We drove for a couple hours to a river that has been on my short list of must-visit spots for this season. I hadn’t been on this particular river in over a decade and never to the section we were heading to. The water here was stunning… a great combination of riffles, runs and pools with lots of depth and variety. It was some of the fishiest looking water I’d seen in a long time. Unfortunately though, as the temperature continued to drop, the conditions were not quite ideal. A few Isonychia duns could be seen flying about during the early evening and eventually, as the daylight dwindled, they were replaced by a moderate number of spinners and a few stoneflies.

This was a last minute trip and I’d been slacking on replenishing my fly boxes once again, so I was pretty low on fly selection. When my limited number of Isonychia patterns weren’t doing the trick, I decided to try a small yellow sally stimulator, as I’d seen a few flying around. I spotted what appeared to be an average fish rising in some slow water on the other side of a seam and I presented my fly slightly upstream with enough slack to drift over the fish before drag set in. The gulp that followed was shocking.

An unexpected, colourful 22″ brown trout to finish off the evening.

It’s almost unfair to be spoiled with such a nice fish on the first visit to a new river, especially on a dry fly, as it sets expectations unreasonably high for future trips. He put up a great fight and made landing on 5X tippet fairly challenging. I couldn’t get over the colour of this brown, especially considering the time of year. I wonder what he’ll look like come fall.

With the image of this trout rising to devour my dry fly burned into my vision for the next week, I drove back to the same spot last Friday to test my luck. The cold front had passed and temps had been consistently warmer. Once again, fishing started out slow during the high sun of late afternoon, but the hatches eventually kicked in thicker than the week before, albeit starting quite a bit later. What resulted was a very short window of excellent dry fly fishing.

Lots of Isonychia were on the river this evening.

This rough tie of an Isonychia seemed to do the trick.

In the span of about an hour and a half, I landed a couple decent brookies and several browns. I also lost several fish to either poor hook sets, dull hooks or bad luck… a couple of those fish being of promising size.

One of a couple nice little brookies.

Far from the trout caught a week prior, but I’ll take catching browns like this any day.

Weather permitting, I’ll likely head back this Friday again, possibly doing some subsurface fishing before the real action starts.

The post A Change of Scenery appeared first on Caffeinated Fly Fisher.

Stillwater fly fishing is still relatively new to me, as is fall fly fishing for trout since I’ve usually packed up my trout gear by now. Consequently, I’ve been doing a lot of learning and experimenting lately. Most days have been productive, albeit tough at times while trying to adapt to stillwater techniques and break my normal river fishing habits. It’s certainly been a relaxing time of year to be out on the water, with the fall colours and quiet cool days.

A nice looking rainbow trout caught on a sunny fall day

One of the more interesting discoveries for me has been the change in feeding habits of the trout at this time of year. Most of my success in the spring and summer was had via sinking lines and bead head streamers, with the odd fish taken near the surface (usually in the evenings). Nymphs and chironomids were also successful, but fished at similar depths. I’d see the odd fish rising, but fish were definitely deeper and spotting cruising fish was a fairly rare occurrence.

In contrast, most of my success this fall has been in much shallower water – usually 2-4 feet deep and often on the surface itself. When the water is clear (i.e. when it hasn’t rained for a couple days), it’s been a lot of sight fishing, which is always fun. A bushy dry fly such as a Stimulator, cast ahead of cruising fish has been one of my more successful approaches.

Even more reliable has been unweighted, beadless Woolly Buggers. These most basic of flies have finally found their forte for me, as they’re something I’d all but given up on many years ago. I still fish the weighted bead head versions with some frequency in rivers, as they can get down to the larger fish faster and have a much more life-like action to them. However, when it comes to fishing super slow in the top couple feet of the water column, I’ve found the classic beadless versions are perfect. As an added bonus, they can be fished as dry flies with a few false casts and/or stripped in the surface film. Smaller sizes, in the range of 6-12 seem to work best in the fall.

A large rainbow caught while sight fishing dry flies

The above fish was one of many fish taken on a dry fly. It wasn’t the biggest fish of the day though: I caught a much larger rainbow (also on a dry fly) that wouldn’t fit in my net. A fellow angler watched in laughter as I unsuccessfully tried to net it 4 times, before giving up and quickly unhooking and releasing it in the water. Apparently a larger net is going to be on the Christmas list this year.

The post Fall Rainbows appeared first on Caffeinated Fly Fisher.

Friday and Saturday were spent exploring small streams close to home, none of which I’d fished before. These are tiny, virtually untouched waters that contain moderate numbers wild trout. The smaller fish in these streams are all too eager to take even a sloppily presented dry fly, but the larger fish require stealth, small tippets and perfect presentations. Of course, larger is relative to the size of the streams here, so a 12″ fish is a trophy on waters like these.

I spent a couple days exploring small, quiet streams like this one.

Most of these streams have a mix of brookies, browns and rainbows, with an average size of about 6″. Over the course of two days, I spent hours catching trout in these waters, bushwhacking my way through overgrown banks, fallen trees and spider webs. Before heading in on Saturday evening, I decided to check out one last spot. Years ago, a fly fisherman who grew up in the area told me that the “Holy Grail of Brook Trout” (so he called it) existed somewhere in a nearby town, but he had never been able to find it. I hadn’t really given it much thought until now – after all, he fly fished the area for decades and wasn’t able to find it, so I assumed I wouldn’t either.

After scouting a few likely roads in town, I pulled over at the entrance to a trail and double checked my maps. It looked like a stream ran fairly close by, so I grabbed my 3 weight and headed out. As I hiked further, the sound of running water grew from non-existent to that of loud rapids. When I reached the stream, I found a fairly slow stretch of water above the rapids, with a nice little pool that was now completely shaded (it was getting late).

