I won’t say it’s been a record season for me though, as I had an especially difficult time keeping big fish on the line earlier in the season. I’m not sure if I’ve finally shaken the dust off my streamer fishing skills, or if the trout have had a change in attitude (or both), but hook-ups with big fish have picked up somewhat over the last month for me. I suppose I can also attribute this to the arrival of warmer weather and the corresponding increase in night fishing success.

A big wild brown from last week, caught just past dark.

The above fish was caught just past dark on a last-minute trip to the river after work. I had tied a couple realistic stonefly patterns using some newly ordered Hemingway wings and I was hoping to give them a try. However, forgetting about the rain we had the day before, I was greeted by a chocolate colored river when I arrived.

A day in the life of a river this season – high and dirty.

The stoneflies were definitely out, but the fish were too busy dealing with the low visibility to care much. I haven’t been finding a lot of time to tie flies this year, so I’ve been keeping a vice and box of tying supplies in my truck for emergencies. My supply of articulated streamers was in shambles, so I decided to tie one in the back of the truck before hitting the river. I went with a bright color given the water conditions.

A last minute tie in the back of my truck before hitting the river.

The result was four big fish in a couple hours, although only two were landed.

Another slightly smaller wild brown from the same night.

As is usual for me, big streamers and mouse patterns have been moving most of my larger fish. I’ve had a couple nice fish on stoneflies as well on the clearer days and I know for a fact that nymphs have also been catching a lot of big fish for people this year – in pretty much all water conditions.

Most of my trout (but not all) have also been caught past dark this month, largely because my weekends have been a write-off and fishing after work often doesn’t get me to the river until 7 or 8 o’clock. The fish below was another memorable one that smashed a streamer early evening in some more off-colored water.

A good looking brown caught on an articulated streamer on a mid-July early evening.

This fish was followed up by yet another decent brown shortly past dark on the same night – and it was preceded by a slightly larger one a week earlier.

The first brown of the season caught on a mouse pattern.

Needless to say, it’s been a pretty good season this year if you’ve been willing to put away the dry flies and emergers and fish meatier flies. I don’t expect this to let up any time soon, but hopefully we’ll be treated to some good dry fly days as well.

We still have lots to look forward to in August… terrestrials, late Isonychia, the understated White Miller, perhaps some straggler stoneflies and of course, even better night fishing. If you’re a masochist, there’s also the Trico hatches.

The post Big Water, Big Flies, Big Fish appeared first on Caffeinated Fly Fisher.

However, these hot humid days mean the trout are hiding and expending as little energy as possible during the day and waiting for the cooler, dark of evening to feed. This is especially true of the largest trout in the river, which are nocturnal by nature. While I wouldn’t recommend fishing on evenings where water temperatures and dissolved oxygen levels are below safe levels, the right conditions can bring out some absolute monsters on nights like this.

It’s been a while since I wet a line after dark and I made a last minute decision to give it a go last night. I arrived during the last few minutes of sunlight, got familiar with my surroundings and downsized my leader to prepare for the impending dark. It didn’t take long before I hooked into my first brown. Unfortunately, an acrobatic jump (which I don’t see browns doing very often) resulted in losing the fish. I managed to get a good look at it and while nice (around 18″), I knew there were bigger fish to be had.

A few casts later, to a section of water that was yet undisturbed from the previous fight, proved me right as I hooked a much larger fish. I finally got a chance to break in my new Hardy Ultralite DD reel and hear what the drag really sounds like when it’s screaming.

Big brown trout taken on a mouse pattern after dark.

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I figured I would take the opportunity to get out for some night fishing over the Labour Day weekend, while the water is still warm enough. The weather wasn’t exactly ideal, with rain and thunderstorms on and off the entire weekend. I’m no meteorologist or expert when it comes to weather and its effect on fish, but there are a number of theories about how weather and barometric pressure affects fish activity. While it’s convenient to use lousy weather as an excuse for not catching fish, I can only confirm that fishing was indeed difficult.

Driving into some ominous looking clouds

Saturday, I decided to try a spot that I was relatively unfamiliar with. I’ve fished the section a few times during the day, so I know it had some nice water. However, I had never spent time scoping out exactly which holes would be good to throw flies at after dark, or how exactly to approach those holes. The result was me fumbling around in the dark trying to find a way to get into a favourable casting position when I could barely see. Needless to say, I had no luck Saturday night. Strike one.

