I went to lower Kish today to fish some of my riffles. Air temp was about 50°, didn't take water temp, and it was a mix of sun and overcast. I fished from about 12:30-2:00. Flow was roughly 115 cfs.
I walked down to where a good long stretch of nice riffles occur that has a lot of habitat for a good chunk of stream. I had a size 6 olive/white clouser on my 4 weight so that is what I started with. First cast I had a good tug but didn't get the hook up. A couple of casts later I swung the clouser near a log jam in about 5 feet of water and caught a sudden flash but felt nothing through the rod or line. I set the hook and had a nice bow on. I got to see the fish fight for a second and then it popped off. I chucked the clouser into the same general pool/riffle and this time hooked up and brought a rainbow to hand. This all happened in about 5 minutes and I thought, "wow, this is going to be easy." I fished my way up a ways with the clouser through perfect habitat and got nothing. I switched to some nymphs and got nothing. I kept working and changing flies through such perfect big fish habitat and came up empty.
I then got to one of my favorite riffles on the entire stream. I nymphed through perfect water, a nice riffle of moderate current with a Max depth of about 3.5 feet. I was just about to change flies but I moved a little further up the riffle. Then, my indicator went down and I was on a nice 16" fish. I've been slamming a lot of them this size lately. It was a lovely wild brown. The same nymph then caught about 10 more wild browns in rapid succession. It was nearly cast after cast. I then noticed a fair amount of small baetis in the air. Had I switched to a tiny PT nymph I probably could have caught many more but I was out of time. I wish I had more because I would have either swung wets or fished dries in the slower water just up from this riffle. But all in all a good 1.5 hours. Rainbows hammered the clouser and the Walt's worm got the wild browns. Perfect autumn day. I saw no redds nor signs of spawning fish.
I walked down to where a good long stretch of nice riffles occur that has a lot of habitat for a good chunk of stream. I had a size 6 olive/white clouser on my 4 weight so that is what I started with. First cast I had a good tug but didn't get the hook up. A couple of casts later I swung the clouser near a log jam in about 5 feet of water and caught a sudden flash but felt nothing through the rod or line. I set the hook and had a nice bow on. I got to see the fish fight for a second and then it popped off. I chucked the clouser into the same general pool/riffle and this time hooked up and brought a rainbow to hand. This all happened in about 5 minutes and I thought, "wow, this is going to be easy." I fished my way up a ways with the clouser through perfect habitat and got nothing. I switched to some nymphs and got nothing. I kept working and changing flies through such perfect big fish habitat and came up empty.
I then got to one of my favorite riffles on the entire stream. I nymphed through perfect water, a nice riffle of moderate current with a Max depth of about 3.5 feet. I was just about to change flies but I moved a little further up the riffle. Then, my indicator went down and I was on a nice 16" fish. I've been slamming a lot of them this size lately. It was a lovely wild brown. The same nymph then caught about 10 more wild browns in rapid succession. It was nearly cast after cast. I then noticed a fair amount of small baetis in the air. Had I switched to a tiny PT nymph I probably could have caught many more but I was out of time. I wish I had more because I would have either swung wets or fished dries in the slower water just up from this riffle. But all in all a good 1.5 hours. Rainbows hammered the clouser and the Walt's worm got the wild browns. Perfect autumn day. I saw no redds nor signs of spawning fish.