I had a bushy size 12 Stimulator tied on, which seemed like overkill for the fish that usually inhabit waters like this. However, before downsizing, I thought I’d give it a few casts. I carefully approached downstream of the hole, knelt behind some tall grass and presented a cast about 25 feet upstream. As the fly drifted over the middle of the pool, I watched a good sized brookie dart up from below and inhale the Stimulator. As fast as it rose, it dove back down from where it came and an even larger brookie chased after it. The second fish was an honest 3-4″ larger than the one I’d caught, which itself was pushing 12″!

A beautiful small stream Brook Trout

In the few remaining minutes of light, three more brook trout in the 8-10″ range came to my net from the same pool. I’m not sure if I found the fabled Brook Trout hotspot that I’d heard stories about, but I was certain that I was on the right track!

Sunday was back to more familiar waters, in what would be the last day on my beloved Credit River for the season. As expected during this time of year, there area around the Upper Credit was utter chaos. Not due to fishermen, but nature watchers. Each year, autumn brings hordes of people from around the GTA to Caledon to hike and enjoy the scenic area and changing of the leaves. It means the normally peaceful and quiet streets are booming with cars and people for closing weekend.

Of course, fishing pressure is also expectedly higher, but nothing like that of more popular rivers such as the Grand. A little legwork goes a long way though, and it wasn’t long before I was on the river by myself, passing only a single pair of anglers all day.

Peace and quiet on a rugged section of the Credit River

The weather and scenery were excellent and the fishing was challenging, but solid. I caught a number of small browns, with one larger brown hooked and lost in some fast moving water. I also hooked into what I believe were a couple baby Atlantic Salmon, which is not surprising given the stocking being done in the Credit. I’ve mistaken these little guys as brown trout in the past, but the big give away is the heavily forked tail and the smaller mouth (does not extend past the eye). If you knew nothing about identifying these, you’d know somewhat was up when you hooked one as they are absolute rockets. Way too aggressive for their own good, these little fish put on quite the acrobatic show and (as you can see below) have no problem attacking flies the size of their own head.

I caught a couple of these small, super-aggressive stocked Atlantic Salmon

A friend and I spent the last two days of fishing season on the water as well. Monday was back to exploring new water, which turned out to be informative but entirely unproductive. We waded stretches of a larger river that lies between two dams, making fish passage up and downstream virtually impossible – thus greatly reducing the fish populations. Still, these sections are almost completely untouched by anglers and there are known to be some populations of resident trout in them, so it was worth at least an investigation. We waded some absolutely beautiful water, with some of the nicest pools and runs I’ve seen on any river in southern Ontario. It’s an absolute shame that this water goes almost completely unused and inaccessible to fish.

With a bit of time left to spare Monday, after hundreds of casts without a fish to show for it, we stopped off at a couple of the tributaries I fished days prior. My buddy was in disbelief over the stories I told of the fish in these waters, so I wanted to prove him wrong.

A slow section of a little stream we stopped off at on the way home

In the few minutes we spent fishing the first stream, I caught a bunch of small trout, including as a nice 9″ brookie. Ryan also managed to spook a much larger brookie from under a log while untangling his fly from a tree branch.

We then moved on to the same trib that I caught the 12″ brookie from Saturday. With the success I experienced last time, I confidently declared a guarantee of some big brookies. It was still relatively early when we got there though, with perfectly clear skies and bright sun shining down onto the stream. In the daylight, I was surprised at just how small the pool I caught the brookies from was – it seemed so much larger and deeper at night. Once again, Ryan was in disbelief that this tiny little pool would hold such fish; and I can’t really blame him.

We slowly walked up to the side of the pool, being careful to stay behind the tall grass so not to spook it. Unfortunately, a number of fish must have caught a glimpse of us and they were sent scurrying in all directions for cover, not to be seen again. The pool was spooked, but at least there was proof of some of the nice fish that inhabit it. It goes to show you just how important stealth is on these small streams.

Tuesday wrapped up fishing season with a day trip to the Grand River. This had been our regular stomping ground (when we fished together) for a couple years, but it treated us like shit this year with constantly high and murky waters and difficult fishing conditions. As such, this was our first trip back to the Grand in several weeks. The river had been a bit high (~10 cms) leading up closing weekend, but thankfully they dropped the flow down to just over 5 cms (which is about perfect) for the last day of fishing.

The Grand River – it can be frustrating trying to decide where to present a fly on this large river

We expected to face some finicky browns, as they’d undoubtedly been absolutely hammered with flies for the last 3 days straight. My thoughts were that we’d either have to exactly match the hatch (with perfect presentations), or use something different – something that the fish hadn’t seen hundreds or thousands of times before.

On that note, there’s an very simple nymph called Walt’s Worm that I’d been meaning to try for some time. I recently watched this video on tying the competitive style nymph on a jig hook. What appealed to me about this fly was its extreme simplicity, as well as the weight and anti-snag nature of it (due to the inverted jig hook). I really dislike having to add weight to my leader, so having a very fast sinking nymph is ideal. I feel like most of the time, we’re tying flies to please ourselves rather than the fish. Given the mangled bugs that regularly float down the river and the fact that you rarely see someone fishing such a simple looking nymph, I decided to tie a couple for our trip.

We were on the river by about 7 am, before the sun was up. We were both casting streamers – Ryan to a hole he knows holds a monster Brown and me to a run above that. Things were pretty slow for the first couple hours, as Ryan failed to entice the big brown to come out and I missed 3-4 hits on a size 6 woolly bugger. Forgetting about the Walt’s Worms that I tied the night prior, I must have gone through a dozen flies (streamers, nymphs and wets) before finally deciding to tie a caddis dry fly on. I hadn’t seen a single fish rise all morning, but I was frustrated and wanted to have some stress free casting for a while. In fairness, it’s hard to go wrong with a caddis any time on the Grand… it may not always work, but if you have no other ideas, it’s probably a good place to start. A combination of desperation and luck brought the first fish of the day to the net.

The first Brown Trout of the day, caught on a Sparkle Caddis variation.

