomorrow hopefully the water levels and clarity are cooperative.
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Rare because trout don’t eat them? Cicadas hatch every year. Even the 17 year variety hatch often because of the number of different types. Nothing rare about cicadas hatching.
 
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