8/24/14 West Branch Upper Delaware River Wayne Co.

[DrNymph]

Floated from Balls Eddy on down from 11a to dark. Water temps in the high 40's low 50's. Flows in high 600's. Fished after rain and fog the previous night. Weather was bright sun with air temps in 80's.

Sporadic bug activity with bwo spinners and random cahills and Sulphurs. Recent weather and bright sun dampened any sort chances of a strong hatch.

Sporadic risers, none continually feeding. Stuck to dry dropper rigs in the fast moving water, with a variation of sulphur and iso duns and emergers up top with pheasant tail and iso nymphs below. Tried flying ants with minimal success.

My friend Dylan brought to hand 5 nice bows and browns and even a 17" tiger trout. All fish were fat and hard fighting and 16" or greater. Most were on the bottom fly in midday and then hitting the dry later on.

I hooked 6 and landed three, largest being a substantial 18" brown that took me into my backing and broke off a rainbow of similar size. All but one fish were caught on the bottom.

The evening didn't really produce much of a hatch either, but fish were still rising. Most of our success was from diligent prospecting rather than obsessive targeting a riser. Took a lot of patience, but completely worth it.

Beautiful day with beautiful fish.

 

[afishinado]

nice report, Doc.

I guess you had the right medicine for those fish...lostsa patience and stick-to-itiveness mixed with some skill. That usually gets you a few fish on the D, even on tougher days.

 

[DrNymph]

Thanks, it was a great day and definitely had some much needed insight from WBA up there...it's a tough that seems to have it's own agenda.

 

[Millsertime]

Ok. Where's the pic of the 17" tiger?

 

[krayfish2]

The hatches have been substandard this year IMO. The isos have been quite weak. Only fish I took on nymphs ignored all offerings but the iso nymph. We pased balls around 9:30 - 10. Down closer to 191 there was good steno hatch but the fish weren't rising to them.

How far down did you guys float. If you went to buck, any cahills or white flies on the water? It was tough. Sporadic risers at best.

Nice fish.

 

[vcregular]

Had to chime in. I fished Friday August 15 - on the main. It was one of those days you dream of in August. Air temp could not have been more than the low 60s and the air was damp. Walked onto the upper Main - below the junction - above buck at about 3pm and the olives were on and so were the fish. It was impressive to see the number of fish feeding. Then as you got closer to 5pm-6pm, the isos poured off. Lets just say the chop was active with fish and bugs. I was impressed. All rainbows, and the type of rainbows that made me a lover of that river more than 20 years ago.

Then on Saturday - it was a sunny day. A float from Balls to Buck. And in the lower West - near everyone's favorite home pool - the stenos came off in decent numbers during the hottest part of the day. Amazingly the fish were easy. Now this only lasted a little bit, but who can complain about that during the briteness of August.

Then later on - down on the upper main, it was not quite as intense as the day before, but it was still decent.

I've not been up there as much as I've been in prior years, but the fishing on the lower west and main was pretty damn good imo

One thing I've noticed is there does not seem to be as many fish in the west - say above Balls Eddy as in warmer years. Which makes sense... no reason for the fish to leave the main. The west has been running steady at 600cfs, and then the East was pumping some precious, cold nyc water for quite a while.

Oh yea, no one on the river that Friday, until prior to dark (missing the action), as I was leaving to have a cold one... or two.

 

[Fishidiot]

Millsertime wrote:
Ok. Where's the pic of the 17" tiger?

Take a closer look at the upper photo he posted.