It worked out that shortly after tying on that caddis, the river came alive a bit and some fish started rising. There were decent numbers of caddis about, as well as solid numbers of BWO. It’s hard to say what they were actually feeding on, but we stuck to caddis and landed a few more fish before they stopped rising again.

With difficult fishing conditions setting in once more, we went back to trying streamers, caddis pupa, various emergers and BWOs. Other than the infrequent hit on a streamer, the fish just weren’t cooperating. After recalling the Walt’s Worms that I tied the night before, I decided to give one a try. A couple casts later and I hooked up to a decent fish. In fact, I began regularly hooking up to fish from that moment on with the Walt’s Worm (I also had luck with the Sexy Walt’s). I was fishing it without an indicator and the fast sinking fly made it easy to keep a tight line and detect hits. I dead drifted it near the bottom and fished it on the swing – I even caught some rising fish with it!

One of several nice brown trout taken on a Walt’s Worm

Despite a decent number of fish landed (at least compared to previous trips to the Grand this year), it was a fairly tiring and hard fished day. After a late 2:00 lunch, the river was filling up with anglers and the fishing was continuing to slow down. We finished off the day fishing dry flies up by the 2nd Line bridge, hoping for more rising fish. I only found one such fish and it came to my net.

Last resident trout of 2014, once again caught on a Sparkle Caddis

All in all, 2014 was a memorable trout season, though somewhat of a polar opposite to last season. While last year I focused heavily on catching large browns in well known water, this year was much more focused on exploring new waters and new techniques. I traded the fewer (bigger) browns for more (smaller) trout and easily caught some of my nicest resident brookies to date. I also caught my first steelhead on a fly, as well as my largest bass to date.

While I take a long break from resident trout fishing, I still have a few months of fishing bass, steelhead and trout ponds. Now if only Sage could hurry and return my twice broken 6 weight VXP so I have something between a 4 and 8 weight to fish with…

The post 2014 Trout Closing Weekend appeared first on Caffeinated Fly Fisher.

On my first visit, unknowing of what the river would hold, I decided to fish upstream. It was a warm, calm day and the river was fairly wide and shallow here, with some nice riffles and runs and lots of small boulders for fish to hold behind. Overall, the combination of easy wading and fairly easy casting and drifts was a welcome change. The main challenge here was presenting a fly upstream in the clear shallow water, where the fish were spooked extremely easily.

I hooked into two browns almost immediately, the first which I lost after it unexpectedly ran at me and I failed to keep enough tension on the line. The second was gently sipping bugs off the surface under a fallen tree before my yellow stimulator fooled it.

Nice little Brown Trout caught beneath a fallen tree branch

As I worked my way upstream, I caught a few more fish of similar size. Surprisingly, there were a number of very nice looking pockets beside and beneath larger boulders, what you’d call ideal / “A” water. In almost all of these pockets though, I failed to bring fish to the surface. Perhaps going subsurface here would have done the trick, but trying to present a nymph or streamer cast upstream directly below a boulder is pretty tricky, especially in this super clear water. Instead, most of my fish were caught in the shallower “B” water – basically, water you’d expect to hold a few fish but with less depth and structure.

I eventually came to a nice looking run that was below a sharp bend in the river. I began carefully covering the run with my casts, working from the outside in, to prevent fish from seeing the fly line before my fly. I missed a couple decent rises before landing a slender brown at the bottom of the run.

The first fish landed at the bottom end of a nice run

Around the middle of the run, the river narrowed and deepened a bit. If there were larger fish in this section, I figured they’d be here or in the nice looking pool up ahead. I stripped several more feet of line out of my reel, to present as long a cast as possible so not to land my fly directly on top of or behind a fish that might be holding there. I laid out my dry fly at the top of the run and watched in anticipation as it floated drag free towards the prime water. As the long silhouette of a trout rose up slowly from the bottom towards the fly, I recall time slowing down. The fish examined the fly as both it and the fly drifted backwards with the current, until it opened its mouth to inhale the fly and time sped back up.

That’s how I remember the take and although I catch trout regularly on the dry fly, it’s rare indeed that such perfect conditions come together to produce such a memorable rise. The crystal clear water, long cast, perfect drift, anticipation, stalking shadow and visible take.

A nice Brown Trout landed after a very memorable take

In all the excitement, when I stood back up after releasing the fish, I was rewarded with a leg full of water. I was wearing a brand new pair of Dan Bailey hip waders and I’d forgotten that you can’t bend down in the water with them like you can with chest high waders! A bit of water wasn’t going to put a damper on my day though, so after removing my boot and wader leg and emptying out the water, I got back in the water and made my way toward the bend in the river upstream.

The sharp bend produced a deep hole, along with a large foam-filled back eddy. If history had taught me anything, this hole was guaranteed to hold at least a couple large fish. Sadly though and to my surprise, after many unsuccessful casts, darkness was already approaching and I hadn’t seen a fish from the hole yet. Since the wade back downstream was an easy one and the sun was already setting, I figured I’d wait a few more minutes and strip a big Gurgler through the hole a few times after dark. My luck wouldn’t change though and I eventually left the excellent looking hole, puzzled. I certainly wasn’t disappointed though, not after a successful and memorable day on a new stretch of water – I was just, puzzled.

The post More Exploring appeared first on Caffeinated Fly Fisher.

Every year I spend a great deal of time exploring new water. Most of the time I’m simply scouting out new sections of my favourite local river, though occasionally I’ll travel to a new river or stream. My most recent fixation is a section of water that I’ve overlooked for years, mainly out of laziness and a hunch that it would be unproductive and impossible to fish. This is a smaller branch of a local river, with much different characteristics from the main branch. The river here is narrow, fast and broken with lots of little pools. Turns out, it’s exactly what I love in a river: scenic, full of character and challenging. This is the type of water where stealth, patience and effort pays dividends.

