BelAirSteve
Member
- Joined
- Sep 9, 2009
- Messages
- 680
So I have not been around much - for those that recongnize my name - as the owner of the local fly shop said when he saw me for the first time in a long time, "Life can sometimes get in the way of a good time."
I have not been doing much fishing, or tying, but I finally had a chance to get out on the stream for the first time in a long time. I went with my buddy, who would much rather catch sun fish and fall fish than fish for finicky wild brown trout. His quote about the Gunpowder is "I don't like it there - if you don't catch trout, you don't catch anything.
He is a good friend, and I try to coach him along. We fish a lot of warm water streams in the summer together, but he just doesn't care enough to adapt his technique to fishing for wild trout. He is happy to just be on the water, and if he catches something - no matter what it is - he's happy.
We went to one of the lower sections, where the state stocks rainbows, but also holds plenty of wild browns. My hope was that he would get into some of the stockies while I chased after the browns. When we arrived, I saw a good 150 yards of bank that was perfect for chucking streamers and nymphing, but he insisted on drifting nymphs is some very slow water. I caught a brown on about the 5th cast, right where I thought a fish would be, and hoped that would bring him down to the area. It's one of those spots when you see it, you say to yourself "Oh yeah...there's fish here." I worked my way down that bank quickly, to get a lay of the land, and caught another brown at the tailout, on the same streamer. My buddy worked his way down near me, and we fished close to one another for a short time. I switched to a bead head pheasant tail soft hackle, and tried to demonstrate technique without being a jerk, but he didn't pay any attention. Believe me, this is one of those spots where, if you were patient and disciplined enough, you could probably take a dozen fish.
So we're smoking cigars and having a nice time, when I hear some geese coming. I look up, and notice that there were only 4, and to split off from the group, and the other two kept going, which I though was unusualy. As I was pointing to the sky to show my buddy, I left my nymph dangling in the current. The next thing I knew, one of those stockie rainbows took it! One of those days where I couldn't do anything wrong I guess.
So knowing that my buddy likes to fish dries, I thought I would go prospecting and see if I could make anything happen. With no real bug activity to speak of, I tied on a #16 adams parachute and started casting along the banks of the slower, deeper water, around the submerged logs. Sure enough, bam! A typical 9" Gunpowder brown. 5 fish in 2 hours - on streamers, nymph and dry - not bad!
And my buddy walked away with a fall fish and what I think might have been a gizzard shad - didn't see it, but from the way he described it, there's not much else it could be.
Hopefully I'll be participating more, real soon.
Steve
Bel Air, MD
I have not been doing much fishing, or tying, but I finally had a chance to get out on the stream for the first time in a long time. I went with my buddy, who would much rather catch sun fish and fall fish than fish for finicky wild brown trout. His quote about the Gunpowder is "I don't like it there - if you don't catch trout, you don't catch anything.
He is a good friend, and I try to coach him along. We fish a lot of warm water streams in the summer together, but he just doesn't care enough to adapt his technique to fishing for wild trout. He is happy to just be on the water, and if he catches something - no matter what it is - he's happy.
We went to one of the lower sections, where the state stocks rainbows, but also holds plenty of wild browns. My hope was that he would get into some of the stockies while I chased after the browns. When we arrived, I saw a good 150 yards of bank that was perfect for chucking streamers and nymphing, but he insisted on drifting nymphs is some very slow water. I caught a brown on about the 5th cast, right where I thought a fish would be, and hoped that would bring him down to the area. It's one of those spots when you see it, you say to yourself "Oh yeah...there's fish here." I worked my way down that bank quickly, to get a lay of the land, and caught another brown at the tailout, on the same streamer. My buddy worked his way down near me, and we fished close to one another for a short time. I switched to a bead head pheasant tail soft hackle, and tried to demonstrate technique without being a jerk, but he didn't pay any attention. Believe me, this is one of those spots where, if you were patient and disciplined enough, you could probably take a dozen fish.
So we're smoking cigars and having a nice time, when I hear some geese coming. I look up, and notice that there were only 4, and to split off from the group, and the other two kept going, which I though was unusualy. As I was pointing to the sky to show my buddy, I left my nymph dangling in the current. The next thing I knew, one of those stockie rainbows took it! One of those days where I couldn't do anything wrong I guess.
So knowing that my buddy likes to fish dries, I thought I would go prospecting and see if I could make anything happen. With no real bug activity to speak of, I tied on a #16 adams parachute and started casting along the banks of the slower, deeper water, around the submerged logs. Sure enough, bam! A typical 9" Gunpowder brown. 5 fish in 2 hours - on streamers, nymph and dry - not bad!
And my buddy walked away with a fall fish and what I think might have been a gizzard shad - didn't see it, but from the way he described it, there's not much else it could be.
Hopefully I'll be participating more, real soon.
Steve
Bel Air, MD
