West Branch of Delaware River, PA/NY border. 6/26

[sight_nymph_17109]

Put my pontoon in around 9 under the supervision of Alpabuck. Floated around 4 miles for the day. Mostly cloudy skies and clear flows in the low 50's.

Fish where rising when we arrived. A smattering of caddis and sulphurs on the water during the morning/afternoon. The order of the day was tiny olives. Hooked 9 in less than a mile and only landed one of them. My issue of keeping fish from getting 'un-buttoned' continues. Periods of rising fish and then nothing through the afternoon.

Fished for 2 hours before dark in the no-kill section. More olives and a few sulphurs. Fish up and feeding when I got there and when I left. Still a bit of 'slime' in the water but not too bad. Water temps around 45 knee aching degrees.

 

[Alpabuck]

We brought ten fish to boat in the no kill all on sulphur cripples smallest other then a 6in rainbow I caught in the farmers pool was 16in biggest was a 23in brown that we measured and then lost before getting his picture which bothers me to no end! Oh well maybe I'll find him again on thursday when I head back up!

 

[jdaddy]

Alpa, were you able to get him to stop at that really awesome bar near the game lands where you put in? Wow, 45 in the West Branch. That is awesome. Sounds like a great trip.

 

[sight_nymph_17109]

One photo from the float. Wrong date on photo.

 

[Alpabuck]

Yeah we stopped in at the bar! He was shocked they had all their teeth and were very nice people. They said do to hard times with the economy they just cant afford to fix the place up. Cryin shame because they were very pleasant people.


SN are you sure that's not a chub?

 

[sight_nymph_17109]

Too many spots to be a chub and it didn't poop in my hands while I was unhooking it.

Here's one for ya though....
As I came through the riff at the end of dead man's pool, I pulled out the nymph rod. I was going from the riff into the head of the next pool and began tossing the stuff out there. Second drift on the PA side ended up hooking a bow. He ran out 20 of line, jumped twice and threw my nymph. Before I could pick up the slack and start the next cast, BOOM... hooked another. I've taken 2 on the same nymph rig at Paradise (one on the top fly & one on the bottom fly) but never had 2 fish hooked on the same drift w/o re-casting. Good news is that one was a bow, one was a brown and I lost both before netting. Was I smart enough to stop and really work that riff since I obviously had a good rig on? NOPE. Kept drifting. Duh.

 

[Alpabuck]

Must be quite a few bows in West right now. I got one above Norboard and one below the little Island below Norboard.

 

[sight_nymph_17109]

Finding them that far up is pretty unusual, I think. The guy I was fishing with said that they've run up out of the main and lower east into the upper east. He's caught them above long flat access point. That's also pretty strange. That river is almost 100% browns w/ a few brookies in the upper section.

 

[dryflyguy]

I caught more bows in the PA sections of the Delaware in april, than I can ever remember. It bet it was almost 50% - although most of them were smaller fish.

Just curious - you guys see any tricos up there?

 

[Alpabuck]

I did not but I didnt make it on the water until about noon both days!

 

[sight_nymph_17109]

dfg,

I caught mostly rainbows at the methodist camp section this year. What's up with that?

I didn't see any tricos but we were at Balls Eddy and south. If I'm not mistaken, the only 'good' hatch of them is up around the gamelands and north.

What I did see was clouds of spinners in a #16-18. They looked like a reverse trico. All white or almost clear body with the tail section black. Super, super thin body. The guy I was fishing with said that they were olive spinners but I've never seen olive spinners that looked like that. It was in the middle of the day around 3-ish.

 

[JackM]

sight_nymph_17109 wrote:
dfg,
What I did see was clouds of spinners in a #16-18. They looked like a reverse trico. All white or almost clear body with the tail section black. Super, super thin body.

Sounds like the Little Jenny Spinner.

 

[dryflyguy]

SN -

Those were blue quill spinners. I've seen them bouncing up and down like that practically all day without falling.

I really didn't see many fish rising at the methodist camp this spring for some reason, and didn't hang around there very long. I caught most of my fish at the game lands and on the main stem. But from my experience - and from talking with other fishermen - the rainbows seemed to be more widespread all over the river.

I used to hit the tricos pretty well years ago at the methodist camp area. Then I couldn't seem to find them up there for awhile. And I haven't been going up there in summer lately

 

[sight_nymph_17109]

Jack,

Dead on with that picture.


dfg,
I had fished the tricos between junction pool and methodist camp but that may have been 10 yrs ago. You didn't see many rises there this spring? I saw tons and some of the fish were dandys. Took 2 bow out of there in the 20-21" range on caddis. There were some bigger fish but couldn't get a good drift and the river was too deep to cross. You know, the rise that looks like a toilet bowl flush. Most of the guys I've talked with fished the SGL section this year. I understand that it's fished great. BIG fish too. I think the entire WB is giving up a much bigger average this year.

Not sure what's going on with the bows but they seem to be moving all over the system. They're in Barnharts on the BK, almost to Shinople on the EB, and all the way to Norboard on the WB. I prefer fishing for the browns but if I hook up with a bow that takes me into the backing, that's cool too.

 

[Alpabuck]

I think it's awesome that the bow's are so widespread. I would love to see more of them in the future.

 

[dryflyguy]

SN -

I hit really lousy weather when I was there in april. Lots of cold, wind, and even a little snow. 3 of the days I was there were pretty much just a waste of time.

 

[sight_nymph_17109]

I was there in the sleet storm. Put the boat in at 191 and floated to Buck the temp only got to 41 that day. I was unprepared and only had a windbreaker / nearly froze. Fish were feeding and Hendricksons were hatching. My hands were too cold to tie flies on but did manage a few. It was super windy up there this spring. That's what ruined most of my trips along with poor timing so that I missed EVERY hatch. Oh well, next year.

 

[bam]

Good stuff. Looking forward to some good fishing on the D these next couple months.

 

[sight_nymph_17109]

Give me a shout. If I can get loose, I'll go. I'm hoping that the fall fishing trip gets a good turnout and the weather is decent.

 

[mcwillja]

Not to hijack the thread but me and a friend just returned from my camp on the west branch and we landed 42 fish in 3 full days on the West Branch. Sz. 18/20 sulphurs sz 22/24 olives and sz 22/24 midges were the ticket. The fish were extremely selective on the sulphurs. We had to use biot body slim profile comparaduns and match the color (orange and yellow). Also yellow biot abdomens and orange thorax colored sulphur spinners in the evening were deadly. Overall great fishing except the slime in the evenings.