This scenic river section has lots of rapids, creating many small plunge pools

At first glance, this river appears extremely shallow and fast, not exactly what most fly fishers consider productive water. However, a closer look and some footwork reveals a number of small pools that are created by this fast water plunging over rocks and tiny falls. Many of these pools are too small to drift a fly through using a traditional fly cast – instead, one must carefully approach from behind and high stick a dry fly or nymph through the hole. Others holes are larger and have the potential of holding a number of decent sized fish.

A moderate sized pool at the base of some faster water

I’ve caught  a pretty even mix of Brook Trout and Brown Trout on this water, which is good to see (stop trying to take away our Brown Trout, MNR). Most of the fish are small to average sized, though I’ve heard of some trophy sized browns inhabiting this section as well.

An average sized Brook Trout for this section of river

My favourite dry fly for other sections of this river – the Stimulator – has been even more productive here. This is no surprise given the huge number of stone flies I’ve seen here.

There’s no shortage of stoneflies here

I’ve found that when fish are less keen to take a dry, giving it some action by skating it across the surface will often produce a strike. This is another benefit of the Stimulator, since it floats so well.

There are about four larger holes that I’ve found, as well as a fairly long stretch of nice looking deep water at the bottom of a steep ravine that is nearly impossible to fish. I’m convinced there are some very nice fish down there!

One of the larger holes, which has produced a couple decent fish

One thing this river is notorious for is making you hike a very long way to find larger holes. The one above has produced a couple fish – the brown pictured below as well as a good sized rainbow that my friend hooked into and lost before we could get it into the net. I’m convinced there are bigger fish in here, but I’ve yet to see them.

A mid sized brown, the first fish to rear its head from the previous hole

These pics were taken earlier in the season, though I’ve returned a few times with good results. However, tonight (technically last night now) was a different story. I drove up for a couple hours of fishing before dark, but rather than spend that time actually fishing, I spent it tracing my steps back along the dense forest path, where (in typical style for me) I managed to drop my BlackBerry. I spent nearly 2 hours retracing my steps, only to give up hope and eventually, by some miracle, find my phone lying face down on the dirt while heading back to my car in the pitch-dark.

This season has been somewhat of a disaster for me on the front of losing or damaging things and thankfully tonight was not an addition to that list. But those are stories for another night!

The post Testing New Waters appeared first on Caffeinated Fly Fisher.

This is the time of year where our fly boxes need to be the most diverse. Depending on the time of day, river and hatches, you might be casting streamers, nymphs, wet flies, emergers, tiny dries, large dries, or even huge topwater patterns. Consequently, I’ve been hitting the tying bench a lot lately, trying to cover all my bases. In what has been an increasing trend of mine, I’ve concentrated more on sub-surface patterns this season to up my odds when fish are either not rising, or when they’re rising but refusing dry flies. Below are some flies I’ve been tying and fishing on some of my local waters.

Grand River

If you fish the Grand River, you know how frustrating it can be if you rely on dry flies to match the hatch. Although I don’t spend as much time on the Grand as I do other rivers, I’ve come to realize that it’s a largely sub surface and emerger river. In response to this, I tied a bunch of the following emerger patters in various sizes, mainly for caddis and blue winged olive hatches. I’m sure that by simply swapping out different colors and materials, these could be used to imitate a much wider variety of caddis and mayflies.

Caddis or BWO emerger, loosely based off a Snowshoe Emerger pattern

A variation of the above fly, tied with slightly different materials and colors

A sparkle caddis pupa emerger, which (in various styles) has done well on the Grand

Caddis pupa nymph: one of the simplest, yet most effective sub-surface flies on the Grand

As a reminder of just how versatile you need to be, I set out to the Grand River last Saturday with a friend and a bunch of the above flies. The weather was perfect, flows were low and there had been no rain for many days prior. Our expectations were high: clear conditions, lots of bugs and rising trout. We spent a total of about 12 hours on the water that day and what we were met with instead was very murky, low-visibility water and not a single witnessed fish rise for the entire day (on the upper and mid stretches). We fished during one of the thickest caddis hatches I’d seen in quite some time, with loads of large caddis floating down the river and fluttering helplessly on the surface – yet we didn’t see a single fish come up. It wasn’t until we drove several kilometers downstream to the lower river (which usually has less visibility than the upper) that the water cleared up and we got into some rising fish. I later learned that the water clarity issues were caused by the first big algae bloom of the year.

Credit River

I was on the Credit after work a couple weeks ago and managed to hit a smorgasbord of hatch activity, with Sulphurs, Isonychia and Caddis all in good numbers. Despite the impressive hatches, fish activity was surprisingly average that evening. I saw and caught a few small fish that were rising, but nothing out of the ordinary. The point is, it takes more than nice weather and lots of bugs to reliably bring up larger trout. I’ve fished many smaller hatches on the Credit in the recent past, with much more (and bigger) fish. I specifically remember an evening a couple years ago at the busiest access point on the river (normally the least-productive fishing) where an Isonychia hatch brought numerous 12-16″ browns to the surface in a feeding frenzy.

For the Credit, I find matching the hatch is generally less of a factor than the Grand. More important on the Credit is presentation and stealth. This isn’t surprising considering the greater angling pressure on the Grand and much smaller, technical water of the Credit. If you’re fishing dry flies, you can usually pick a common food source such as an Isonychia, Stonefly or simply use an attractor. Personally, I like bushy dry flies here, unless there’s a prolific hatch going on: a Stimulator or Humpy are two of my favorites. My only gripe with the humpy is that it can be annoyingly difficult to tie.

Stimulator: One of my favorite and most productive dry flies for the Credit River

Bead Head Soft Hackle Pheasant Tail: One of my favorite sub-surface flies, especially for pocket water and small streams

A simple Isonychia Parachute pattern, effective for imitating this abundant mayfly

A Sulphur soft hackle, effective when sulphurs are out or as a searching pattern

Gurgler: One of my go-to night patterns that I tie in various styles and colors

If I had to fish the Credit with only two flies, the Stimulator and Bead Head Soft Hackle Pheasant Tail would probably be my choices. As mentioned though, I think fly choice is more a matter of personal preference here. I have no doubt that a good Isonychia nymph or simple Walt’s Worm would do equally as well (if not better).

