I hate caddis pupas!

Fished the midsection of the WB, hoping to avoid the crowds and be one of the first ones in on the "bust out Hendrickson day", (It wasn't).  There were paraleps hatching in good numbers at 2:00 and they were joined around 3:00 by a mediocre Hendrickson hatch and a testy wind. Caught the only riser I saw and was in the car heading elsewhere at 3:30.

Got fooled at Buckingham when I only saw one angler in the water.  Walked down stream and when I was almost to where I planned to fish two fishermen stood up and started fishing.  One was an old river friend and we had a nice chat while the wind blew and the fish refused to rise.

Probably about 5:00 (I don't wear a watch) the apple caddis, Hendricksons and trout started going.  It was easily the most feeding fish I've seen on the river all season.  How'd I do?  Not well.  When the water is at 3300 cfs a 300 cfs "bump" doesn't seem like much but to a wade fisherman it's HUGE.  Couldn't reach most of the rising fish and even if I could it probably wouldn't have mattered.  Why?  Caddis pupa.  They were taking subsurface.  Not looking up.  The one fish I saw eat a Hendrickson dun also ate mine and by the looks of his mouth he had also eaten every other one that had floated by (with or without a hook).

The water is warming, the fish are eating and perhaps someday soon it'll all come together.  Most years the Hendricksons are in the upper reaches of both branches by this time and by the 15th it's over.

 Go and try your best, I've talked to a lot of good Delaware River fishermen (self included) who aren't averaging a fish a day right now!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Had To Get Out The Neosporin For The Tooth Cuts On My Index Finger.

  To say the Delaware  is a hard river to figure is an understatement. Yesterday was an overcast day that had fishermen thinking olives. Turned out the water was probably too warm for olives and too cold for sulfurs, in short, a dud. Today the air temp was a little cooler, (I think), with a mix of sun and clouds and the sulfurs, (both yesterdays and todays), hatched. The fish? At least where I was, went nuts, threw caution to the wind, and ate everything that came down their feeding lane, both with and without hooks. Heard from two sources that the sulfur hatch at the red barn was also very good today. If my last report on the red barn sulfurs was erroneous, blame it on Ed who has been in Hawaii for the last two weeks, (hence no reliable red barn reports). The fishing mid-day was so good, and the number of fishermen in the "Zone", (it's Friday afternoon), so high, that I decided to fish down river during the evening hours. Fished a pool in the middle section from 6:30 unt...
Read more

Fishing A Cold Blow From Out Of The North.

  Jean came down and we spent the weekend watching wildlife in the backyard, driving around the area and enjoying two "nights out", one with David and Maryann, (the apprentice Troutfitter Inn cleaning lady). A shout out of thanks to her for spending four hours on the road to have dinner with us. Not sure the company or the meal was worth the drive. We drove up to Stilesville to witness the hordes of anglers, and then along the reservoir all the way up to Walton, where we usually stop and go in some of the shops. It was threatening to rain so we elected to keep going. It was raining on top of the mountains but we took route 206?? to Downsville anyway. We hit the rain part way up the mountain and then drove down the other side to Downsville in a torrential down pour. Came out of the rain at Downsville and drove down route 30 with the intention of checking  out the trout in some of the BK's thermal refuges, saw the muddy water at "Jaws" and drove back to the Lordvi...
Read more

Don't let that that rain come down.

 My South Holston river friend, (one of only two people who will fish with me), (the other is currently on injured reserve), is up for a visit (he brought his boat) and today we floated. There might have been some question about where we chose to float (no one else launched where we did), but we enjoyed the fact that we never saw another fisherman, let alone another boat, on the river all day. The weatherman might well have gilded the lily a bit when he predicted a chance of showers and a high temp of sixty degrees. It rained all day, and the temperature peaked at fifty three degrees. When I read the forecast for the rest of Mark's stay (rain for the next four days) I was thankful that we got in the day that we did today.  How was our day? We sucked it up, paid an extra $5.00 to launch (didn't have the proper change), parked in the wrong place (got a note from the owner where we put in), never made it to the predetermined takeout place, and had a delightful day counting bugs (...
Read more