Lesson: When night fishing, make sure you have a plan of exactly what water you’re going to fish and how you’re going to fish it.

Sunday, I was going to play it safe and head to a well known spot – where I have plenty of experience night fishing. The weatherman was calling for a small chance of thunder showers, but it didn’t look serious and considering his track record of forecasting weather the past couple weeks, I decided to test my luck. I drove to the Credit after dinner and no sooner than I put my waders and boots on, it started to rain. It was raining lightly at first, so I put my rain jacket on and continued to gear up. Just as I walked away from my car, it began pouring. Assuming it would last only a short while, I got back in my car and waited for it to pass. A few minutes later, my buddy sent me a text saying there was a tornado in Fergus, heading north east (i.e. where I was). Not believing him, I did a quick search on my phone and sure enough, there was a funnel cloud spotted in Fergus. I started the car and drove back home. Strike two.

Lesson: Listen to the weatherman.

Monday, the forecast was looking a bit better, other than the fact that it was cold and windy – typical post storm conditions, not usually associated with good fishing. Nevertheless, I was determined to make up for the last couple nights and headed to the spot I intended to fish the night prior. Other than a light sprinkle later in the evening, the weather participated. After about an hour of casting a Gurgler after dark, I hooked up with a nice sized Brown Trout. Unfortunately, I think I didn’t set the hook well enough and lost him after a small fight.

Lesson: Big flies don’t hook themselves in big trout. Set the hook with some authority!

I no doubt spooked the pool a bit during the previous hook up, but was determined to stay until at least one fish made its way to my net. I tried several sizes and colours of Gurglers and I could not entice another rise in the next hour or so. On top of that, I was beginning to suffer from twisting tippet (after re-tying my leader a couple times already). At about 10:30 pm, just about ready to give up, I decided to try one last fly: a Foam Mouse. A couple casts in produced a violent take and this time I remembered to set the hook. The result was this nice Brown Trout. Third time’s the charm!

Decent Credit River Brown Trout, taken on a large foam mouse

The post Fall is in the Air appeared first on Caffeinated Fly Fisher.

I still remember a few relaxing nights on the deck where we would repeatedly hear huge splashes in that hole – a big brown smashing prey no doubt. It was after this that I realized just how aggressive these fish get when the sun goes down. A couple years later I caught my first 20+” fish in that very hole after dark, on a big mouse pattern. I lost it before I was able to get it to the net, but I still consider it my first real night fishing success.

Night fishing is so popular out there that Gates Au Sable Lodge began hosting an annual Midnight Fly Fishing Derby, where pairs of anglers head out for an evening fishing tournament in hopes of landing the biggest fish.

Since then, I’ve been doing a bit of night fishing back home in Southern Ontario. Last weekend was my first real chance this year and it was no let down. I landed an 18-20″ fish and lost 2 other similarly sized fish in the span of about an hour.

18-20″ Brown caught after dark on a Southern Ontario river

The same rules apply here as they do in Michigan… huge browns come out of hiding about half an hour after the sun completely sets. Here’s are a few things that I’ve found increase my odds when fishing at night for big browns.

1. Use big flashy flies.
I have no doubt that casting a standard dry fly or streamer will catch fish. However I’ve found that consistently catching larger fish is both easier and more fun with a large (up to size 2-4) top water fly like a Gurgler or Mouse. With these flies, not only are they easier to see (or feel), but you generally strip them in and don’t have to worry much about getting that perfect drift or presentation. They also disturb the surface enough to attract predatory fish from all around.

2. Use darker colors.
The smaller the fly, the more important this is. When I fish a Gurgler, I don’t bother with darker colors as I prefer fishing a bright/white fly that is easier to see. A size 2 fly is large enough and disturbs the water enough that the fish are going to see and/or hear it regardless. If you’re fishing smaller dry flies however, you want to be using a preferably black fly which creates a more visible silhouette against the night sky. This seemed counter intuitive to me at first since black is much more difficult for the angler to see. However, we’re looking down from above – a completely different viewpoint than the fish. I’ve heard it described as washing your fly if you try to fish a white dry fly at night.