Stillwaters

My experience with stillwater fly fishing is laregly limitted to local stocked water, with the exception of some native brookies and warm water species. Still, I’ve done some experimenting and found a few options that work well for me. I highly recommend checking out the various videos and articles by fellow Canadians Phil Rowley and Brian Chan, who are highly regarded as experts in this area. They’ll tell you that fly selection is much less important than tactics and this has definitely held true for me. Still, its nice to have a few patterns that have proven to be effective.

Slow retrieved nymphs and chironomids are known to be some of the most productive flies, but I’ve found more actively retrieved streamers to be a good all around choice as well – not just for trout, but also for bass and other species.

Redneck Bugger (as I call it): A crystal bugger with a red hackle neck

CB Stocker: Another simple and effective streamer for trout

The above streamers are easy to tie and have worked well for me for both stocked rainbows and smallmouth bass (for the latter, especially the bugger). On days when fish are rising and sometimes even when there are no visible rises, such as warm days when the water is extremely calm, I’ve had a lot of success with a Stimulator. This versatile fly (shown above) can represent a host of different insects: from stoneflies to caddis to hoppers. It also floats extremely well and can be twitched on the surface to entice a strike.

I dont know if it’s just me though, but it seems that irregardlesss of preparations and fly boxes full of favourite patterns, more often than not I end up on the river feeling as though I’m missing some critical fly. This keeps my vise busy and shopping cart full with new tying materials.

The post Preparations appeared first on Caffeinated Fly Fisher.

I left early (5:30 am) to ensure I’d have access to one of the few boats that are available for use. I was pretty surprised to find a couple others already on the water when I arrived at 6:15. I headed to a second pond that was still quiet and empty. It was as perfect a morning as they come and the water was like glass. It was refreshing to be out fishing without having to wear bulky waders and a vest/pack for once.

A quiet and peaceful morning on a trout pond.

I picked up a new 6 weight Sage VXP this season (which I got a great deal on) and decided to give it a try with some recently purchased sinking leaders. I’m new to the sinking leader thing and I’ve got to say, I’m in love with them. I picked up a couple 7ft 12lb RIO VersiLeaders @ 3.9 and 7 inches per second (ips), as well as a 10ft 24lb Airflo PolyLeader @ 6.1ips. Attaching these leaders via a looped connection to your floating line is an excellent way to fish deep with streamers, without needing a second spool of sinking line or having to add split shot. I found it extremely easy to fish streamers anywhere from a foot beneath the surface to 10+ feet down.

So, most of the morning was spent fishing streamers on sink tips and there was no shortage of action. I landed 6+ rainbows on Woolly Buggers and Mickey Finns, with several more lost.

A colourful rainbow caught on a productive white crystal bugger with red hackle collar.

Another nice average sized rainbow caught on a streamer.

As the morning progressed, a few fish began rising. I wasn’t sure what they were eating and for all I knew the rises could have simply been fish chasing minnows. The important thing is, some of them were looking up and I imagined it didn’t matter much what pattern I chose. I settled on something big and bushy: a size 10 stimulator, for no other reason than it would float well and I could twitch it to imitate any kind of big insect on the surface. To my surprise, the very first cast triggered the biggest rainbow of the day.

A large rainbow that slammed a simulator twitched on the surface.

Although I did manage to entice a few more rises with the dry fly, it turned out to be less reliable than streamers. I switched back to my sink tip and fished woolly buggers for another hour or so before packing up and heading to work. It sure is nice to have the flexible hours that I do, but I definitely paid for it that day as I struggled to stay awake at my desk. There’s nothing like waking up at 5:15 and spending 4-5 hours on the water in the sun to tire you out!

The post Stillwater Rainbows appeared first on Caffeinated Fly Fisher.

This is my favourite time of year to fish. The scenery is at its peak with the fall colours and fish are becoming more aggressive as they beef up for the coming spawning and winter seasons.

I love fishing small, quiet water like this during the fall

Like so many others, I went on somewhat of a fly fishing binge the last several days of the season. I used up my last vacation day on Friday and spent most of 3 full days on the water. I suppose I can’t really blame others for having the same idea as me, but it always shocks me to see just how many fisherman decide to dust off their gear for these final days of the season. Why not just visit the river once or twice during the rest of the season and get the same amount of (much more peaceful) fishing in? I rarely see another fisherman in most of the water I fish, yet that same water is full on closing weekend.

For the most part, I spent my last few days fishing small rivers and streams, often spending as much time hiking into locations as I did fishing. Sure, it would be nice to toss big flies at some of the best holes in hopes of enticing the largest fish in the river, but I value scenery and peace and quiet more than the size of fish. So, while the majority of fly fishermen spent their time battling it out on more popular beats, or fished shoulder-to-shoulder for the largest of Southern Ontario’s salmon and trout, I headed far upstream to stalk the smallest of our native trout: Brook Trout.

I don’t target brookies very often, partly because of their smaller size and partly because they’re more susceptible to angling pressure than other fish. However, early spring and fall are great times to fish them and what they lack in size they more than make up for in beauty and feistiness.

One of the many colourful Brook Trout caught last weekend

Brookies are often willing to eat just about anything they can (or can’t) fit in their mouth!

My friend Ryan and I spent Thursday and Friday almost exclusively fishing for brookies. I took him to a couple locations, one of which very rarely sees any fishing pressure. It was the first time he’d really spent time targeting brook trout and we both had an absolute blast. The first hour saw us land easily 10+ fish, many out of a single nice run. I left the majority of the run to Ryan and he took several 8″+ brookies, small browns and rainbows out of it. As he was setting up I cast a humpy into the tail end of the run and kicked things off with this nice looking fish:

First Brook Trout of closing weekend

Friday morning and early afternoon were less productive than Thursday as we fished some more difficult water – several miles of it I might add. I’d never walked this entire stretch of river before, though I knew of a few holes on it that were usually productive. They lived up to their expectations and most of our fish were caught from them. We waded downstream and without knowing much of the water, we stumbled across (and spooked) a few unexpected nice holes. I have a feeling they would fish very well in the future, if approached carefully.

