mystillwater
Member
- Joined
- Oct 27, 2009
- Messages
- 131
Saturday... Opening day... yowzer... it was my first opening day trout experience. probably my last. there were Bubbas spaced out about 10 feet apart the length of the creek by 8am.
with that said, my buddy and i managed to find some decently quiet water and waited it out until everyone caught their limit and went home. by 11:30am it was pretty much cleared out.
i realized the difference between spin fisherman and fly fisherman.... spinners complain about the bugs, fly fisherman rave about them...
anyway, the fisher were taking a little bit of everything. my buddy had a few takes on a small black beadhead woolly bugger. i'm convinced this fly will catch you a fish on the Brandywine 365 days a year. i brought my first Brookie to hand with a woolly as well.
bugs were hatching but only saw 2 or 3 trout break the surface. we couldn't coax them into taking a dry.
went back out this morning and found it to be a little quieter but still surprisingly crowded for a monday morning. still, not hard to find a stretch to yourself. after not getting much action on the trusty woolly i rigged up a pheasant tail with a scud dropper. this was brilliant.
i'm fairly new to fly fishing in general and nymphing was a discipline that always intimidated me. i tired it many times but never had any success. its one of those things that i always think i'm doing wrong and until i catch a fish, i'll never feel comfortable that i'm getting it.
well, today things clicked. i was in a great spot. there was a pool below a bit of a drop in the creek and the water was kind of dumping off into the pool and shooting around some rock outcrop. past the outcrop, the water slowed a bit before dumping again below. i was able to cast a quarter upstream into the heavier current and watch my indicator as it moved into slower water at about 90 degrees. as it hit a quarter downstream it would begin to swing and the fish were begging for it at that point. i caught 4 in an hour and all on nymphs. 2 took the dropper and 2 took the pheasant tail. a rainbow, a brown and 2 brookies... the Brandywine Triple Crown. didn't manage a picture of all of them but here are a couple:
all released safely. my most succesful day on the fly. and i fell in love with nymphing. i'm certainly not a pro by any means but at least i tasted some success so i know i'm on the right track. and even better, i found out it was a blast to fish a nymph when they're taking! pretty cool day.
on the way out, i ran into these guys:
looks like many more happy days of fishing this spring on the Brandywine... might have to go out again tomorrow.
cheers!
with that said, my buddy and i managed to find some decently quiet water and waited it out until everyone caught their limit and went home. by 11:30am it was pretty much cleared out.
i realized the difference between spin fisherman and fly fisherman.... spinners complain about the bugs, fly fisherman rave about them...
anyway, the fisher were taking a little bit of everything. my buddy had a few takes on a small black beadhead woolly bugger. i'm convinced this fly will catch you a fish on the Brandywine 365 days a year. i brought my first Brookie to hand with a woolly as well.
bugs were hatching but only saw 2 or 3 trout break the surface. we couldn't coax them into taking a dry.
went back out this morning and found it to be a little quieter but still surprisingly crowded for a monday morning. still, not hard to find a stretch to yourself. after not getting much action on the trusty woolly i rigged up a pheasant tail with a scud dropper. this was brilliant.
i'm fairly new to fly fishing in general and nymphing was a discipline that always intimidated me. i tired it many times but never had any success. its one of those things that i always think i'm doing wrong and until i catch a fish, i'll never feel comfortable that i'm getting it.
well, today things clicked. i was in a great spot. there was a pool below a bit of a drop in the creek and the water was kind of dumping off into the pool and shooting around some rock outcrop. past the outcrop, the water slowed a bit before dumping again below. i was able to cast a quarter upstream into the heavier current and watch my indicator as it moved into slower water at about 90 degrees. as it hit a quarter downstream it would begin to swing and the fish were begging for it at that point. i caught 4 in an hour and all on nymphs. 2 took the dropper and 2 took the pheasant tail. a rainbow, a brown and 2 brookies... the Brandywine Triple Crown. didn't manage a picture of all of them but here are a couple:
all released safely. my most succesful day on the fly. and i fell in love with nymphing. i'm certainly not a pro by any means but at least i tasted some success so i know i'm on the right track. and even better, i found out it was a blast to fish a nymph when they're taking! pretty cool day.
on the way out, i ran into these guys:
looks like many more happy days of fishing this spring on the Brandywine... might have to go out again tomorrow.
cheers!