3. Shorten your leader and use larger tippet.
I learned this lesson the hard way, more than once. Since you’re casting (almost) blindly, you will be dealing with line tangles from time to time. Having a shorter leader definitely helps here. On top of that, the fish are not shy at night and there’s no need to keep your 10-12 foot leaders and tiny tippet. In fact, when I know there are big fish around, I have been going down as low as 4-6 foot 2x tippet. When a huge brown smashes a top water fly as you’re stripping it in, especially when you don’t see it happen, it’s easy for them to snap off even 4x tippet (I’ve had this happen).

4. Know the water and get into a favorable casting position.
Don’t try to wade a river like you would during the day. Pick a hole that looks like it holds a lot of fish and stay put. If you really know the river well, you might be able to move carefully between a few holes, but often you can spend a lot of time at a single location at night. If you’re stripping top water flies, cast downstream and strip them back upstream. This is a very forgiving way to cast at night and accuracy is not too important. I’ve also had success dead drifting flies, especially mice, though it requires a bit more practice to get a feel of where your fly is landing when you can barely see.

The post Night Fishing Season appeared first on Caffeinated Fly Fisher.

Grayling is a fly fishing paradise.  I won’t go into detail on why this is such a great fly fishing town, but suffice it to say that it’s surrounded by several blue ribbon trout rivers, it’s host to river stretches with nicknames like the “Holy Water”, it’s got more fly shops than most towns have gas stations and it’s the birthplace of Trout Unlimited… you get the idea.

I made an effort not to spend too much time on the water this trip, since my wife doesn’t fish and we had other things planned for the week.  Most of the time I didn’t stray too far from the place we were staying.  Located on the Holy Water, one of (if not the) best stretches of trout water on the entire Au Sable, it’s just too convenient.

The main hatches for the week included Tricos in the mornings, terrestrials (mostly ants) in the afternoons and some sporadic BWO hatches in the evenings.  No overly large trout were had during this trip, but a nice assortment of brown, rainbow and brook trout were caught.  That’s one of the things I love about the Au Sable in this stretch… all three trout species are very plentiful and on any given day it’s entirely possible to hook up with trophy sizes in all of these fish.

Au Sable Brown Trout

Au Sable Brook Trout

Au Sable Rainbow Trout

And then there’s the night fishing…

This is somewhat of a craze in the area.  So much so that Gates Au Sable Lodge, a local lodge and fly shop in the area, hosted a midnight derby this year.  It just so happened that this was prime night fishing time on the Au Sable. I’d done a bit of night fishing in the past on this river, with one unforgettable night where I was stalked by an angry Bobcat on shore for about 30 minutes.  This year though, I wanted to target BIG browns… something I hadn’t previously focused on while night fishing.  A bit of poking around revealed a couple flies that have landed numerous trophy browns after dark on this river:  Gartside Gurglers and Mice.  Unfortunately, I didn’t bring exactly the materials needed to tie these, but I did manage to tie a couple make-shift versions:

A quick and dirty Gurgler tie for some night fishing.

A simple variation on a foam mouse that I was quite happy with.

I spent two nights tossing big flies like this blindly in the dark.  Both of the above patterns worked quite well, but sadly I didn’t land the monster I was after.  I had several vicious hits on the gurgler, but missed all of them.  As for the mouse pattern above, I tied this only for the second night, which I fished for a total of about 10 minutes before hooking up with a big brown which somehow managed to snap it off with 4x tippet!  That was a sad time indeed as I felt I might have caught my new record brown trout.  I must say though, from the few minutes I fished this, I absolutely loved it.  It pushes water amazingly… which is good for getting the attention of those big predatory browns at night.  It’s very simple to tie as well, so I might just post some tying instructions for it later.

I also spent a few hours at Wakeley Lake, a non-motorized, catch-and-release only lake that is only accessible via a 1/4 mile hike.  Because of the restrictions and the fact that it’s not easily accessible to more casual anglers, it’s a super lake to fly fish from either a float tube, pontoon boat or canoe.  I brought my float tube and in the few hours I spent there, I hooked up with a bunch of decent pike and bass.

Wakeley Lake Bass

Wakeley Lake Northern Pike

Another Wakeley Lake Pike

Oh and lastly (and perhaps least importantly), they have lots of big ugly spiders in Grayling.  Maybe only slightly more than I’m used to in the GTA, but for some reason they tend to sneak up on me more up there.  This one crawled out of my waders onto my arm when I put them on one morning, after leaving them outside to dry overnight.

This spider surprised me by crawling out of my waders onto my arm one morning…

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