Later Friday afternoon, when Ryan had to head home, I decided to drive back to the location we fished on Thursday. The weather was absolutely perfect, there were some nice hatches of Blue Winged Olives and Isonychia and the fishing was even better than the day before. Despite the hatching insects, the money fly was a size 12 Stimulator. One particular small pool yielded well over a dozen brook trout in 30 minutes! I’ve never pulled so many fish out of a single hole… it was surreal!

A small pool here (hard to see in this picture) produced well over a dozen fish

Here are a few of the nice looking fish that came to my net Friday evening:

The remainder of the weekend was filled with brown trout fishing. Saturday evening was the only time I spent on a more popular stretch of water and although I know the fishing can be good there, I regretted it afterwards. I shared the river with several other anglers and fished pools that had been largely overfished that day and more recently had an absolutely massive streamer ripped through them by a fisherman ahead of me.

Sunday I drove to a more remote stretch of river, where very long hikes and difficult to navigate terrain ensured I would be the only angler on the river for the day. It’s not really big fish water, for the most part. Narrow, fast moving water, a few scattered pools and lots of riffles. I made my decision to fish this water minutes before leaving the house and my fly inventory was somewhat lacking for this type of fishing. What I really wanted to do was swing soft hackles, so I quickly browsed some fly patterns to find something quick and easy to tie. I settled on a bead head soft hackle pheasant tail. I tied 2 of them, hoped they would last the better part of the day and left for the river.

Two hours later, after finding a parking spot and completing a long hike, I sat down on a rock in the middle of the river and tied a new leader from scratch (more on this later). I put on one of my two pheasant tail soft hackles and began carefully working productive looking water. Either my choice of fly was good, or the fish were just not picky. Whatever the reason, fishing was excellent. I caught a few browns from the first small run.

Pockets of water like the one in the upper-middle area of this photo produced lots of fish

As expected, the fish weren’t big, but it was very rewarding and often technical fishing.

Lots of small browns like this in riffles and pockets behind rocks

I worked my way downstream for a few hours until I eventually lost my only two soft hackles. By this time, it was about 6:45 and the sun was beginning to set. I was moving into an area with some slower moving water and I knew of a couple deeper pools up ahead, so I decided to tie on a streamer to try my chances at landing my last big fish of the year.

I swung and stripped my streamer through the occasional fishy looking water. Not paying much attention (I was looking forward a a certain pool down river), a 16-18″ brown with a big yellow belly leaped out at my streamer as I raised it at the end of a drift. Due to a poor hookset, he was only on for a couple seconds before escaping back to structure he came from.

A bit discouraged, I continued heading towards the final pool of the night. When I arrived, it seemed to have changed since I’d last been there. Structure had shifted, it looked smaller and there was some debris that looked as though it was carefully placed to snag flies. Still, it looked fishy enough, if not somewhat tricky to pull a big fish out of. I stripped my streamer through the pool many times without any sign of fish. After several casts, I got hung up on some underwater structure. Not wanting to wade in and spook the pool, I broke it off. After re-tying my tippet, I stood around for a bit wondering if I should tie on another fly or call it quits. It was almost dark now and I had a very long hike back.

As I was staring at my fly box, I heard a MASSIVE splash. I looked up and saw a big wake of water at the back of the pool. Startled, I wondered if that could possibly be a fish. The splash was so big, I didn’t think it could possibly be a brown. I knew beavers frequent this area, so perhaps that was the cause? I’ve fished after dark many times in the past and I’ve heard my share of large browns smashing the surface, but they have never sounded remotely as big as this. My next thought was clear: Gurgler, size 2! Let’s do this, one last shot at a trophy fish for 2013!

I cut off my smaller tippet, tied my size 2 Gurgler to some 2X and began stripping and popping it through the pool. After dozens of casts and no sign of the big fish, I again stopped to think. Suddenly, another huge splash and this time I saw it! It was now dark and although I couldn’t get a good look at it, I could easily tell this was a BIG brown.

With the reduced visibility at this time of night, I decided to cut off all my tippet and only use a few feet of leader, tying my Gurgler directly to the thick mono on the mid section of my leader. I continued casting and stripping, but after many more attempts the fish was still refusing. I assumed that I must have spooked it by now, since a size 2 fly on such a short, thick leader isn’t exactly a delicate presentation. The brown gave one more big splash, letting me know it still wasn’t done feeding. Half a dozen casts later, it slammed my Gurgler!

Now’s where this starts sounding like your typical fish story. The sad part is, a fish story and a broken leader is all I have to show for what was the most chaotic and mind blowing battle I’ve ever had with a fish. There was no knot in the leader where it broke (though it may appear so). The line is curled at the break purely from the tension it took to pull and snap mono this thick.

Broken .014″ mono, snapped by the biggest brown I’ve ever hooked into

Suffice it to say, this was easily the largest brown I’ve ever experienced, by a pretty big margin. I’ve caught several 20″+ fish in the past (~3-4lb), but none have compared to the weight and power of this fish. My best guess is that this fish was well over 6lb, possibly over 7lb. Other than the odd brookie and very small resident rainbow, there are basically no other fish species in this part of the river, so it most certainly was a brown.

Wild head shakes and thrashing ensued as it tried to shake the hook free. For a few minutes he ran to an undercut bank and was nearly unmovable. I tried to disorient him by applying pressure in different directions, but pulling too hard felt almost as though my 4wt Hardy Zenith was going to snap. It moved back and forth along the bank, staying as deep as possible. I was afraid it was going to run into some nearby structure that would surely put a quick end to the fight.

