Angler 119's Delaware River Fishing Report

Yesterday the release from Cannonsville Reservoir was bumped up to almost 1000 CFS before being lowered to 700. Why? The river has been below the minimum flow requirement at the Montague monitoring station for the past few days and apparently the river master has called for the release increase to meet the minimum flow requirement. There has been no power generation from Wallenpaupack during that period and I don't know if they have maxed out their drawdown or if the shutdown is short term in nature. In any event you can expect increased turbidity in the WB and BR during periods of high release. You should be mindful (if wading) that water levels can change without warning. Streamers are often effective in the colored water but I have had fish come up and refuse my dry fly when the water was so muddy I couldn't see my feet.

Some regular readers who know that I usually fish Monday through Friday are probably wondering what happened to Fridays report. Well, here it is. Drove back to Syracuse for an oil change, new tires and my annual physical. The bad wheel alignment that chewed up my tires will be corrected early tomorrow. My wife is fleeing Florida ahead of the storm and I will be picking her up at the airport just before the SU / Liberty football game. Will possibly return To "The Lordville Estate" in time to throw a few flies at BR fish on Sunday night. In my spare time I had a chance to add up the catch totals for August. In number of fish caught it was my sixth best out of my 28 years of record keeping. It was the third best August in the number of rainbows caught, while the number of browns was down quite a bit. Contrary to the usual decline in numbers of big browns that show up in the August catch, the percentage of browns over 17 inches was one of the highest in the years I have kept re...

Did you ever hit Delete instead of Backspace? Just did and the whole G.D. four paragraphs disappeared. With my perfect Manhattan gone, I'm in no mood to try to recreate my day of driving around the river system. Sorry but if someone can tell me how to find it, I will be glad to publish it. Paragraph 4: It's now 6:30, I've eaten a sandwich, watered the newly planted grass and am heading out to fish the Big River. On a bright sunny day fishing the BR before the sun sinks below the hill is insanity. The fish just aren't there. Get your gear in order, check your leader for knots, clean your line, tie on a new tippet and your very best fly. When it starts to happen there is no way to stop the clock, no time outs or commercial breaks. You have an hour and small change to make or break your day. Tonight there were a few isos, some yellow sallies, lots of olives, swarms of midges and spinners of all sizes on the water that, since the last trico spinner fell this morning, h...

Fresh from the success of yesterday's "perfectly planned" day, I had no doubt, looking at the weather forecast, that I could do it again. "Overcast with afternoon and evening showers" the weatherman said. The day screamed olives and isos. If water conditions (temp and flow) permit, there is only one place for me to to be on this kind of day. The Big River. Left camp at 3:15 (after a short snooze) and drove up the PA side. No bugs whatsoever at Buckingham. Stopped at Shehawken for a look see and ended up talking to Tom, an engaging gentleman who was taking out after fishing down from West Branch Anglers. He had seen no olives or isos and very few rising fish. After hearing his report I turned around and headed back down to Stockport where only the green Kia was parked. The owner is a retired, avid fly fisherman who fishes almost as much as I do. Stockport is his favorite "spot" but there is lots of room there and he usually walks way down sometimes t...

Today went according to Monday's plan. Worked on the topsoil pile from 9:00 until 11:55. Had lunch, tied flies and left for the UE sulfur hatch. It was quiet when I got there but within half an hour the bugs started coming and the fish started feeding in earnest. Had multiple targets to choose from on every cast but it proved difficult to pick out the dumb ones (there aren't any). Got a big open mouth refusal from a big fish who sits on the far side of the river just on the edge of the current gulping sulfur duns (the ones without hooks in them). Managed to fool half a dozen two year olds that in the UE are a full two inches shorter than their WB cousins. At 5:00 with the hatch still going strong, I left. And (remember the plan) headed for the BR for the iso hatch. The BR had fishermen but nothing like last night. Had a quarter mile of river to myself. The isos may have started earlier (it was overcast and cool) because it seemed they were over earlier than last night. Rose s...

Had the best of intentions when planning the day. With the morning temp at 50 degrees, I would work on seperating my pile of gravel and topsoil, mow the grass and water the newly seeded areas before lunch. After lunch, I would to try to hook up with the UE sulfur hatch which had the fish up and feeding last week. When the sulfurs quieted down I'd head for the BR iso hatch. Well, everything went as planned until I came in for lunch and it was already 1:45. Then things seemed to get in the way. Forgot I had to replace chewed up isos, olives, spinners and sulfurs. By the time I had redampened the newly seeded part of the lawn the sulfur hatch trip had been rescheduled for Tuesday. Did a crossword and a sudoku and yes, maybe dozed off for a bit and low it was 5:15. Headed up the PA side of the BR with the intention of fishing Stockport. Five cars and a boat trailer parked there changed my mind. Stopped at Junction Pool (three cars) and looked downstream at the tailout riff, no on...

With my wife down in Florida visiting our daughter and granddaughter I hustled through my to do list back home and got back to the camp in time to spend the evening scouting out a couple of pools on the big river down near the camp. One had a few fish but is overlooked by a house in which a fisherman resides. He has made the fish difficult to catch. They look at every fly with their bifocals before eating. The second pool is one of my favorites. Couldn't fish it during the bug hatches this spring because of the high water. If there are any trout in it at present they sure didn't let me see them. Did hook two smallmouths. The second of which ate late in the evening, jumped and fooled me into thinking he was a trout. In the last three days the water temps have dropped to comfortable fishing levels on all of the streams, BUT, if the fish have moved at all it's not very far. Wait for the first good rain that significantly raises the rivel levels before looking for fish ...