I turned my headlamp on full brightness and walked a bit closer, prompting the fish to bolt to the other side of the pool where it proceed to wrap itself around an underwater log. My heart was racing: I wanted to land this fish so bad and I was afraid I may have lost it. I quickly waded over to the log and tried to free the line. I reached underwater and grabbed the line and all the sudden he darted out from under the log back to the undercut bank: he was still on!

At this point, a good 10 minutes (or so it felt) into fighting the fish, there was still no sign of fatigue. It was pulling harder than before and moving closer to some underwater structure. Again, afraid it would run into this structure, I applied enough pressure to keep him in the pool. And then… snap!

My leader came flying back at me, a foot shorter, with a section of the mono snapped clean. I couldn’t believe it… my heart sank. I felt like an idiot for applying so much pressure, but it seemed like I had little choice. I’d just lost the fish of a lifetime and to make matters worse, my size 2 Gurgler was broke off in this trophy brown’s mouth, with a foot of mono attached to it. Thankfully I was using a barbless hook, but it doesn’t make me rest much easier. I can only hope it will work itself free and that the fish will go back to regular feeding (and perhaps give me a second chance next year).

I was both an extremely exhilarating and disappointing finish to the 2013 season. I stood still in the river for a good 15 minutes pondering what had just happened. All I had to look forward to was a 45 minute hike back to my car in the pitch dark and 7 months of trout-less days. It was certainly a memorable end to the trout season.

In addition to losing that fish, I also managed to lose my $200 pair of Smith Polarchromic sunglasses. My buddy lost his $100 landing net and tore a large hole in the neoprene socks of his breathable waders. Good times.

The post 2013 Trout Closing Weekend appeared first on Caffeinated Fly Fisher.

I got out again Friday morning before work. There weren’t many bugs early morning, so I started fishing wet flies. When that was unproductive, I moved on to nymphs and later tried streamers. Fishing was slow, with little more than a couple missed hits on the wet flies.

As the sun came up and the temperature began rising, I started seeing a bunch of these:

Lots of Tricos were hatching an hour or so past sunrise

The water was very clear, but I wasn’t really seeing any rises. Since the sub-surface patterns weren’t doing particularly well for me, I figured I may as well try some Trico dry flies. A couple refusals (from some very small fish) was about all the action I had with these. Despite the hatches, fish simply weren’t feeding on Tricos, at least not on the surface.

I went back to wet flies, again with no real success. Mind you, my supply of wets was less than ideal, with only a couple unweighted patterns tied on standard dry fly hooks. I don’t think I was getting the fly down far enough. I could have added some weight to my line, but I just didn’t have much confidence in these flies.

There was still no surface activity, but I decided to tie on another (larger) dry fly: one of my historically most successful attractor patterns for this river, a Red Humpy. I had only one left and on top of being a pretty bad tie, it was also quite beat up. A few casts in and I caught my first fish of the morning: a tiny brown trout. Shortly after, I caught a couple more small browns.

The first few fish were all 6″ or less, so assuming that my Humpy was only managing to fool the young dumb fish, I switched back to a Trico. I figured, maybe the dry fly action was just now picking up and matching the hatch would get me into some better fish now. Well, it didn’t… the Trico continued to be ineffective.

Before switching back to my Humpy, I tried a few other flies to rule out the possibility of the Humpy not being the reason for my previous luck: a Stimulator, Caddis, BWO and a Partidge and Red.  I caught nothing on these flies, but after tying the Humpy back on, I was into more fish almost immediately.

As I waded downstream (further from the access point), the fish began increasing in size. A couple more 6″ fish, then some in the 8-10″ range.

I started to catch some better fish as I moved further downstream

It was getting late and the sun was now high in the sky. I was pretty happy with the outcome of the morning and the fact that I managed to figure things out and land a few decent trout. I started to wade a bit more quickly down river towards the next exit point, still drifting my fly through some of the better looking water. That’s when this good looking brown trout gulped up my Humpy:

A nice brown trout caught mid day on a Red Humpy.

I caught this fish midstream in some pretty shallow riffles, full sun and no cover nearby. Needless to say, I was not expecting it! I had 6x tippet on and he got into some pretty fast water, but I managed to get him to the net to wrap up another great trip.

So, why a Red Humpy? I remember my reason for deciding to start tying and fishing it on this river many years ago. My dad’s friend PJ introduced me to the Humpy and I liked how durable the fly was and how well it floated. My theory was that since the Isonychia Bicolor (Slate/Mahogany Dun) is so common on the this river almost all season long, a Humpy tied in red around size 12 might work as a rough imitation. I can’t really say whether this is the key to its success here, but I guess it’s a theory. Or, it might simply come down confidence. Everyone has their favourite go-to fly for a particular river and for me, this is it.

The post When Matching the Hatch Fails appeared first on Caffeinated Fly Fisher.

My wife graciously agreed to let me spend way too much time on the water this past weekend, to finish off the trout season. I took Friday off work and managed to get out for three consecutive days, all of which were spent on different sections of my favourite local river. By the way, you’ll notice that I rarely mention river names or locations. This is on purpose, in an effort to avoid random lazy people from typing a couple words into Google and going away with sensitive and hard earned fishing locations. If you really want to know where I fish… well, I probably won’t tell you unless you’re family or friend  But, you’re more than welcome to ask.

Anyway, on with the report!

Friday, September 28th

Friday was supposed to be a full day of fishing, but I slept in a bit more than I would have liked and as usual, I needed to do some last-minute fly tying to top up my box. The main ties included a bunch of Red Humpy dry flies (which are always productive on this river), as well as a number of Simulators and a couple Gartside Gurglers for a bit of night fishing.

Lots of Stimulators in sizes 12-14 would be the main go-to fly during the days

Gartside Gurgler (size 6) for hopefully enticing some hungry Browns at night

I ended up leaving later Friday afternoon and headed to a favourite stretch of river, where I would wade for a few hours and eventually settle into a nice piece of water for some night fishing. This area is very picturesque to begin with, but add to it fall colours and it’s paradise. Driving up was definitely enough to put me in the mood:

Fall colours on the way to the river

The river was virtually empty, as usual. I saw one other angler at the access point and he was headed down another section than I was. I had the river basically all to myself for the remainder of the day.

I fished upstream for a few hours. The day fishing wasn’t overly productive, but it was decent. A number of small browns were caught in the 8-10 inch range. After a while, all the brown trout in this size start looking identical to each other, so I’ve basically stopped taking photos of them. I did manage to hook into a nicer (14-16″) brown that was holding in a small piece of slow moving water behind a fallen tree. It was a somewhat tricky spot to cast to with faster moving water beside and below it, but with a single drag-free cast, he slammed my Red Humpy. Unfortunately, one leap and a headshake later and my barbless hook came loose.

A nice brown was hooked and then lost in the little holding area behind this fallen tree

A couple more small fish were caught (and a couple lost) before dark began to set in. I equipped a headlamp, made my way to the spot I would settle into for a couple hours of night fishing, then waited for it to get dark enough for the big browns to come out. I was stripping Gurglers and foam mice. About an hour of fishing and I had a few mediocre splashes by some bantam weight browns – but they all either missing their target, or change their minds at the last moment. Then I changed two things:

1. Changed from a size 6 Gurgler to a size 2.
2. Started stripping faster.

The first cast that combined these two changes resulted in a tremendous take. I had him on for line for about 15 seconds, then my hook popped out… again a barbless hook, but I have a feeling I simply didn’t set the hook hard enough this time.

I thought I had the fish on long enough to spook the pool, but a couple casts later proved me wrong. I made sure to set the hook this time and it seemed like I was in for a good fight. This was a much bigger fish than the last one, likely 20″+. Unfortunately, my clumsiness would be my downfall yet again. I had too much line out and as I fumbled around in the dark trying to get the line out from under my feet and onto my reel, he leapt with a fierce head shake and snapped off my 4x tippet

Again, I quickly learned from my mistakes and decided to make two final changes:

1. Changed from 4x tippet to 3x flourocarbon tippet: These big trout, in this light, are obviously not too picky about tippet size, or fly size for that matter. In fact, I’m sure I could get away with 2x.
2. Made sure not to trim my knots too close (I had a feeling this caused my leader to tippet knot to break).

I missed a bunch more fish that night, or more likely, they missed (or dodged) my fly. I did manage to hook into and land one good fish, though not as large as the one lost before it.

Decent brown trout landed after several botched hook-ups before it

Saturday, September 29th

On Saturday, I decided to hunt Brook Trout as my trip the week prior served to wet my appetite with some nice looking brookies in full fall colours. I managed to get out at a much more respectable time (before noon), although I would have to skip the night fishing due to some unexpected rain and lack of proper rain gear.

Fishing was unexpectedly tough and I had to really work for the fish. I don’t mind though, as time on the water is rewarding even without catching fish. In fact, I probably walked more than I fished on Saturday, deciding to venture further downstream than I ever have in the past, where there are no access points and very infrequently fished water. This part of the river is slightly smaller than the brown trout water and is also a bit prettier.

Narrow stretch of brookie water

Brookie water: a bend in the river with some nice holding areas for trout

In total just a handful of fish were caught, mostly on Stimulators and a few on an Isonychia nymph – most were in the 7-8″ range. I actually experimented with a size 6 Gurgler for a couple minutes just before leaving… it was still light out and I had absolutely no expectation for it to work, especially on this brook trout water where the average fish size is much smaller. I was shocked however when a nice brookie slashed at my Gurgler only a few casts in! Not sure exactly how big it was, but by the size of the splash and sound it made, I’m guessing it was well over 12″. Fish missing this fly seems to be an extremely common occurrence, that’s for sure…

Several Brook Trout like this in the 8″ range were caught Saturday

Another brookie: small, but always fun on a light rod

Sunday, September 30th

Truthfully, I wasn’t supposed to fish on Sunday. My wife had planned to go to a cooking show in Toronto and I was staying home to spend some well deserved time with the kids. I was completely fine with this, especially since I was able to put in so many hours the previous two days and the forecast was originally showing rain Sunday.

The plan was for my wife to be gone most of the day – coming home at dinner time or later. So, I was surprised when she opened the door at 3:00 pm, which was much earlier than we had expected her back. At this point I had spent several hours with the kids and was feeling a little less guilty about my fishing the previous two days, so I got the idea in my head that I might get a chance to sneak out for one final try at evening fishing. Surprisingly, my amazingly understanding wife was OK with this.

Even better, the weatherman lied, again… it was sunny with a few clouds all day. Although I had clearance to leave, I wasn’t in much of a rush and decided to spend 2.5 more hours at home with the kids. Finally, when playtime was done and everyone was heading inside for the night, I left for a few more hours of alone time on my favourite river.

Last wade down the river for 2012

By the time I arrived, suited up and walked in, it was about 6:30 pm – so I had under 1 hour before dark. Needless to say, I spent only a short amount of time casting some dry flies in some runs and riffles, where I had a few rises from some browns. But it was the night fishing I was really here for – I felt like I had finally put the pieces together Friday night and was ready to land some big browns.

While the theme of fish slashing at my fly and missing definitely kept up, I managed to lose a single fish and land two others that I hooked into. They were both caught on a size 2 Gurgler and one of the fish was most likely my largest Brown to date. I haven’t figured out exactly how big he was yet, but it should be easy when I get around to it since I have a shot of him next to my fly rod. He was definitely over 20″ and in fact, he was much too big for my net, so I had to land him by hand.

A respectable smaller brown trout landed Sunday night.

Big brown trout: last fish of trout season 2012 and probably my new record trout!

Releasing the big fish of the night.

2012 definitely went out on a positive note and left me itching for 2013, which is 7 long months away… One last shot of the hero Gurgler that took so much abuse over the last few days and lived to tell the tale.

The hero Gurgler that was chewed on by many a trout this past weekend

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